By Meredith Camp

For the third and final installment in this series, I am discussing the Partnership for Public Service’s last type of innovation: developing an entirely new approach.  This innovation steps us the furthest out on the ledge of the unfamiliar but offers up greater opportunity for creativity.  In the context of training in the workplace, these opportunities are endless.  With the surge in informal training and social learning, coming up with a new way to engage employees to learn from each other or an experience is as easy as you would like it to be.  Simple ideas can often be the best.  Capitalizing on the workforce itself can lead to many great ideas; tapping into people’s interests can lead to many on- and off-site training exercises, including experiential learning trips, collaborative brainstorming exercises, and new experiences that broaden the way people think and learn about things.  If your organization seems to be in a rut when it comes to training, try asking your staff to offer their input on how they learn best and what they believe would really make a difference in helping new information take hold.  Sometimes your best resources are all around you.

How has your organization fended off the inevitable training rut?