What Can HOA's Teach Us About Learning Objectives?

HOA HEADACHE

Anyone who has ever found themselves entangled in a violation issued by their Homeowners Association (HOA) can relate to how utterly futile and often nonsensical the rule enforcement can be. We recently fell victim to HOA regulations on the color scheme of our house. The part that made it much more difficult was the cryptic description of the violation. For example, we received a notification, “Violation: the exterior paint has not been approved for the many changes made to your property. Attached are the original colors.” Then there was a sticky label with the following:

However, no mention is made to which of the “many changes” were in violation. Since we inherited the current color scheme when we purchased the home a few years earlier we had no idea what the colors were supposed to be.

My husband, with his practical bent on life, arrived home one day with a pale, almost glow-in-the-dark light blue gallon of paint labeled as Moonmist. It does not even remotely resemble the color scheme of our house, but we proceeded to paint some of the porch this color and submit photos as evidence to the HOA in hopes of resolving the matter. A short time after the submission we received another notice that the matter had not been resolved with no explanation as to why.

Finally, the nitpicky, detailed-oriented, exacting part of me submitted a three-page document replete with photographs and labels requesting information as to the exact color for each part of our home.

MYSTERY SOLVED!

As we were pondering hiring an attorney to fight the looming daily fine about to levied for a continued violation, it dawned on me to simply put together a property improvement request and gain permission for the current colors. Genius! It was within minutes after online submission that I received a call from the community manager to explain – finally – what the issue was. The Moonmist in question was supposed to be a McCormick brand color that is a beige, not blue, color. This was the first time anyone ever mentioned the brand of paint required. As it turns out, different brands result in radically different colors with the same title. Who knew the paint world did not have a universal color scheme?

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"The next time you are writing learning objectives for a training event, avoid the confused communication style of the HOA.”

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INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN APPLICATION

What does an HOA headache have in common with instructional design (ID)? Just as our HOA failed to communicate the one critical piece of information to us that would allow us to finally resolve the violation (its McCormick paint from now on!) it is far too often that training content similarly fails to inform the learner on the expectations of the course and how they are to be evaluated. Learning objectives communicate to the learner critical information on the concepts and applicable skills they are expected to master and serves as the benchmark by which they will be measured for success. Without this critical information, the learner will be just as confused as a homeowner with a plethora of color choices named Moonmist. Writing Learning Objectives is no simple task and considers a great deal, including key knowledge and skills areas to be accomplished during training and the level of Bloom’s Taxonomy to be reached. One beginner’s approach is to write SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Action-Oriented, Realistic, Timely). For example, if my training event is for an ISO requirements document, a critical knowledge area might be those key terms necessary to interpret the standard. Questions to consider for this learning objective include:

Our learning objective might be written as:

The learner will identify at least 70% of the key terms from ISO/IEC 9000 by the end of the course.

Where either the learner will succeed in identifying 70% of the key terms by the end of the course or they will have failed to achieve the goal. The measurement instrument should reflect this information.

IN CONCLUSION

Now, full disclosure, the SMART goal approach is not my original idea. I give full credit to the immeasurably talented Ms. Georgia Harris, formerly head of the Weights and Measures Division at NIST, and a gifted instructor / instructional designer who empowered me with this approach as part of my initial ID skills more than ten years ago. Thank you, Georgia!

The next time you are writing learning objectives for your training event, avoid the confused communication style of the HOA and instead try using SMART goals for improved learner success.

If you have questions about this article, I have answers! Please feel free to contact me at IDPinnacle@outlook.com or subscribe to this blog.