This is a guest blog post by one of Noddlepod’s accredited partners, Myles Runham.
A consultant with considerable experience working with digital learning services, Myles has worked in several senior positions at the BBC and Ask.com Europe (AKA Ask Jeeves), but most recently as the head of digital at the BBC Academy.
At the heart of all this work is a focus on user needs and user experience. This is also the topic of his presentation at the Learning Technologies conference on the 1st of February, so we asked him “what lessons we can take from the web in creating great learning tools and experiences?
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The most valuable approach to developing learning technology products is to focus on the needs of the user. Sounds simple? It is, yet so many people and organisations have training needs or the learning technologies themselves as their primary focus.
“Great web products have focused on the needs of the user and have answered those needs”.
That’s why I think the world of learning has a lot to learn from the development of the web. Why? Because great web products have focused on the needs of the user and have answered those needs. Think Google, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Think Pinterest, WhatsApp, WordPress and Wikipedia. These tools all seek to meet a user need or solve a user problem. They are focused on this to the exclusion of all else. That’s what we all need to do.
I will be talking about this in greater depth at a speaking session at the Learning Technologies conference in February. Right now, in this post, I will explain a bit more.
Let’s start with explaining how and why I know this, that user focus is essential when developing good learning technologies. Before arriving in L&D some seven years ago, I spent a number of years working in a variety of digital businesses. Of course, they weren’t called digital businesses back then – they were variously called internet, online and website businesses. What I gained in those years was a thorough understanding and appreciation of how digital products are made, how they are promoted and marketed and how digital content can be conceived and produced.
This world was a world of content producers, designers (of graphics, user experience and marketing), developers, salespeople, engineers, testers and commissioners. This world soon became one of agile thinking, design and lean production.
I held onto these principles of agile thinking, design and lean production, even when I moved into a new role in a new career in a new organisation. That new career was in L&D, a world were few of these principles were present. But we need those principles in L&D, we really do.
My role was to modernise and overhaul the digital objectives of my new employer. The environment was one of systems, processes, training needs analysis, learning design, LMS and a certain Kirkpatrick. It was a confusing time for me: I was surrounded by training and had much to learn.
Once I had found my feet in this new landscape, I decided it was time to apply some of my pre-training tools and techniques. Assembling a team – and that team came to bear a strong resemblance to the team of content producers, designers and so on from my previous working life – we set out to discover our users. Who do I mean when I refer to users? I mean the people who are trying to get something done with the products you are trying to create.
The decision had been made early on to focus on users, not delegates or trainees. We had been told that delegates and trainees wanted training courses, something that would result in a short voyage of discovery for us. After all, training courses were available from the trainers. After some early exploration, we also decided that learners (employees) would only be of limited help too. Learners did assist us for a while but in the end, talking with them about what they wanted, we realised that it was rarely learning. Instead, what they were almost always trying to do was “find something out or get something done”. It wasn’t about learning in its truest form.
"Talking with users about what they wanted, we realised that it was rarely learning. [It] was to “find something out or get something done”.
We discovered that what worked best for these users were tools. They needed tools that offered good content, tools that discovered good content, tools to make, share and discuss that good content and tools to find expertise and experience from their colleagues in the business and the industry. Ideally, these would be the tools of their work, not only tools of learning about their work.
This information, which was gleaned from talking with users, watching them at their work and then trying things out with them and for them, brought me back to older and more familiar terrain. What these users wanted were good web products. What we have since called online products and now call digital products.
We found that users responded best to those products that focused on their tasks and goals and allowed them 
the scope to achieve them in their own ways.
Does L&D provide this? It has to be said that the systems and processes of a training service rarely hit the mark in the digital context. The structured, linear content provided by L&D regularly fell short - and that was when it was eventually found. It was always hard to find, time consuming and frequently struck the wrong tone.
"The systems and processes of a training service rarely hit the mark in the digital context."
More latterly, L&D has sought a social dimension to its efforts. A new focus on employees’ ability to find, connect with and work with each other is producing results and increasing engagement. Noddlepod, an exemplar of this approach, works because it is a simple tool. It works because it solves a user problem; helping users find relevant resources and support from their peers at the time that they need it.
The products which best served these needs of “finding things out and getting things done” (what we might call learning) were consumer focused tools and services. They were, and still are, the tools of our everyday lives – those tools such as Google and Twitter.
As I explained earlier, those products that work well have the user at the core. This is what the world of 
learning can learn from the history of the web. There is an irreplaceable benefit to focusing on what people are trying to do and how they like to go about it. This is a much more successful approach than one that is preoccupied with what we would like people to do and how we would like them to go about it. The latter perspective can dominate the learning world, although it is changing, and there are now pockets of excellence, where the focus is on user needs.
“There is an irreplaceable benefit to focusing on what people are trying to do and how they like to go about it.”
Just look to those good digital products that are successful because they deliver what users want and need. We use those products all the time. That thinking is what we need to learn from and emulate.
If you are at the Learning Technologies Conference or if you are following the twitter back channel, I’m on at 15:30 - 16:40 on the 1st of February. The room nr & twitter handle is #T4S3. I would love to see you there!
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You can read more about Myles Runham here. You can also connect with him on Twitter or on LinkedIn.