A while back I did something quite unusual. I completed a self-study e-learning programme, as a student, not as a consultant running their eye over someone else's work. Some time later, having had the chance to reflect on the experience, I can't resist making a few comments. I'm not going to tell you what the programme was or who it was made by. but I will say it was a compulsory piece of training, completion of which was required if I was to be able to go ahead with some work with a client. Contrary to the nature of much compliance training, the subject in this case was inherently interesting and gave an insight into the lives of people who work in much more hazardous environments than south east England (which, in case you were wondering, explains the picture). All in all it was competently produced and lively in its presentation. At this point you're expecting a 'but' and I don't intend to disappoint.

There were some relatively minor annoyances:

• The on-screen text was mirrored by audio narration you couldn't turn off. As I could read much faster than it took to listen to the narration, the two were always out of synch and I had to resort to turning the sound down on the computer.
• There was no clear indication of what was really important to remember and what was nice to know.
• There was far more information than any human being could possibly hope to absorb; much of this would have been better presented as auxiliary reading materials.
• The assessment tested what was easy to assess rather than what was really important.
• The scoring of multi-answer questions was far too harsh - if you missed one option from a 'which of the following ...' question, you scored nothing.

Compliance changes everything

My main concern is the effect that compulsion has on the learning process. In fact, it's clear to me now that compliance changes everything. Knowing that I had not only to complete this course but pass an assessment to demonstrate the fact, made all the difference to me. The content itself took a back seat, because I became fixated with picking out the key points that I thought would be tested, skipping through any material that I suspected was superfluous, and getting on to the assessment as fast as possible before the material had evaporated from my mind. I achieved this. True, I missed the 80% pass rate by 3% the first time, but I noted down the answers to the questions I got wrong and simply took it again. No problem second time. Job done. Material already largely forgotten. Move on.

Except this material was important - indeed it could easily have been life-saving - and it was fascinating. I would have enjoyed exploring it in detail and probably would have done so if the end objective had been my competence (or at very least enhanced awareness) rather than simple compliance. It seems you can't effectively combine the two, at least not when compliance takes the leading role.

Compliance is such an ugly word

All this has got me thinking again about the whole nature of compliance training and what an ugly word 'compliance' is. Here's how Dictionary.com defined it:

• the act of conforming, acquiescing, or yielding
• a tendency to yield readily to others, especially in a weak and subservient way
• conformity; accordance: in compliance with orders
• cooperation or obedience

These sound like rather derogatory concepts to me. Who wants to be yielding, acquiescing, compliant, obedient? And what self-respecting learning professional wants to induce these characteristics in others?

Why compliance is killing e-learning

E-learning producers are in a difficult position, because a great deal of their work comes in the form of compliance training (according to Charles Jennings, 80% of all e-learning produced in Australia is to meet compliance needs). But in the long run they must surely feel the effects of a poor user experience:

1. Employees hate doing compliance training
2. As a result, trainers hate training it
3. The answer, then, is to use e-learning instead
4. With the result that now learners hate e-learning

Sorting out this problem may, in the end, determine whether formal, self-study e-learning, at least in a corporate context, continues to exist.

When compliance is not enough

Some time ago, Tom Kuhlmann posted about Those Pesky Compliance Courses, making the point that these aren't usually performance based and therefore a 'course' is probably not what's really required; he recommends keeping them simple, putting a test up front so those who already know the rules can exempt themselves from the body of the material, and un-locking all the navigation, so no-one's forced to sit through something they don't need.

All good advice, but only assuming the whole process is just one of getting boxes ticked to satisfy an external regulator. If the material is really not relevant, then it makes sense to make the box-ticking exercise as painless as possible, like renewing your passport or some similar administrative chore.

Now I'm not going to pretend that I'm an expert on compliance courses. I've never had much to do with designing them and, as someone who hasn't been an employee for 30 years, I have only occasional cause to take one. It's just that, when I have been required to undertake a mandatory course, typically as a consequence of some client engagement, it has seemed pretty important to me; important because my behaviour really could put me or my client at risk. If I just bluffed my way through a quiz or flipped across a few screens, I wouldn't be sensitised, because I would not have been emotionally engaged (except, I must admit, in the challenge of passing the quiz).

When the risks are small in terms of probability but serious in terms of consequence, mere compliance may be enough to get the boxes ticked, but wouldn't reduce the risk and surely that matters. When you look at the subjects of most compliance courses, then they do seem to be quite important:

• Stopping money laundering
• Avoiding mis-selling
• Promoting health
• Reducing accidents
• Promoting inclusion and equal opportunities
• Keeping confidential data safe

See what I mean?

A formula for changing behaviour

So, if mere compliance is not enough, and you really need employees to take note, what would I recommend? Well, first of all, I'd need answers to some important questions:

• What do we want employees to do that they may not be doing now, if the organisation is to achieve its goals?
• What must (note the emphasis) employees know if they are to do these things?
• What big ideas/principles do they need to understand and buy into in order to do these things?
• What skills, if any, do they need to acquire and/or put into practice in order to do these things?
• Over and above knowledge and skills, what else needs to be in place in the work environment if performance is going to change?

The answers to the questions above will obviously determine the shape of the solution. However, more often than not I would expect to see many of the following elements in the solution:

• A resource, probably a video, which ramps up the level of emotional engagement. Using a documentary approach, I would interview real people who have been in real situations of risk related to the area of compliance. Statistics are not enough - we are much more likely to engage with the stories of real people. The important principle to get across here is that non-compliance really matters - it could threaten your employer's future and your own.
• A diagnostic assessment which determines how much of the programme you need to take - none, some or all. This assessment would comprise of a series of mini-scenarios (the portrayal of a situation, followed by one or more 'what would you do?' questions) rather than a knowledge test.
• For novices, a clear and concise exposition of the absolute essentials of the policy, backed up with examples and rationales. Probably best if this is easily accessible and printable, so not a piece of e-learning.
• A series of more in-depth scenarios tackling ever more challenging but realistic situations, ideally directly relevant to your particular job role. An element of gamification here might add something.
• Resources which support the scenarios with in-depth explanations. These can take the form of web articles, videos, PDFs or whatever is necessary. The idea is that you will go to these to fill any gaps in your knowledge brought out by the scenarios.
• A final assessment, again based on mini-scenarios, and ideally drawn from a large pool to reduce the risk of cheating. To avoid users guessing, I'd include the option 'I don't know' in every question. This would score zero points, whereas wrong answers would score minus points, making a guess a risky response.
• To follow-up, I'd provide a forum where you could ask experts for answers to really tricky questions not covered in the programme.
• I'd also keep up a steady flow of new stories and reminders by email, on the intranet or any social platform.
• And I'd try and make sure that compliance was not only modelled by managers but backed up by the performance management system.

Compliance or competence, you choose

There are two ways of looking at compulsory and regulatory training:

1. You can regard it as a simple box-ticking exercise in which employers and employees go through the motions of delivering and receiving training, in order to satisfy regulators and insurers that the job is being done.
2. You aim to bring about a shift in behaviour such that infringements are very unlikely to occur, because employees believe in the policy and have the necessary knowledge and skill to put it into practice.

Option 1 is based on the assumptions that infringements are unlikely, the regulations are a nuisance and that compliance is a necessary evil. Option 2 is founded on the principles that infringements can and do happen, that the regulations are rightly in place to prevent harm to third parties, and that policies are not enough - delivering on these policies requires competence. Quite a difference.

Unlike those employees who undertake this sort of training, you do have a choice. Use it wisely.