Training Courses Development

Summary: The training course design and development process describes the way by which the training courses are created, designed, developed, evaluated, and maintained over their lifecycle. Roles, responsibilities, are defined, as well as preservation of the material and security.

TCDD: Training Courses Design & Development Process
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Introduction

This process was created to explain how the training courses offered to participants should be developed. It is our final intention to achieve the highest level of excellence in the development of quality content appreciated, free of errors, that fully meet the objectives valued by the attendees.

Scope

This process applies to all training courses that are developed to be delivered through WiseCourses Academy.

Overview

It then describes the process to be used during the design, development, review, approval, correction, improvement of the course, so that it can be used in a training event.

It can be a course already developed previously, or a completely new course to be developed. Furthermore, it can be a course owned by WisePlant or third parties, as in the case of official ISA courses.

1. Objectives
2. Authorship
3. Identification
4. Write SMART goals
5. Development of contents
6. Development of the evaluation
7. Get feedback
8. Pilot test
9. Publish and distribute
10. Syllabus

Objectives

A list of objectives should be developed, a list of benefits, results, capabilities, and expectations that the participant acquires or should acquire or incorporate at the end of the course satisfactorily. There must be a clear connection between the expectation and the result at the time of completion of the course, seeking to avoid problems of interpretation or satisfaction of the participant.

Authorship

Responsibility for the development of the course must be established and determined. Those responsible for development and roles should be appointed.

In case it is a course 100% owned by WisePlant Group LLC, surely the responsibility for the development will be internal or subcontracted personnel.

In case the intellectual property of the course is shared, internal WisePlant staff and external personnel will be appointed. External staff may be appointed by an organization or independent professionals who share the intellectual property and authorship of the course.

In case the course is 100% owned by a third party, the responsibility will be of a completely external team. WisePlant staff should have the possibility to issue evaluations, comments, and observations to the author. The author must have an improvement program and certification processes like or equal to WisePlant that is ANSI/IACET certified.

This point is of substantial importance to take care of the property rights of the author or proceed with the registration of intellectual property as appropriate to each case.

We identified the following possibilities.

• 100% WisePlant Group LLC.
• Shared between WisePlant with another organization or professional.
• 100% External. WisePlant Group LLC develops under license or agreement.

If the course in question is from an existing third party, with shared responsibility, it will be necessary to evaluate its contents, objectives, development, material, previous experiences and determine the GAP between the current version and the updated version to be produced for use.

Regardless of the state of progress and development of the course, it must undergo the complete design and development process described in this procedure.

This should be done based on the items in the previous point. It may turn out that there is much to be done, or that there is little to be done with existing material.

Identification

For the identification of the courses, we use the following convention:

PPCC. LL.VRR. M – TITLE

• PP: two-digit code that identifies the program to which the course belongs.
• CC: two-digit code that identifies the course in question.
• LL: two-digit code that identifies the language used. Example: EN – English, SP – Spanish, PT – Portuguese, or other.
• V: Identification of the version of the course.
• RR: identification of the course review.
• M: modality of the course.
• TITLE: Course title.

The course code must be clearly visible on all information and communication elements, such as brochures, website, calendar, etc. The version and revision of the course being used must always be clear.

Each course should have a code that identifies it, its title for quick reference, and a clear description that summarizes the objectives. It can contain a short or extensive introduction, depending on needs and use.

SMART Objectives

At this stage, it is necessary to develop the objectives set at the beginning of the creation process.

Specific. The participant should know what he will learn or be able to do after completing the training course. Requirements must be included.

Measurable. Participants will leverage this knowledge consistently for each report. Results must be measurable after the training event ends. This is important for both the participant and the instructor, and for the organization.

Attainable. The participant will be able to perform the tasks that he or she is expected to perform.

Relevant. The content will focus on knowledge and skills essential to the job.

Duration. The participant will be able to complete it in a timely manner.

Content Development

Course content (index). It must clearly describe all the contents to be developed by the project team, and these must be generated in a controlled manner, safely and with the appropriate tools.

Course structure. Whether organized by topics, topics, domains, or other. It must be organized in a way that makes logical and adequate sense to satisfy the intended objectives.

• Course
  • Module 1
    • Lessons
    • Exercises
  • Module 2
    • Lessons
    • Exercises
  • …..
  • Module N
    • Lessons
    • Exercises
  • Final Evaluation
    • Simulation
    • Formal evaluation

Material: PPT, laboratories. Everything must match the target and index. There must be consistency from start to finish. The contents to be developed, and finally developed must support the objectives. This includes the theoretical part, practical exercises, laboratory products if necessary for the exercises, complementary reading material. It must be clearly stated that it is mandatory and that it is optional or complementary.

Depending on the modality or modalities offered of the course, different elements or even similar but different editions may have to be developed. Among them we identify the following elements that can change according to their modality:

• PowerPoint presentations
• Text, audio, or video scripts
• Practical exercises
• Laboratory infrastructure for practical exercises
• SCORM Packages
  • Online modality
  • On-demand mode (audiovisual recordings)
• Certificates
  • Assistance
  • Knowledge
  • Experience
• Supplementary material
• Commercial and marketing: brochures, data sheets, images, icons, etc.
  • Objectives
  • Proceeds
  • Sales prices, cost structure
  • Requirements for participants
  • Requirements for instructors
• Templates
  • Course Life Cycle Sheet
  • Example Syllabus for each modality
  • Results reports

The development of the training course from the initial moment may require a high effort and quantity of resources until the contents are ready to be formally provided to the participants.

We identified the next stages. Each of these versions must be recorded, analyzed, and saved as evidence of the development process.

• Alpha Draft: The course material is 75% to 80% developed.
  • LL.ALPHA
• Beta Draft: The course material is 95-98% developed.
  • LL.BETA
• Gold: it is considered that the material is developed in 99-100%
  • LL.GOLD

Evaluation of acquired knowledge

Knowledge assessment. At the end of the course, it should include a mechanism to evaluate the results achieved by each participant. There may be different evaluation methods, depending on the type of course.

Evaluation methods may vary according to the objectives and type of training. For which we will use Bloom’s Taxonomy as a reference.

Feedback of results

When the course is developed for the first time, evaluation by a group of experts in the field (SME) is required. Seek an outside opinion.

Training event survey and feedback. Partial course feedback and course satisfaction survey. All participants and the instructor should have the possibility to provide feedback from the course. These results obtainable at the end of each of the training events should be used to determine points of improvement in the contents. These points of improvement of the contents will be used for the creation of new revisions or versions of the course.

Change management, form that specifies the change or change requirement, continuous improvement.

Pilot Test

Event and pilot test training, when a course is launched for the first time, quality control. Participants should be aware that it is a new course.

Publish and distribute

Once the version or revision of a training course has been finalized and approved, the appropriate publications and distributions must be made.

The Syllabus

Specifications of everything the participant should know and do during the training event. All instructions must arrive before the course.  Dates, requirements, step by step, activities, what each of the students should do, how to send queries outside class hours, how to interact with the group of students, access to material, compulsory attendance, etc.