I live in what is called a "master planned community" meaning a team designed our community architecture, layout, streets, parks and amenities...down to the last detail. We all have very similar houses, mailboxes, fencing, and color scheme. 

In a housing development such as ours, houses are built in days, not months. We get new neighbors all the time. I truly wondered how the builders did it, so I paid attention to the building process. I discovered, that many components are pre-built and shipped in. The builders have built the same houses over and over because there are only a few floor plans to choose from. Finally, the crews are very efficient because they have perfected the craft of building these homes; all part of the master plan.

The results: 

- High Quality Homes

- Homeowner and builder needs are met

- Everyone loves their home

As eLearning professionals we want the same thing. A high quality product, built on time that meets the need of our learners and budget. We throw the phrase "rapid development" around, however, something always gets in the way, and we don't put tools and processes in place to make it happen.

Strategy #1 | Don't Build Courses - Design Programs

Custom homes are wonderful, and designed with the specific home owner in mind, however, they take a great deal more time, cost, and effort to construct.

Don't build courses, design custom programs with many courses or lessons. Meet the learner needs, however, don't "re-invent the wheel" with each course.

• Build a Master Plan: Layout your program over the next six months or year, and decide primary topics, media, instructional design structures. (see sample Design Plan below)
• Storyboard the Plan: Let your team storyboard, in matrix form, all of the courses, so they are not thinking what to do "slide by slide".  Be sure to include media, graphics, and interaction ideas.
• Discover Reusable Assets & Structures: Look for components you can pre-build and use for all the courses: interfaces, images, exercises, and styles, for example.
• Include Course Maintenance: In your plan, be sure to schedule Course Maintenance Cycles to take care of those "non-critical" updates.

 Rapid Development Benefits include:

• Consistent Instructional Design and Learner Experience
• Discovery of Reusable Content, Graphics, Styles, and other assets
• With each course, your team will become more proficient as they take advantage of knowledge and skill gained from the development of previous courses.

High Level Instructional Design Plan for Sales Processes (Four Lessons): 

 A basic program/lesson matrix like this, enables the instructional designer to see lessons side-by-side enabling them to design consistent structures, and asset development plan.

So it's a new year. Build a plan and make rapid development a reality in your organization.

Happy development,

jB

Coming soon from jB:

• Strategy #2 | Invest in a Primary Toolkit for Your Team
• Strategy #3 | Build Centralized Asset Library
• Strategy #4 | Create Course & Content Styles
• Strategy #5 | Practice your craft