When simulations create learning that is applied on the job immediately, they quickly promote behavioral change.
Explicit knowledge is easily extracted, documented and replicated. Examples include how to read a profit and loss statement, how to write software, how to calculate a break-even point, how to reduce inventory and working capital or how to manage time.
“I never try to teach my students anything. I only try to create an environment in which they can learn.”
— Albert Einstein
Simulations can be produced in all fields through computer games, role-playing or building models. But a true simulation has a specific goal in mind — to mimic or simulate a real system so learners can explore it, perform experiments on it and understand it before implementing it in the real world. The most effective simulators are not games, nor are they training workshops, despite the fact that many are often used this way.
A simulator’s ability to condense time and space remains among the most effective ways to uncover employees’ intuitive response to stimuli, and to show them how their behavior contributes to or detracts from organizational value. As such, simulators are most often utilized within industries such as nuclear power, aviation and surgery where failure results in dire consequences. To maximize the value from a simulation learning experience, participants should immediately and directly apply their learning to a specific intervention within their organization.
The Link to Behavioral ChangeMost organizations aspire to deploy significant change programs, only to find them nearly impossible to implement. That is largely because successful change requires more than a vision, thoughtful learning offerings and a coherent strategy; it requires a workforce that not only does not resist change, but embraces it.
To achieve success, an organization must build a transformation program that will allow change to be rapidly pulled across its departments and throughout its layers. Regardless of the level of senior management commitment, unless key thought leaders at all levels embrace the change, the initiative will die on the vine. To create this kind of widespread passion, learning leaders must expose the workforce to what could be, which will enable them to rethink their mental models, enable them to break free from their entrenched paradigms and embrace the opportunity to learn.
Allowing participants to enter a simulated environment provides them with the opportunity to experience alternative realities which can prompt them to rethink their current beliefs.
