How to SHOW the importance of checklists, through some team gaming or play?

[Jim Wynne]

When considering the principles of learning we are only concerned with training and not teaching.

Knowledge of the principles of learning are necessary to effective teaching.

Teaching is purely the imparting of knowledge.

You're making up your own definitions here, or subscribing to the ideas of someone else who made up their own definitions. Using the distinctions you suggest, training is not explicitly different from teaching; it's a form of teaching. There's nothing wrong in using the terms interchangeably. I can say that I've taught someone how to swim if when I'm done the person knows how to swim. By the same token, if I impart knowledge about water safety prior to getting in the pool, I can say that a person has been trained in water safety.

Training is also the understanding of the practical application of this knowledge.

See above.

A teacher is not necessarily concerned with the after effects of his or her teaching, other than passing exams.

Why would a person want to teach if there were no concern for the results?

A trainer teaches with the sole purpose that the theory is correctly put into practice.

My emphasis.

As for the subject of this thread, if people are knowledgeable regarding the things they're supposed to verify before using power equipment, it doesn't make much difference what you call the act of imparting that knowledge. I can teach people how to look for hydraulic leaks by showing them pictures of vehicles with hydraulic fluid dripping from them and the places on the vehicle to look for leaks, and it matters not whether I say afterward that I trained them or taught them.

 

[Scanton]

Jim Wynne, thank you for your constructive feedback.

The Oxford English Dictionary describes Teach and Training differently.

Teaching - Impart knowledge to or instruct (someone) as to how to do something.

Training - The action of teaching a person or animal a particular skill or type of behavior.

I differentiate between the two words because of the environment I work in and the number of times failures have resulted from Teaching and not Training. Having repeatedly heard “I’ve told him so many times” or “I’ve shown him what to do” (both teaching) after a failure. I have never had a situation where “I told him what to do, shown him what to do and then watched him do it correctly two or three times to ensure he understood” (training) result in failure.

I can give you examples of engineering apprentices who’s exam scores were above 90% for every subject taken, but at the end of a 4 year apprenticeship could not sharpen a drill or competently use a mill or a lathe. I would say this qualifies as being taught and not trained.

I saw numerous examples of students taught to pass exams in computer science but had zero ability to build a computer, fault find or program a computer. I would say this also qualifies as being taught and not trained.

I know that these two words are used by the majority of people interchangeably, but the fact is that they do mean different things, and yes I understand that one is an extension of the other.

In the manufacturing environments where I have enforced “Training” and not “just Teaching”, the level of error/failure and scrap has been drastically reduced and been stable at that level for years, even as new employees are taken on board. It’s something that has worked for me for a couple of decades, and like it or not the recipients find it an easy concept to grasp.

Back to the original subject, If we ensure that the result of the training on completing the checklist was that the person being trained understood each line item, the desired result, the undesired result, the correct reaction to an undesired result and the potential ramifications of an undesired result, not completing the checklist from that point forward would be tantamount to sabotage or misconduct, both of which can be dealt with using a completely different process.

 

[rogerpenna]

Not wanting to offend you Rogerpenna, however I must ask the question "Are you training, or are you teaching?"

Training Not Teaching

• When considering the principles of learning we are only concerned with training and not teaching.
• Teaching is purely the imparting of knowledge.
• Training is also the understanding of the practical application of this knowledge.
• A teacher is not necessarily concerned with the after effects of his or her teaching, other than passing exams.
• A trainer teaches with the sole purpose that the theory is correctly put into practice.
Quite simply, that is the reason why training takes place in the field, as training cannot only be done by books and courses alone.

Scanton... I am quite confused, but again, maybe the blame is on me as english is not my primary language and it's a possibility that I am not making myself understood.

But isn´t the OP asking about GAMIFIED training to make them understand the importance and use of checklists?

It seems to me the question I made is asking for ideas/examples where:
- I am trying to make employees understand the practical application of this knowledge
- Concerned about the after effects of this teaching ONLY. (this won´t even be registered as training)
- We are concerned about the theory being put into practice ABOVE ALL.


As I am asking about a GAMIFIED approach to train over a 100 employees divided in teams in a space of hours, it will be done on the company patio. Notice I GAVE an example I was thinking about, regarding team members looking for post-its around a truck or excavator...

 

[rogerpenna]

There are too many people theorizing here about a lot of things instead of staying on topic. I am sorry to be rude, but it's true.

Please, before discussing training vs teaching, if we need to train, if we should make exams, etc, etc, read the first paragraphs in the topic:

"My company has an annual "QUALITY Day", where we usually have some team buildings games, some talks, coffee break and some comedy show for the employees

We recently decided we would scrap the external shows, and focus on gaming... specially, try to have a few team games that would be about current issues on the company... helping people understand the work of other areas, do some daily activities in a more gamified manner, etc. "



Look, I need CONTENT for this day.
The way people replied to this thread, no matter WHAT game I tried to ask suggestions for our "Quality Day", people would come with theories about what is happening on the company, that I should empower the employees, etc, etc.

I would give up on doing these team games and answer "ok, we will scrap the team games and instead have a comedy show".


And then people here would reply "Your HR department should take more care of employees welfare. If they can´t laugh, they are not happy"

If I wanted opinions on my checklists problem, I would create a topic as that. Which is not a BAD idea, just don´t think THIS thread should go off-topic discussing about that when the focus is another AND I need to fill a morning with team games.


Thanks for CreativeQC, John Predmore and others who answered the topic directly.

 

[rogerpenna]

Let's assume that checklists are completed as expected. How does that assure that the items on the checklist were actually done? The only thing you can know for sure is that the checklists are completed. Checklists aren't much good unless you can actually verify that something called for wasn't done.

How can we know pilots do the checklists before each flight?

Flight checklists are not much good unless we can actually verify that something wasn´t done and the plane crashed?

Maybe pilots are VERY AWARE of the importance of checklists. And that is what I am trying to build here. The notion that human memory and focus and be faulty.

Now, please notice you asked a question that was answered in the OP or second post of this topic.

Because I said 2 or 3 times in this thread that many Checklists WERE completed as expected but we had several clues they WEREN´T actually done. Like maintenance problems on items that should had been checked.

Which is why I am asking for suggestions to SHOW THE IMPORTANCE of checklists.

I think it's self-explanatory. If I am trying to show the importance of checklists, it's because JUST having the checklist filled isn´t enough for us.

Creating some kind of game isn't likely to help anything. In my experience that sort of thing tends to trivialize things and can be perceived as condescension. If you have to go to that length to get people to do their jobs, there's a problem that goes deeper than checklists.

ok, so you have any idea of any other game I can make for our Quality Day?

A team-building game? Well, won´t that also trivialize things and be perceived as condescension? If I go to that lenght to get people to act like a team, there is a problem that goes deeper than worker relations.

Again... maybe scrap ANY game (its funny, because gamifiying trainings and even work itself is "the thing" nowadays, but you think it trivializes things) and hire a comedy show instead? But then again, won´t others come and tell me that if I need a comedy show for employees, than the problem is deeper?

Gee, you can problematize ANYTHING if you want. I can tell you that a end of year company party also hides deeper problems in the company.


All 5S material you see talks about rewarding teams (even if we just THANKS)... well... if you need to REWARD people for cleaning their places, there is a DEEPER problem!!!

I don´t know why we even PAY our employees beyond the need for basic survival.

If employees do not want to work in my company except for a salary, that clearly shows deeper problems.

Reductio ad absurdum, I know, but I am doing it because you people are trying to problematize it in an off-topic way

 

[rogerpenna]

Alert: I use caps a lot. I am not screaming, just putting emphasis on my virtual voice. It's easier than using BOLD.

You will all notice I did it even in the OP. It's an habit acquired since 1996 at least. I also bite my nails. Yeah, maybe there are deeper issues with biting my nails or writing in bold. Maybe I should see a psychologist or a neurologist. But sometimes, just using some bitter taste transparent nail polisher can be good enough.

 

[Scanton]

Sorry rogerpenna you are absolutely correct, I lost sight of the original question.

You could try an extension of “The Cinema Game”. It was originally designed to highlight the importance of KPI’s and getting the correct KPI’s for any given process, however it could be adapted to include a check sheet/record sheet at the end so the KPI’s can be correctly recorded and efficiently communicated.

You break the trainees into small groups and let them designate one person as the manager of the Cinema, one as the assistant manager and the rest as various Cinema employees (they can take their pick of the roles). The basic scenario is that the manager entered a competition on the back of a breakfast cereal box and won the first prize of a month long holiday of a life time on a cruise ship. He will only have access to a phone for a short period at random intervals every day, but still needs to keep tabs on how his business is running.

First thing is to get everyone to list out the items they deem important to communicate as a reflection of how the business is performing, adult tickets sold, children’s tickets sold, concessions tickets sold, popcorn sales, ice cream sales, drinks sales, staffing levels (absenteeism), toilet paper used etc, that will be communicated each day.

Once this is done go around each group and get them to read out what they want to communicate and why, this will trigger other groups to add things to their lists and usually some humour from some unusual items.

Once every group has contributed, get them all to finalise their list into a check list that has room to record the results from every day of the week, that can be communicated in 60 seconds, the reason being that this is all the time the manager will have on the phone each day, as he is not made of money and he is paying for the phone call, and also that he will make the call each day whenever he can so the list needs to be competed are ready for this call whenever it is made.

The end result should be that every group has a checklist that is easy to complete and can efficiently communicate the Key Performance Indicators of that particular Cinema to the manager on the cruise ship. It can also be used to accumulate the data each week, month etc.

This should make clear to everyone involved that checklist/record sheets are made up of key performance indicator data that is very important to someone in the business, even if it isn’t always the person doing the recording.

Good luck.

 

[rogerpenna]

Sorry rogerpenna you are absolutely correct, I lost sight of the original question.

You could try an extension of “The Cinema Game”. It was originally designed to highlight the importance of KPI’s and getting the correct KPI’s for any given process, however it could be adapted to include a check sheet/record sheet at the end so the KPI’s can be correctly recorded and efficiently communicated.

You break the trainees into small groups and let them designate one person as the manager of the Cinema, one as the assistant manager and the rest as various Cinema employees (they can take their pick of the roles). The basic scenario is that the manager entered a competition on the back of a breakfast cereal box and won the first prize of a month long holiday of a life time on a cruise ship. He will only have access to a phone for a short period at random intervals every day, but still needs to keep tabs on how his business is running.

First thing is to get everyone to list out the items they deem important to communicate as a reflection of how the business is performing, adult tickets sold, children’s tickets sold, concessions tickets sold, popcorn sales, ice cream sales, drinks sales, staffing levels (absenteeism), toilet paper used etc, that will be communicated each day.

Once this is done go around each group and get them to read out what they want to communicate and why, this will trigger other groups to add things to their lists and usually some humour from some unusual items.

Once every group has contributed, get them all to finalise their list into a check list that has room to record the results from every day of the week, that can be communicated in 60 seconds, the reason being that this is all the time the manager will have on the phone each day, as he is not made of money and he is paying for the phone call, and also that he will make the call each day whenever he can so the list needs to be competed are ready for this call whenever it is made.

The end result should be that every group has a checklist that is easy to complete and can efficiently communicate the Key Performance Indicators of that particular Cinema to the manager on the cruise ship. It can also be used to accumulate the data each week, month etc.

This should make clear to everyone involved that checklist/record sheets are made up of key performance indicator data that is very important to someone in the business, even if it isn’t always the person doing the recording.

Good luck.

Thank you Scanton. That is quite interesting. Not sure this format will be feasible with the numbers we are going to use, but this is noted and will try to use sometime!