In Real Life: Less Friction = Better Learning

I go to Disney World every year for the Fourthof July. That may sound super luxurious—until you realize that I live inOrlando. Actually, I live just half a mile behind Cinderella Castle. The WaltDisney World Resort is my literal backyard. Fireworks explode outside my windowevery night at 10pm. It’s really cool … until you want to go to sleep early(Figure 1). 

Figure 1: I’mthe one in the third row who is VERY excited to let it go

I spend a lot of my free time in the themeparks. Having worked there for 10 years, I tend to pay more attention to thedetails than most guests. Once you know how the sausage is made (or in thiscase the turkey legs), you can’t look at things the same way. For the past fewyears, I’ve been fascinated by Disney’s growing ability to blend technology anddata with physical environments and guest service to create increasinglyimmersive experiences. The goal is clear: reduce the friction in the guestexperience. Reduced friction can lead to a pile of positive business results:

 

• Improved guest satisfaction
• More time spent in the parks
• More food and merchandisepurchases
• Positive word of mouth
• Plenty of return visits

 

Here are just a few ways Disney technologyimproved my visit to Epcot on July 4.

 

• Wished a magical day by name bythe parking attendant (after tapping my magic band).
• Walked right into the park with nowait at the front gate, where another Cast Member greeted me by name (again,the magic band).
• Had awesome meals in Italy andMorocco (pre-booked reservations via the park app).
• Rode Frozen Ever After, one of themost popular attractions in the park with no wait (pre-scheduled FastPass).
• Downloaded my Frozen photo laterthat evening (system tracked my presence and automatically pushed the photo tomy account).
• Saved from an unnecessary walkacross the park when I received an email notification that my next attractionwas experiencing technical difficulties (automatically received a FastPass toride it later in the day).

 

Technology all but eliminated the frictionthat typically occurs during a theme park visit and helped me use my time moreeffectively. It couldn’t stop the Florida rain (yet), but overall I had anawesome, fun-filled day.

Removing frictionfrom the customer experience is a common discussion point in most industries,from hospitality to retail to technology. Disney happens to be VERY good at it.However, I don’t hear nearly as much conversation about a frictionless workplace experience,especially as related to L&D. We talk a lot about content and technology.But what about the underlying experience? In real life, howdifficult is it for employees to get the help they need when andwhere they need it? In most organizations, it’s WAY too difficult. Justconsider …

 

• How many emails do you have tosend to get an answer to a basic question?
• How many clicks does it take toplay a video in your LMS?
• In how many potential places couldthe information you need be stored?
• How much quality information islocked inside of 30-minute, one-and-done, click-next-to-continue eLearningmodules?

 

L&D does not control the entire employeeexperience. But we do play a critical, ongoing role in people’s ability to dotheir jobs. If the last 15 years have shown us anything, it’s that content andtechnology alone do not get the job done. Rather than just make more stuff, wemust get closer to the day-to-day of the people we support and shape ourexperience around their reality. The new focus of L&D should be on connections and channels. How can we better connect the people who NEED with thepeople who KNOW? And how can we reduce the friction—wasted time, frustration,guessing, negative outcomes—along the way?

To reduce friction during my Epcot visit,Disney employed technology to help me find the right experience at the righttime. Doing the same for employees in the workplace requires a similar focus onfour factors: experience, channel, time, and person.

RightExperience

This is where the course fails. The right learning experience is not always astructured course. In fact, it’s almost never a structured course. To reducelearning friction and get people the help they need quickly, L&D must breakout of the course mentality andexpand its toolkit to includea variety of tactics that can be flexibly applied in the workplace.This is the basic idea behind my layered approach to learning.Solving any performance problem should start with curating on-demand,quick-access information. You then build on top of this foundation of sharedknowledge—adding structured experiences only as a last resort. Yes, sometimescourses will be needed. But why build a course when a well-written article willdo the trick?

RightChannel

You may have great content, but how doessomeone find it? You may have brilliant subject matter experts (SMEs), but howdoes an employee contact them when needed? This is where a considerable amountof friction arises in the workplace learning experience. While mostorganizations have plenty of technology, they lack in purpose and clarityaround how to use these tools. For example, your employees may have access toemail, the company portal, SharePoint, the LMS, shared drives, etc. What goeswhere and why? This is where a curator can make a huge differencein reducing friction by protecting the user experience and establishingpurposeful channels. Rather than endlessly hunting for a single tool that canhandle every possible need (it doesn’t exist), L&D can help define thevalue, and drive consistent application of the organization’s full toolset.After all, you have more than one app on your smartphone, right?

RightTime

Who knows when it’s the right time to learnsomething new? Who knows when a problem is afoot? The employee! Therefore, toreduce friction, L&D must make resources—whether content or SMEs—easy tofind at the moment of need. However, “right time” isn’t just a pull concept. Anemployee won’t always see their own performance gaps or know how to best focustheir effort. Sure, some may have exceptional awareness and thrive in aself-directed learning environment. But others may struggle with misdirectedautonomy. This is where people-analytics will play a critical role inproactively identifying problems and pushing the right support, whether it bemanager coaching or recommended content, at the right time—before bad thingshappen.

RightPerson

This is the never-ending struggle forworkplace learning professionals. With our limited resources, should we providegeneric training for everyone or specific support to just a few? Scale almostalways wins out over personalization. Disney has confronted this challenge too.Tens of thousands of guests visit a theme park every day. How can each personpossibly have a unique experience? And yet multiple cast members called me byname at Epcot on July 4. I received a personal photo after riding Frozen. Andon some attractions, the experience actually changes even more based on mypresence. Solving this problem is what sets Disney apart in a crowdedentertainment marketplace. It will also be what reestablishes the value ofL&D in the modern workplace. And, just like at Disney World, the powercomes from the meaningful combination of data, technology, and people (aka adaptive learning).

Regardless of your role or industry, everyL&D professional must begin to explore ways they can reduce workplacefriction and ensure the right experience is provided to the right person at theright time via the right channel.

Technology and data are now fundamental pillars of theWalt Disney World Resort experience for the average guest. When they work andthe friction is eliminated, a guest doesn’t even know it happened. The sameshould be true for the employees we support. They don’t always need to know thedetails or who does what behind the scenes. But, if we do our jobs correctly, havinga better learning experience at work should be easier than visiting a themepark on the Fourth of July.