Tag Archive for: vendors

Happened to notice these two statements printed in vendor literature at a recent conference. I’ve obscured their names just enough so I’m not obviously picking on them but they will know who they are.

Statement #1 from vendor named “C*g*i*o”

  • “We all know that up to 80% of what learners are taught in training will be lost in 30 days if there is no practice or reinforcement.”

Statement #2: from vendor named “A*ea*”

  • “We have known for more than 150 years that humans forget up to 70% of what they learn within 24 hours!”

These statements are false and misleading. To get a more accurate view of human forgetting, check out this well-researched document.

The Sad Reality of Faux or Misleading Research Citations in Vendor Literature

Buyer beware! Vendors are now utilizing confirmatory-bias methodologies to sprinkle their verbal and visual communications with research-sounding sound bites. Because we are human, this persuasion technique is likely to snare us.

We may even buy a product or service that doesn’t work.

My recommendation: Spend $500 on a research-to-practice expert to save yourself tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars, euros, pounds, etc.

 

 

You won’t believe what a vendor said about a speaker at a conference—when that speaker spoke the truth.

 

Conferences are big business in the workplace learning field.

Conferences make organizers a ton of money. That’s great because pulling off a good conference is not as easy as it looks. In addition to finding a venue and attracting people to come to your event, you also have to find speakers. Some speakers are well-known quantities, but others are unknown.

In the learning field, where we are inundated with fads, myths, and misconceptions; finding speakers who will convey the most helpful messages, and avoid harmful messages, is particularly difficult. Ideally, as attendees, we’d like to hear truth from our speakers rather than fluff and falsehoods.

On the other hand, vendors pay big money to exhibit their products and services at a conference. Their goal is connecting with attendees who are buyers or who can influence buyers. Even conferences that don’t have exhibit halls usually get money from vendors in one way or another.

So, conference owners have two groups of customers to keep happy: attendees and vendors. In an ideal world, both groups would want the most helpful messages to be conveyed. Truth would be a common goal. So for example, let’s say new research is done that shows that freep learning is better than traditional elearning. A speaker at a conference shares the news that freep learning is great. Vendors in the audience hear the news. What will they do?

  • Vendor A hires a handsome and brilliant research practitioner to verify the power of freep learning with the idea of moving forward quickly and providing this powerful new tool to their customers.
  • Vendor B jumps right in and starts building freep learning to ensure their customers get the benefits of this powerful new learning method.
  • Vendor C pulls the conference organizers aside and tells them, “If you ever use that speaker again, we will not be back; you will not get our money any more.”

Impossible you say!

Would never happen you think!

You’re right. Not enough vendors are hiring fadingly-good-lookingly brilliant research-to-practice experts!

Here’s a true story from a conference that took place within the last year or so.

Clark Quinn spoke about learning myths and misconceptions during his session, describing the findings from his wonderful book. Later when he read his conference evaluations he found the following comment among the more admiring testimonials:

“Not cool to debunk some tools that exhibitors pay a lot of money to sell at [this conference] only to hear from a presenter at the conference that in his opinion should be debunked. Why would I want to be an exhibitor at a conference that debunks my products? I will not exhibit again if this speaker speaks at [conference name]” (emphasis added).

This story was recounted by Clark and captured by Jane Bozarth in an article on the myth of learning styles she wrote as the head of research for the eLearning Guild. Note that the conference in question was NOT an eLearning Guild conference.

What can we do?

Corruption is everywhere. Buyer beware! As adults, we know this! We know politicians lie (some more than others!!). We know that we have to take steps not to be ripped off. We get three estimates when we need a new roof. We ask for personal references. We look at the video replay. We read TripAdvisor reviews. We look for iron-clad guarantees that we can return products we purchased.

We don’t get flustered or worried, we take precautions. In the learning field, you can do the following:

  • Look for conference organizers who regularly include research-based sessions (scientific research NOT opinion research).
  • Look for the conferences that host the great research-to-practice gurus. People like Patti Shank, Julie Dirksen, Clark Quinn, Mirjam Neelen, Ruth Clark, Karl Kapp, Jane Bozarth, Dick Clark, Paul Kirschner, and others.
  • Look for conferences that do NOT have sessions—or have fewer sessions—that propagate common myths and misinformation (learning styles, the learning pyramid, MBTI, DISC, millennials learn differently, people only use 10% of their brains, only 10% of learning transfers, neuroscience as a panacea, people have the attention span of a goldfish, etc.).
  • If you want to look into Will’s Forbidden Future, you might look for the following:
    • conferences and/or trade organizations that have hired a content trustee, someone with a research background to promote valid information and cull bad information.
    • conferences that point speakers to a list of learning myths to avoid.
    • conferences that evaluate sessions based on the quality of the content.

Being exposed to false information isn’t just bad for us as professionals. It’s also bad for our organizations. Think of all the wasted effort—the toil, the time, the money—that was flushed down the toilet trying to redesign all our learning to meet the so-called learning-styles approach. Egads! If you need to persuade your management about the danger of learning myths you might try this.

In a previous blog post, I talked about what we can do as attendees of conferences to avoid learning bad information. That’s good reading as well. Check it out here.

Who Will Rule Our Conferences? Truth or Bad-Faith Vendors?

That’s a damn good question!

 

 

I’ve been at the helm of Work-Learning Research, Inc. for almost 20 years. Ever since I began to have a following as a research-to-practice consultant, I’ve been approached by vendors to “research” their products. A great majority who approach me are basically asking me to tell the industry that their products are good. I tell these vendors that I don’t do that kind of “research,” but if they want a fair, honest, and research-based evaluation of their product for their own benefit—advice not for public consumption but for their own feedback and deliberations—I can do that for them. Some take me up on this, but most don’t.

I recently got another request and I thought I’d share what this looks like (I’ve removed identifying information):

Vendor:

I’m reaching out as the co-founder of [GreatNewCompany], a [high-tech blankety-bling] platform. We’re trying to create a product that [does incredibly wonderful things to change the world of learning].

I wanted to ask if you’d consider reviewing our product? I know you’ve spoken to [this industry luminary about such-and-such] and wondered if this was an area of research you’d planned to do more work in?

A free account has access to almost all features but is just limited to [25] unique recipients [https URL generously offered]. If you need more access to perform a comprehensive review or have any questions then please let me know.

I understand that this isn’t a small ask as it’d take a decent amount of your time but thought I’d see if you found us interesting.

Gentleman Researcher/Consultant:

I do review products, but not for public consumption. I do it to provide feedback to developers, not for marketing purposes.

My cost is [such-and-such] per hour.

Let me know if you’re interested.

Vendor:

Thanks for letting me know – it’s appreciated.

We’d be interested in some consultancy on helping raise awareness of our product and to better reach more customers. We’re not sure if we’re just failing at marketing or whether our product just doesn’t have the broad appeal. Do you think you’d be a good fit helping us with that?

Thanks.

Gentleman Researcher/Consultant:

It’s a crazy market now, with lots of new entries. Very hard to gain visibility and traction.

I don’t schlep for others. I run a high-integrity consultancy here. SMILE.

One recommendation I make is to actually do good research on your product. This helps you to learn more and it gives you something to talk about in your content marketing efforts. A way to stand above the screaming crowd.

I can help you with high-integrity research, but this usually costs a ton…

Vendor:

Hi Will,

Thanks again for the thoughts, sounds like we’re a bad fit for the kind of consultancy that we need so I appreciate you being open about that.

Cheers!

THE END

A happy ending?

================

Conclusions:

  • Be careful when you hear about product endorsements. They may be paid for.
  • Remember, not all communications that are called “research” are created equal.
  • Look for consultants who can’t be bought. You want valid advice not advice tilted toward those who pay the consultants.
  • Look for vendors who tell true stories, who honestly research their products, who learn from their experience.
  • Be skeptical of communications coming out of trade associations when those messages are paid for directly or indirectly (through long commercial association between the vendor and the association).
  • Be even more skeptical of best-in-industry lists where those listed pay to be listed. Yes! These exist!
  • In general, be skeptical and look to work with those who have integrity. They exist too!