A few months ago, comedian David Walliams swam The Thames for Sports Relief. Professor Greg Whyte guided David through his training regime, advised him on his diet, shared techniques to help him complete the challenge and even swam alongside him at points during the challenge to motivate and support him. Greg describes himself as having “professional experience assessing, treating and improving the performance of athletes and sporting enthusiasts”.
I heard another swimming story a few years ago when I attended a course, about a competitive swimmer who wanted to rank in their next competitive games. The swimmer sought the advice of a professional trainer, who trained with him most days, critiquing his performance and giving him advice on what he could do to bring his time down and improve upon his technique. In the end, the swimmer’s time decreased and he won silver in the competition. Like Professor Greg Whyte, the trainer had many professional accolades, however there was one vital honour that he did not have...this trainer couldn’t swim.
Regardless of the technical ability (to swim in this case) of the two sporting professionals, the end results were the same - both swimmers reached their goal. So in that case, both “professionals” who were employed, did their job, with common characteristics displayed by both:
- Critique performance and offer advice on how to improve performance
- To motivate and influence the swimmers to adopt the techniques based on their recommendations
- Understood the goals of the individuals, what they wanted to achieve and what was motivating them to achieve it
- The swimmers seeking their advice trusted and respected their credentials as professionals (based on their knowledge from their experience, qualifications and professional standards achieved by them and wanted to learn from them.
When looking at my mind map of what I think defines an elearning professional, many of the above mentioned soft skills emerged, with them outnumbering the technical skills. (When I talk about “technical skills” of an elearning professional, I mean the basic skills to use and implement the technology). This didn’t surprise me as I am of the opinion, for example, that a good manager doesn’t need to know the “nitty gritty” of their employee's job, but needs the skills to bring out the best in them, which will in turn help them achieve the goals. As with any “e” market and its constant evolution (now “e” is turning into “m” for mobile), an elearning professional must keep up to speed and that is why accreditation of a professional body and continuing professional development fits into my definition. They are passionate, are seen to offer sound judgement and are influential with their opinions that are respected and trusted. The elearning professional has transferable skills from face to face learning that they can bring into elearning, making people feel they are not missing out on the traditional interaction of a classroom environment or a paper based experience.
My mind map shows the technical ability necessary, is the knowledge they have of how elearning tools can support the learner and in what circumstances they would benefit. They may not necessarily know how to build the technology, but they have a network of people who can do that for them. The “technical professional” will know how to create multimedia, podcasts and build the infrastructure needed to support an eportfolio structure for example, but will not necessarily know how this will impact the learner.
What I would also highlight (slightly contradictory) is that the elearning professional who has the technical skills plus the behavioural skills will, in my opinion be more credible in the elearning field, however a lack of these technical skills doesn’t make them an "elearning unprofessional".
So does an elearning professional need to be able to metaphorically swim? I guess that all comes down to the opinion of person who is seeking their professionalism to decide.
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