It’s been more than 20 years since Gloria Gery published her pioneering work, and still the promise of real-time performance support remains elusive. What opportunities do trainers now have to help employees improve skills while doing real tasks on the job? When is it appropriate to use mobile devices and when isn’t it? What new strategies are needed when developing mobile learning as performance support?

In this session you will explore these and other questions as you discover a learning model that effectively and efficiently takes advantage of mobile devices and performance support as part of an overarching learning strategy. You will learn about a framework for evaluating performance-support opportunities for learners and how you might best leverage mobile devices to meet them. You will leave this session understanding how training departments can begin to take full advantage of the mobile opportunity to meet the learning moment and train and support their workers on the job.

In this session, you will learn:

• What opportunities trainers now have to help employees improve skills while doing real tasks on the job
• When it is appropriate to use mobile devices and when it isn’t
• What new strategies are needed when developing mobile learning as performance support
• How mobile devices can be fully leveraged to meet the learning moment and train and support workers on the job

Audience:
Novice to advanced designers, developers, project managers, managers, and directors.

Technology discussed in this session:
HTML5, several mobile devices (smartphones and tablets), and responsive design.

Many organizations want to increase their deployment of performance-support (PS) programs, but are struggling to find a way to do so with a limited budget. You don’t need to spend lots of money on design and development tools for effective performance-support content. Performance support does not always need to be a product from a vendor; you can quite effectively create and deliver performance-support content using your existing software or free online tools.

In this session, you’ll learn how to quickly create PS content for smartphones using free tools and software. You will learn how to develop PS solutions on a budget using tools such as PowerPoint, Keynote, SnapGuide, DropBox, iBooks, and more to create and deliver both online and local performance-support content. You’ll come away from this session with tools, techniques, and a plethora of ideas for your next performance-support project. 

In this session, you will learn:

• How you can use your existing tools to create PS content
• Free online tools that you can use to deliver content
• How to create a simple PS project
• How to create interactive PDF content
• Guidelines for developing a PS template

Audience:
Novice and intermediate designers and developers.

Technology discussed in this session:
Windows, Mac, iPhone, and Android.

Participant technology requirements:
Participants will need a Windows or Mac computer with PowerPoint or Keynote and a smartphone.

Every year, thousands of America’s service members separate from the military to start a new chapter in life as civilians. The re-entry into civilian life can be a difficult phase that results in unfamiliar challenges. The increased number of separations from the military strains the current infrastructure, resources, and techniques to prepare for post-military life.

In this case-study session, you will learn how DoD’s Advanced Distributed Learning group used mobile performance support and knowledge management to enhance performance for veterans going through the transition process. You will discover how we used an app to re-engage users, build confidence through actions and visualization of success, and focus immediacy and relevance of task on future life success. You will develop an understanding of use cases for mobile learning in a performance-support capacity and how to address mobile-learning challenges. You’ll get a demonstration of the prototype app that leverages the Experience API (xAPI) to capture user activity.

In this session, you will learn:

• About an example of re-imagined mobile learning through performance support
• How to use the xAPI to capture learning events
• How to engage and motivate users to success through mobile
• How to accommodate the limitations of mobile that are really opportunities for focus

Audience:
Novice and intermediate designers, developers, project managers, managers, and directors.

Technology discussed in this session:
Experience API (xAPI), learning record stores, and apps.

Field-based performance support (PS) generally means printed job aids, which quickly become dirty and outdated and are nearly impossible to replace with new information. Today’s professionals carry and prefer using mobile devices. They expect performance support whenever and wherever they need it, which makes mobile devices the perfect vehicle for delivering PS. When PS can be accessed by scanning images and real objects, it’s not only the fastest and most preferred way to get PS, it’s fun and amazing!

In this session you will learn how performance support developed in any digital medium can be attached to most static images and objects. You’ll explore how scanning the image or object will play or display the associated learning content, and you’ll discover a great solution for getting the most current content to field-based employees and ensuring it is always up-to-date. You will leave this session understanding how to set up augmented reality to support mLearning initiatives.

In this session, you will learn:

• About augmented reality technology
• How to set up augmented reality training “auras” via Aurasma
• Which tasks are best supported with augmented reality
• To extend augmented reality technology to non-training purposes

Audience:
Novice to advanced designers, developers, project managers, managers, and directors.

Technology discussed in this session:
Augmented reality—Aurasma, iPhone, and Reflector.

Access to relevant information in a timely manner is a growing need of people in both their professional and personal lives. Leveraging augmented reality technologies on mobile platforms provides quick and easy access of information required to complete a job at hand more efficiently or simply to enhance a learning process.

In this session, participants will explore mobile augmented reality and performance support, and examine why the two work so powerfully together. Participants will also learn the importance of context in performance support and how augmented reality builds upon it. The session will cover the various technologies and tools that can be used to create augmented reality solutions. Practical use cases and take-away tips, which can be used to build performance support augmented reality solutions, will also be shared

In this session, you will learn:

• More about how augmented reality solutions can bring about productivity improvements and potential cost savings
• Various augmented reality platforms available and their uses
• Practical applications of augmented reality for performance support
• Challenges associated with augmented reality solutions and how to overcome them

Audience:
Novice and intermediate managers and directors.

Technology discussed in this session:
iPad, Android smartphone, augmented reality tools, and APIs.

To enable a more “on-demand” (or “just-in-time”) approach to performance improvement, organizations are moving away from relying completely on formal learning models to an informal approach, where people can quickly access information when, where, and how they need it. Learning strategies are evolving, with a focus on opportunities to move away from traditional LMS-centric, push, methodologies toward smaller learning modules and flexible pull approaches.

In this session participants will examine a case study with one of the leading pharmaceutical companies experiencing a critical issue with training employees globally on many disparate systems. You will explore an innovative solution designed to improve the performance of the individuals with on-demand learning. You will learn about the various components of this performance support project, including how mobile technologies were used to implement it.

In this session, you will learn:

• How to integrate technology into a greater enterprise learning solution
• How to demonstrate the effectiveness of on-demand learning to achieve business objectives
• How to utilize multiple learning methodologies within a learning solution program
• Effective strategies to deploy on-demand training throughout an enterprise

Audience:
Novice and intermediate designers, project managers, and managers.

Technology discussed in this session:
Sharepoint, Android, iOS, and Surface Pro.