How ADDIE Can Improve Black Empowerment Concepts
As a trainer by profession, I’ve spent two decades developing programs for corporate and non-profit clients. One of the basic elements of developing a program is identifying the methodology in which you will develop and evaluate the program. Every idea has validity unless it is vetted using a criteria that is in live the program’s objective.
As a trainer, we have different methodologies that we use to develop training. The most widely used methodology is the ADDIE model. It is rather simple in its structure but used correctly will make a profound difference on the quality of a training program.
Often times the discussion of the black community delves into the American systems, white supremacy, lack of unity and ideas on what black people must learn to improve their lot. What often happens is a circular conversation where the result is individuals of differing opinions simply agree to disagree which defeats the purpose of the exercise. Another thing that occurs is the avalanche of disparate information in the form of historical facts, conspiracy theories, political ideology and religious beliefs. It all comes together that is equivalent to a data dump. There is no plan that could accommodate all of these view points; and it would not be effective or efficient to attempt to do so.
It is my belief that the black community would be well served to have a model that test the prescriptions put forth by those looking to assist in improving the plight of black people. A training methodology used for training is the perfect in this regard because training is focused on one of three things: increase knowledge of a trainee, impact what a trainee does, adjusts the acts of a trainee. And essentially this is what many are attempting to accomplish with the black community.
Returning to the ADDIE model; it is relatively easy to understand and is itself fully vetted. As the acronym suggest, there are only five steps:
1. Analyze
2. Develop
3. Design
4. Implement
5. Evaluate
Analyze
During analysis, the designer identifies the learning problem, the goals and objectives, the audience’s needs, existing knowledge, and any other relevant characteristics. Analysis also considers the learning environment, any constraints, the delivery options, and the timeline for the project.
Black people are well aware of the problems. We know all too well about the disparities in education, health, income, wealth, access to capital and as of late, voting rights. What has not taken place is a thorough analysis with the objective of creating a coherent strategy for learning and taking action. In the analysis phase you are asking:
1. What is the community need that is driving this training?
2. What are the objectives of this training?
3. How do we define success?
4. Who is the intended audience?
5. What do they need to learn?
6. What resources do they have available?
Question number five, six and seven are more difficult than they seem. The mistake that many black activists make is assuming that all black people should think alike or have the same agenda. We do not and if you attempt to place everyone into one training session you will lose everyone. You must either hone in on a particular audience or make your training broad enough so that it addresses the needs of a more diverse population.
For example, if my company is implementing a new computer system I may create a training session for every employee that highlights the needs being addresses by the system and how it will impact the company going forward. Those employees who must work with the system will have a more intense training specific to their roles.
Design
Design is a systematic process of specifying learning objectives. Detailed storyboards and prototypes are often made, and the look and feel, graphic design, user-interface and content is determined here.
This step is relatively easy with most training programs if the analysis is thorough and correctly. However, considering the complexity of the subject matter in this article, I do want to go further.
As I stated earlier, with most training you are attempting to impact knowledge, skills or action. It is in the Design phase where the trainer writes his/her objectives. There are three objective domains: Cognitive, Psychomotor and Affective.
With the Cognitive objective, the focus can be on knowledge, comprehension, analysis or evaluation. It is a means of dealing with facts and information. In second grade we read stories and answered a few questions about them as a means of testing our reading comprehension. In high school we were tasked with writing papers that compared and contrasted a particular topic.
In the case of the black community, we can relate this to the numerous black history facts that we learn over the years. You may find them interesting or even fascinating, but most of it is simply stored data.
The Psychomotor objective is a matter of learning to do something. Whether it is plumbing, programming a computer, or flying an airplane, the goal is that the trainee will exhibit a particular skill at the end of the training session.
The Affective objective deals with behavior. It can be a basic is making person aware of something to having them internalize it for themselves. The ADDIE model relies on Krathwohl’s Taxonomy of Affective Doman:
Receiving is being aware of or sensitive to the existence of certain ideas, material, or phenomena and being willing to tolerate them. Examples include: to differentiate, to accept, to listen (for), to respond to.
Responding is committed in some small measure to the ideas, materials, or phenomena involved by actively responding to them. Examples are: to comply with, to follow, to commend, to volunteer, to spend leisure time in, to acclaim.
Valuing is willing to be perceived by others as valuing certain ideas, materials, or phenomena. Examples include: to increase measured proficiency in, to relinquish, to subsidize, to support, to debate.
Organization is to relate the value to those already held and bring it into a harmonious and internally consistent philosophy. Examples are: to discuss, to theorize, to formulate, to balance, to examine.
Characterization by value or value set is to act consistently in accordance with the values he or she has internalized. Examples include: to revise, to require, to be rated high in the value, to avoid, to resist, to manage, to resolve.
This is where many organizations in the black community place their focus. It is their belief that if they can convince black people to study their heritage it will then lead them to unify and thereby creating the capacity to make improvements in the black community.
The problem is that this is where many stop. Their thinking is that is you get black people to appreciate their history it will someone impact their actions and the choices they make regarding their lives. This is simply not true. Knowledge does not necessitate a specific action. This is just part of human nature. Which is why people with lung cancer continue to smoke and countries find themselves fighting the same war decade after decade.
To resolve this, any program must effectively move to the next step.
Development
It is the phase where you begin to see the strengths and weaknesses of your program. Let’s take the often-mentioned goal black people creating their own professional sports league. Folk toss this idea around with only the vaguest idea of the likely success of such an endeavor. It’s always talked about as in a social context but with any thought to the economics of sports.
If you were to subject this idea to the ADDIE model, the results may be the following
Analyze:
1. How long would it take to create a league?
2. How many teams could the new league support?
3. In what cities would the leagues start and is there a market for it?
4. What kind of stadium deals could be arranged?
5. Could the league attract NBA caliber players?
6. What is the salary of the players?
7. What is the startup cost?
Objectives:
1. Create a league of 10 teams in the 10 largest population centers of African American
2. Institute league bylaws and salary caps
3. Draft players
4. Finalize stadium and TV deals
5. Marketing and Promotions
Design (Cognitive, Psychomotor, Affective):
1. Educate the community and sports world about the league
2. Convince people that there is value is supporting the league
3. Recruit NBA players the value
4. Attract investors
In the development phase is when you actually have to sign the stadium leases, the TV contracts and sign off on the investments funds. It is here you will note the viability of the idea. Did your market research suggest black people would watch a basketball league not dominated by Kobe Bryant, Derrick Rose or Lebron James? Did you raise enough money to attract any high profile names from the NBA to draw viewer interest? Are the stadium deals lucrative enough to pay salaries? Can you attract top college prospects away from the NBA? Is there really a market for a black-only league? This is where the rubber meets the road because the structure of the league is predicated on affirming the aforementioned questions.
And this is where many black organizations fall short. They have not moved beyond spreading ideology and theories to designing a program based on measureable objectives and sound research. Trainers often create a prototype before going live with the training. This is what I like to call the “proof of concept”.
When discussing any idea about uplifting the black community, there should always be a prototype as reference: show where the economic development worked to the benefit of black people; highlight the schools where excellent academic performance was achieved; illustrate how blacks are making gains in certain industries or entrepreneurial endeavors.
Wherever there is success then we should for scalability.
Implementation
If we return to the black professional basketball league, the implementation is rather easy. The league will draft its players and play the games as scheduled. This is all about execution.
Evaluation
From Black Nationalist to Libertarians, from the Tea Party to Occupy Wall Street; none have means to evaluating their effectiveness. The problem is many of these groups are married to an ideology and often times their goals are not truly measurable. How do you measure black unity? And because many operate on the fringe and are not accountable to anyone, they are under no pressure to produce documentation of their effectiveness.
Evaluation simply asks did you meet your objectives. It will allow you to review every aspect of your process and make improvements where necessary or completely abandon the project entirely. It will allow documentation of what works and what doesn’t and those lessons will carry over to the next idea.
The Takeaway
Black people love their conspiracy theories, religious beliefs and black ideology. The problem is that we are not making the necessary gains that our history and influence would suggest. One of the reasons may be that we do not thoroughly test the numerous ideas and ideologies that are presented as solutions to the problems ailing the black community.
Taking any thought from idea to a tangible product or service requires a process and when you are attempting to implement programs that will impact the livelihood of an entire community we should require more than just theory.
We must understand that presenting knowledge or disseminating facts are only the start of the process. Without a methodology to test ideas whereby we can evaluate the validity of said ideas, we are simply regurgitating words and encouraging an environment where every ideology, theology and philosophy has equal standing.
It is time that the black community moves past this and finally proving that the alternative to what is available now has credibility. Every idea should be tested against model whereby it must prove to meet stated objectives and is scalable for critical mass. The ADDIE model is as good as any place to start as it is a proven system and has stood the test of time.
James is the founder of Mass Appeal Media and is a writer and designer living in the Chicago area.
