Does your company management get excited about “best practices”? In theory, as all of the organization’s employees work at their jobs, some of them are bound to discover better ways of doing things. A smart organization will have a way to detect these better ideas and spread them throughout the organization.

This energizes executives. They see a continually improving organization, one in which the next boost in the productivity of one department or job function may come from another branch thousands of miles away, or from an entirely different department.

Unfortunately, many companies don’t apply best practices to collecting and spreading best practices! They botch the job again and again, alienating everyone who is supposed to apply the best practices along the way.

It’s easy to tell when that’s happening. When management announces training, or new policies, on a recently discovered “best practice,” do employees groan and start thinking about how to waste as little time as possible on this latest fad?

Are the front lines receptive, ready for an injection of ideas and new energy that will contribute to the company’s success? Or are they resistant, making your latest “best practices” initiative just one more energy drain, one more distraction from their “real” jobs?

If “best practices” don’t get much of a reception in your organization, don’t blame the employees! It’s more likely the system for transferring best practices from one region or department to others is not working very well.

And that’s probably because you forgot the basics:

1. You didn’t really start with a best practice! Maybe good initial results within one region aren’t really due to the new practice, and won’t hold up. If you rush to judgment based on early, incomplete data, you’ll have everybody else adopting the new practice just about the time you discover that it doesn’t work.

2. You tend to get all your great ideas from just a few regions or divisions. The rest of the company gets tired of always implementing suggestions from the favored few, and they’ll automatically resist the next ideas that they know come from your favorite market, department, or vice-president!

3. You were too optimistic about how widely you could extend the practice. Sometimes the principles that work well in one division or region don’t work in another. You need to seriously examine the “local” conditions of a given region or department before you assume the new practice can be productive there.

4. You turned a “bottom up” approach into a highly authoritarian “top down” approach. Management churns out “best practice” orders without attempting to get any buy-in from the employees who will apply them. And sometimes they “improve” the original practices to the point where they don’t even work in the region or department that invented them in the first place!

5. You didn’t make careful, well-designed employee communications the centerpiece of your efforts to spread the best practice. The biggest reason that best practices don’t take root is poor communication. You expected employees to embrace the idea without proper positioning, explanation, and follow through. You didn’t sell the ideas, and present the rewards and benefits that the new practices would bring to the employees (not just to the company).

There is a cure for most of these problems: patience. Few of these newly discovered best practices are so remarkable that they will transform your organization’s fortunes overnight. You can afford the time to thoroughly understand these practices, truly measure how well they work, and to communicate them effectively to other employees.

Best practices can contribute to your success — but only if you apply the best possible practices for collecting, communicating, and nurturing them throughout your company.

(c) copyright 2007 Will Kenny

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Success in a face-to-face environment does not always transfer to the elements needed for success in an online course; however, teaching online can be as rewarding as teaching in person. By including a variety of interactive strategies and maintaining communication, instructors can create a learning environment that encourages students to learn and to explore. The following tips include the key elements for success in teaching and learning in an online course.

The first week of an online course is very important for both the instructor and the learners regardless of the subject area, program, or level. Clarity is required because the students many not know how to utilize all the online course functions and features, or may be nervous if they have never taken an online class before. Be sure to be very clear on class policies, such as when and how to submit assignments. Some strategies that help the students feel less isolated are including a welcome page or email before the class starts and then having the students introduce each other can help guide how the rest of the class will run as students make connections to their classmates.

Including a general area to discuss things unrelated to a class such as weather, travel, pets is suggested so as to maintain a social connectiion that is often missing in online courses. It is also very important to clearly outline the rules of netiquette. Let the students know how you want them to frame communications and the tone that is comfortable to all class members. Have a clear organizational structure. For example, the syllabus should be very clearly outlined with dates and deadlines.

When facilitating the class, keep learners actively engaged in thinking about the course content through a variety of strategies such as active participation. For example, you can post thought-provoking questions that do not have direct answers and lend themselves to prompting even more questions and debate.

Make use of online resources that students can easily access. For example they can virtually access electronic articles in the library or repository. With the power of hyperlinks, this is quite doable. However, be sure to check your links each time you teach the course and several times during the course as these may change depending on the hosting service.

Plan interactive assignments that require students to work in teams to problem-solve. For instance, provide them with case studies that they can discuss in chatrooms and discussion boards and have them take turn being responsible for different tasks such as recorder or moderator. Organization is important – make it intuitive where and how to locate course content. Don’t switch out things to often and let them have multiple ways of accessing the information.

Use student-centered techniques. You can empower students by having them be responsible for summarizing the week’s discussion, being in charge of a discussion, or writing weekly reflections. This approach will empower them and save you time. Create activities where the students can integrate new ideas with existing knowledge, and provide them a frame of reference within the online environment.

Do not let the technology drive the instruction! Try to strike a balance between technology and content. Remember that good courses use the best aspects of multimedia but that do not leave the technology to do the teaching. You want the students to learn and use the technology but not at the expense of the course content.

Most important, be there for them! Remember they could be miles away and feeling isolated. Respond to requests as soon as possible and provide detailed feedback. Patience, availability, and accessibility will keep you connected to the students.

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