Applying technology can improve training initiatives.

When members of your work force need to enhance their effectiveness at certain job skills – for example, selling, negotiating, running meetings, managing their time, managing their people – what do you do? The options have not fundamentally changed in a long time. Essentially, you can give them something to read, watch, or listen to; or perhaps you can send them to a class.

In recent years, technology has somewhat enhanced your options. You might be able to give them richer media than you could a few years ago, offering training videos instead of training manuals. You may be able to provide more active, participatory learning experiences with interactive simulations replacing or augmenting passive lectures. You may be able to increase access and decrease travel costs by using conferencing technologies to allow distance participation.

But while all of these technologies can play a useful role, and the business case for employing them can be compelling, they don’t address one key issue: the separation in time and place between learning and execution. Whether you are using an old-fashioned lecture or newer, richer media, you are still often stuck in what could be called the “say and pray” training paradigm, where you teach your workforce what the right thing to do is, and then you send them out into the field and pray that they do it.  

But the challenge with most job skills is about doing the right thing at the moment of truth, remembering to apply what you’ve learned while you are executing, understanding how well you’re doing, and getting specific pointers about how your actual behavior does or does not align with the target. This is the kind of input that a good coach gives an athlete. Unfortunately, in the workplace, it’s generally not feasible to give each employee a personal coach, so we give employees upfront training instead of the point-of-need coaching that they really need.

The good news is that mobile devices are now maturing to the point where they can enable a key transition – delivering learning closer to the point of need – where it will be most effective. Right now, this is happening in a rather simple way, with podcasts and interactive mobile systems making training mobile. This can, for instance, allow a field technician to brush up on the exact device he or she is going to repair that day while traveling to the repair site. And work is underway to create technology that transforms learning even more dramatically by turning the cell phone into an automated mobile coach.

A Coach in Your Pocket
Imagine a world where a device in your pocket lets you know if you are talking too much on a sales call, managing your time well or getting enough sleep. Imagine that device being used to deliver on-the-job learning at the point of need helping to develop employees by allowing them to set specific goals, then giving them objective measures of whether their behavior patterns match the goals they’ve set.

Sound like science fiction? These days, fiction is closer to reality than you think. A prototype Mobile Personal Services Platform (MPSP) makes it possible to develop applications that can transform a mobile phone into a customized personal coach. This platform has been enabled by two technological trends: the dramatic increase in the capabilities of mobile smart phones and the emergence of small, wearable sensors that can be used with these devices to provide data about a wearer’s body, behavior and physical environment. Prototype software uses these technologies to give people personalized feedback and advice on everything from nutrition to the art of conversation.

A Word in Your Ear
The first prototype coaching module is focused on making people more effective in professional conversations, such as team meetings, sales calls or negotiation sessions. Software running on the phone collects voice streams and location data. Wireless connections send the data from the participant’s phone to a server that integrates and analyzes the data, fusing information from various devices to create a meaningful picture of the conversation.

The system then matches the observed behavior against performance goals in near-real-time, and makes suggestions about how to better achieve behavioral targets. These suggestions can then be relayed to the user, either on the phone’s screen or by whispering advice into the user’s headset, depending on the user’s preferences.

The prototype also generates more detailed feedback for later review on a computer. For example, it might show that he or she was more effective in meetings held early in the day, but tended to drone on or interrupt too much in the afternoon.
 
With You When You Need It
The mobile phone has ceased to be just a phone; MPSP is part of the next wave of mobility innovation. It will exploit the mobile device to deliver a wide array of game-changing services enabled by its constant presence on your body and its growing awareness of your physical environment. This will enable companies to serve their customers better, help employees improve their professional effectiveness and allow consumers to adjust their behavior to achieve personal objectives.

It will also turn the mobile device – which has evolved into a powerful, wearable computer complete with ever-more-sophisticated wireless sensors – into a new type of service channel, personalized to the immediate context and needs. With the advent of the new generation of mobile platforms and applications, the challenge now is to explore how this can improve the way we work and live, for example, by enabling people to develop a better understanding of their own behavior and begin to improve their personal and professional effectiveness.
 
Taking Mobility Further
Where will this capability take us? We can foresee companies in a wide variety of industries exploiting the enhanced awareness of the body, behavior and physical environment afforded by these devices, and using it to help their employees and their customers improve their personal effectiveness. For example, a healthcare company might offer a service that would help someone detect if they were eating healthily, meeting exercise goals they’d set for themselves or suffering from higher blood pressure than normal, and would then make real-time suggestions to address the problem.

As technologies like MPSP mature, they will help companies improve productivity, operate more intelligently and capture new market opportunities. But perhaps their greatest impact will be at the individual level, by helping people to become more effective – whether they are trying to develop into more successful negotiators or enjoy happier, healthier lives.

Alex Kass is a researcher in Accenture's Silicon Valley Lab in San Jose, Calif. He can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it