Planning HRD Interventions; What,Why, and How

There is a large body of literature on the instructional design process but little information about the planning practices of Human Resource Development (HRD) practitioners, those who may be devising training or organization development interventions. This article describes qualitative research conducted on the planning processes of five experienced HRD practitioners. Results indicate that subjects had similar mental models of the planning process, portraying the general framework as: a) discerning the desired outcomes, b) understanding the current situation, and c) designing a process to meet the needs. They characterized the planning process as holistic and iterative, involving the use of scenarios, and paradoxical in nature. This paper will identify how the subjects' values, beliefs, and principles of practice influenced their planning. It will also describe techniques used by the subjects to enhance their planning, which involved activating internal resources (prior experience), seeking external resources (reading, talking to others), and tapping into their subconscious for insights or answers. Implications for education, practice, and further research on the planning practices of HRD practitioners will be proposed.     

Principles of CBI Design and the Adult Learners The Need for Further Research

The increasing use of computer-based instruction in performance improvement/HRD is accompanied by a growing need for guidelines directing its effective design and use. Current CBI research has limitations that have not been addressed. Research deficiencies include a limited number of studies in many areas, contradictory findings, and questionable generalizability to adults in the workplace due to an almost exclusive use of college age and younger students as research subjects. This article examines principles of CBI design found in the performance improvement/HRD literature and their applicability to adults in the workplace. Five major areas are discussed: learner control, feedback, screen design, use of group methods, and computer anxiety. CBI designers are urged to be cautious in adopting current research guidelines. Further research on CBI for adults in the workplace is urged.     

Creativity in the training and practice of instructional designers: the Design/Creativity Loops model

This article presents a discussion of research and theoretical perspectives on creativity and instructional design, offering a conceptual model of the connection between these two constructs that was originally proposed in the dissertation work of the first author (Clinton, Creativity and design: A study of the learning experience of instructional design and development graduate students, Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Georgia, Athens, 2007) and that we call the Design/Creativity Loops (DCL) model. Central to the model is a representation of the iterative, looping problem-solving cycle that can include established stages of creative thinking. As an instructional designer is routinely confronted with the next task or design problem in a project, these tasks or problems spawn iterative mental excursions that are opportunities for creative thinking. This article also explores ways that the design and development process can benefit from an emphasis on creativity and offers suggested directions for future research.     

Using Deliberative Inquiry to Assess Future Needs for a Graduate HRD Curriculum: A Case Study

The many changes in today's workplace argue for equivalent changes in educating human resource development (HRD) professionals. The need for HRD curricular changes to be thought out fully and future-focused warrants the use of systematic methods for formulating, solving, and learning more about how to formulate and solve curriculum problems. Deliberative inquiry is such a method. This research methodology is directed toward curricular decision-making as it occurs within a specific context and, simultaneously, toward learning how to formulate and solve such problems. This study focuses on how faculty members in one university department used the problem formulation phase of deliberative inquiry to assess future needs for their HRD specialization. The article first overviews the research methodology of deliberative inquiry and then describes the systematic approach-subject matter analysis-that was used to structure the problem formulation relative to HRD curricular needs. The problem formulation process clarified stakeholders' values. It also resulted in reframing the situation, which led to new insights about the issues facing the HRD curriculum and ways to address them.     

Developing Design through a Creative Problem‐Solving Process: A Group Community Art Project

For the past few years, creativity has gradually become an important element in the national cultivation of talent in Taiwan. Although traditionally art education is closely linked with creativity, the academic research on general art education is very insufficient. Therefore, the goal of this research is to investigate how creativity could be cultivated in curriculum planning for general art education at technology universities as well as what students’ learning process was when they participated in a course's creative activity. The research applied the theory and steps of creative problem‐solving (CPS) on a general art course to design a group practical activity combining with the local community. This involved converting the steps of creative problem‐solving into different stages of group design activities with the goal of constructing a design process equivalent to the process of problem‐solving. The main research results revealed that students could experience the problem‐solving process through group design activities and develop their divergent and convergent thinking at the same time. Moreover, the cooperative learning model is the most appropriate teaching strategy for students from non‐art‐related departments when cultivating their creativity.     

Performance Diagnosis Matrix: A Discussion of Performance Improvement Scholarship

Most Human Resource Development (HRD) and Performance Improvement (PI) professionals agree that organizational performance is critical. There is less agreement, however, on the specific concepts that underlie differing models of performance diagnosis and improvement. Part of this disagreement may stem from a lack of a strong theoretical and empirical grounding in the multi-disciplinary concepts that comprise the basis of performance improvement. Swanson's (1994) Performance Diagnosis Matrix of Enabling Questions identifies elements central to HRD effectiveness and provides a theoretical framework through which multiple and diverse scholarly contributions can be explored to provide HRD/PI with additional theoretical strength. This discussion offers a more complete and stronger understanding of HRD/PI and the elements necessary to improve organizational performance by researching significant authors and research studies for concepts raised in the fifteen enabling questions posed in Swanson's Performance Diagnosis of Enabling Questions. These fifteen questions address performance variables (mission/goal, systems design, capacity, motivation, and expertise) at three performance levels (organizational, process, and individual).     

The cognitive profile of creativity in design

The objective of the study was to explore the cognitive profile of creativity in design by applying a new approach to the assessment of creativity based on the theory of meaning (Kreitler & Kreitler). The assessment of meaning enables to identify cognitive processes that characterize an individual as well as those necessary for good performance of some cognitive act, such as creativity. It was hypothesized that creativity in design will include partly cognitive components identified in previous studies of creativity and partly new ones. The participants were 52 students in a school of design, who were administered a designing task and the Meaning Test, assessing a broad range of cognitive processes. The design products were assessed for creativity by three experienced architects. The cognitive processes, differentiating significantly between the students who produced highly creative designs and those who produced less creative ones, were interpreted as constituting the cognitive profile of creativity in design. The obtained profile supported the hypothesis and provided information about the cognitive processes of creativity in design, which may also be used for promoting creativity in design students.     

Killing the Goose: Conflicts between Pedagogy and Politics in the Delivery of a Creative Education

This article arises out of a research project which looks at the promotion of creativity in pre‐degree and undergraduate learners in art and design. The project considers ‘conceptual’ definitions of creativity and its promotion which have been evidenced by research, and ‘operational’ definitions and delivery methods used by lecturers and students in the art & design sector. The theoretical understandings and empirical evidence thus gained reveal the continuing existence of a radical and potentially effective pedagogic idealism within art & design education. However, a comparison between theory, experience and current realities, leads us to the conclusion that the existence of this educational desideratum is threatened by the commodification of education and the over‐elaborate monitoring which accompanies it. This is a personal and somewhat polemical view but, we believe, one that is also widely held in the sector. We suggest that a reaffirmation of experiential evidence is essential to counter the impact of an increasingly audit‐driven approach to education which focuses on outcomes rather than process and on systems rather than individuals.     

Building a Creative Ecosystem – The Young Designers on Location Project

This article reports on findings from a research project designed to explore ways in which creativity can be fostered through interactions between selected children, particular environments, materials, techniques and key adults. The Young Designers on Location (YDoL) project was funded by the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA), and brought together selected groups of 11 year‐olds with ‘design‐related professionals’ (DRPs) to work together intensively for a week in two locations (Bath Spa University College and Ironbridge Gorge Museum, Shropshire) then subsequently in participants' schools. The findings from case studies of selected individuals within the Bath location include key messages about the quality of environment and relationships in unlocking children's creativity. The study has exemplified aspects of Harrington's model of a ‘creative ecosystem’ [1].     

Creativity in the Bronze Age: Bringing Archaeological Research into Contemporary Craft Teaching and Learning through a Live Project

The CinBA Live Project sought to engage students of contemporary craft courses in the UK with Bronze Age creativity. We aimed to explore the ways in which the creativity inherent in prehistoric craft may be used as inspiration in contemporary making. It simultaneously offered institutions a unique opportunity to offer a practice‐led, research‐based live project which was distinct to those generally known to be available to art and design institutions. It offered a different experience within this established pedagogical model in art and design education by using the Bronze Age as a source of inspiration for creative practice through practice‐based research in contemporary craft within the framework of an international academic research project, and suggesting new roles for the interpretation of the prehistoric past through creative work. This article reports on the CinBA Live Project. It outlines the context of the opportunity, details our methods of facilitation, describes the activities undertaken by the students and considers the outputs and post‐project impact of the activity.     

Human resource development in the agriculture sector: three levels of need

This paper defines human resource development (HRD) as a functional process that involves learning interventions which are both determined by and have implications for public policy, public and private sector institutions, and the HRD specialists operating within the institutions that seek to implement these interventions. HRD is considered a force for optimizing human growth, organizational effectiveness, and national development through skills enhancement in the workforce. The agricultural workforce is broadly divided into four major segments, and these are related to three arenas of educational activity: in‐service training and development, non‐formal extension and extension‐type educational programmes, and school curricula. Following the definitions section, the paper takes up the question of basic needs of HRD in the agriculture sector (HRD/AG) at the policy, institutional and operational levels. Finally, there is a brief review of the global forces, both exogenous and endogenous, affecting HRD/AG. The conclusion calls for carefully diagnosed, systematically implemented HRD/AG policies to ensure for the development of profitable agriculture in a clean environment.     

Understanding the impact of organizational power on evaluation outcomes

The purpose of this study is to examine how power relations among stakeholders, especially between the human resource development (HRD) practitioners and others, affect evaluation outcomes. Using a qualitative case study design, a managerial leadership development programme in a Korean company is analysed. This study shows that the HRD practitioners’ interests in securing their status within the organization governed shaping the evaluation outcomes. The evaluation report was produced and reported portraying mostly the positive aspects of the programme. However, while going through the evaluation, the HRD practitioners felt constrained, and considered themselves as the powerless in terms of the organizational strategic needs and expectations, both of which pertain to the characteristics of the organizational culture. Instead of attempting to alter the organizational culture, which was unfavourable to HRD functions, they are acquiesced to the culture.     

大学生基础创新素质评价

创新思维过程包括对象及其部整关系和因果关系的信息处理,共性关系为核心的综合信息处理,相似关系为核心的综合信息处理三个关键环节。由此构建出以知识、心理为基础,以创新思维为核心,以创新成果为重点的大学生基础创新素质评价体系。     

Ethical Applications of Technology in HRD

Human resource development (HRD) professionals are increasingly incorporating technology into their work activities. However, research that examines the ethics in the use of technology by HRD professionals is still underrepresented in the literature. This article first conducts a PEST (political, economic, social‐cultural, and technological) analysis by examining a number of important general and specific trends that affect the use of technology in HRD. It then discusses some implications with regard to these trends and their impacts on HRD practices.     

Customizing and Implementing Training Evaluation

One barrier that human resource managers may face in evaluating their training programs is lack of expertise in how to customize and implement an evaluation model. Using a case study approach, we conducted a research study to document the process and results of customizing and implementing a training program evaluation model in an organization. In this article, we describe the steps that the HRD managers in one organization used to customize and implement the Training Effectiveness Evaluation (TEE) model (Swanson & Sleezer, 1987), and the decisions and actions that were required to move from the model to actual practice. We also describe how the decisions and actions in implementing the model influenced the evaluation results. When the project began, the HRD managers lacked expertise in customizing and implementing an evaluation model. By the end of the project, they had overcome this barrier and gained new skills. They had learned to use the tools of the TEE model and had customized the model to meet the needs of their organization.     

Is there creativity in design? From a perspective of school design and technology in Hong Kong

As creativity is likely to become a crucial aspect of living in the future, it is important for educators to teach students to think creatively when solving constantly evolving and increasingly complex problems. Supported by the idea that creativity can be taught and learnt, elements of creativity are now embedded in secondary school education. Among all school subjects, design and technology (D&T) is one of the best examples for fostering and cultivating students?? creativity, as the subject offers creative activities that enable students to realize their ideas in the context of the real world. This paper analyzes the creative elements in the D&T curriculum in Hong Kong as seen in the exemplar projects on the Education Bureau website. Some problems and difficulties encountered in fostering creativity in the context of Hong Kong are identified, based on the current teaching environment. The paper also draws attention to East Asian beliefs and implicit theories, which greatly influence teachers?? underlying assumptions about learning and teaching, and at the same time notes that these beliefs may be detrimental to the development of creativity among students. The paper then identifies the problems and inadequacies in fostering creativity in design at the secondary school level and expects to raise awareness of the importance of creativity in D&T.     

高中生物研究性学习的探索与实践--以植物器官种子为例

研究性学习的开展是以学生为主体 ,通过对自己感兴趣的课题的确定和探讨 ,亲身经历和体验发现问题、探究渊源、获取新知、解决问题的过程 ,它有利于培养学生的创新精神和实践能力。在高中生物教学中 ,以种子为材料引导学生确定课题 ,进行实验探究 ,对培养学生的创造能力、实践能力及知识的综合应用能力可起到良好的促进作用。     

Preservice teachers’ perspectives on the definition and assessment of creativity and the role of web design in developing creative potential

This empirical study explores the perspectives of eight preservice teachers on the meaning and assessment of creativity and the role of web design in developing creative potential. Data sources included eight semi-structured interviews analyzed by three independent raters, web design checklists, and interviewer’s notes. Five themes emerged from participant responses during data analysis: a) definition of creativity, b) assessment of creativity, c) creativity and instructional strategies, d) creativity and problem solving, and e) creativity and web design. Web design is viewed as a process of ill-structured problem solving that educators can integrate in the curriculum to link content knowledge with the construction of a tangible product. Each of the web design steps, according to these preservice teachers, is important in developing and realizing the creative potential because they require comprehension, analysis, synthesis, application, and evaluation skills to create a unique product.     

创新过程的系统模型与创新机制的创新

本在全面评述美国名心理学家Csikszentmihalyi最近提出的创新过程系统模型的基础上，论述了中国创新工作的实施必须以创新机制本身的创新为前提的观点，并就创新研究与实践问题提出若干思考和建议。