Learning or assessment? What’s more important?

Please read Seth Godin’s blog post on It’s easier to teach compliance than initiative before reading my additional comments below.

I agree, initiative is very difficult to teach.

I disagree, that organisations are seeking out intelligent problem solvers. Not all of them anyway. Maybe that is just my experience, maybe that is an Australian thing, but many organisations still stick to the same old processes and people that support it

I strongly agree that it is still much easier to teach compliance.

For  the last twenty years in Australia and I believe in other countries (particularly those who have implemented competency based training) we have pursued vigorously better, more effective assessment processes, systems, methods and tools to the point that we have almost forgotten about the importance of learning. I have also observed this happening in our University systems. A trainer and a teacher from day one of their educational development into the profession are very quickly exposed to the concept that learning is a means to an end. That end is compliance, competence or outcomes achieved. Learning is not shown as and end in itself. Often the education they receive emphasises program design and delivery techniques which will bring about an economical learning process ie in the fastest time possible with the least amount of effort. Once entering the training or education system they soon realise that they are rewarded when they can design a shorter session, shorter program or manage to get a large number of people to achieve competence in a more efficient way. Ridiculous amounts of time are spent on assessment design and validation processes which are then often neglected in the stampede of getting students over the line with a certificate or diploma firmly clamped in their teeth.

I am starting to sound very pessimistic here and I am aware that excellent teaching is being carried out in a range of different locations but it does concern me as I feel the pressure everyday to achieve compliance rather than what I would say is good sound learning. Not just how to pass the assessment or exam but how to manipulate, innovate, create, problem solve, analyse, forecast, predict, assimilate and achieve excellence rather than competence. I guess the measure of how much this is occurring to you or in your training organisation is how much time do you spend thinking about what and how you teach and how you could inspire and motivate learners to want to know more rather than what must I do to get them compliant, to the finishing line. How do you feel about this? Do you agree or not? Would you attend a program that took twice as long to complete if you knew that the trainer, delivery and potential learning was superior?