Bespoke desktop applications training programmes

Learn only what you need to know

Complex, feature-rich, powerful – the only way you can describe today’s highly evolved desktop applications. To master each and every feature of these applications will certainly take quite some time – so how do you go about creating a successful learning programme, when time out of the office is a significant direct cost? The answer is to only ‘teach that which needs to be learned’ – in other words, create a course that contains only topics that people need to know.

This might seem like an impossible task, but actually most of us only use a fraction of the power of the applications on our desktop. The actual features used typically fall into three camps:

• Core features that everyone uses.
• Mainstream features that many people use.
• More specialist features that are used dependent on job role/task.

Developing bespoke desktop applications training programmes

The solution, then, is to develop a training programme which is focused on the specific needs of your computer users. Some of what they need to learn will be common to all users of that application and some will be specific to their role. Many features won’t need to be learnt in depth, but just touched upon so that people know they exist. In this way, the time needed to learn the desktop application drops significantly from a few days, to just a few hours. This also makes learning more focused – because we’re not switching people off by trying to teach them things which aren’t relevant to them.

Blended learning – another twist

But bespoke learning programmes can be made more engaging still – by combining different learning methods into a single, seamless training programme. An example would be to start the process with a lecture (for orientation), then provide a short classroom session (to learn the key topics) backed up with at-desk training and support (to help with specific “how do I?” queries).