Designing technology-based performance support

Abstract

Instead of struggling to train your corporate staff to use your mission-critical applications, why not have the application help teach the users to perform their jobs? (Foster, 1997) This quote from Ed Foster nicely captures the heart of the issue of on-the job performance support versus training. Ultimately, organizations seek meaningful performance from employees, with training being a means, not an end. Increasingly, these organizations are turning to tools and systems that support workers while they are doing real work to overcome the known limitations of training, including lack of transfer, forgetting, and rapidly changing workplace conditions. Performance support, particularly in technology-rich work environments, shows considerable promise for enhancing performance while reducing training time and costs. This trend has major implications for professionals engaged in conventional forms of training development. Below I discuss several questions commonly asked about technology-based performance support. I have chosen to use the term Electronic Performance Support Systems (EPSS) throughout this article, since that term has gained some popularity in the literature and is inclusive of a variety of forms of technology-based performance support. The article concludes with some general observations about areas of needed research and development and suggests implications of EPSSs for training developers and for the groups developing competency standards for instructional designers.

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