Why This is Important

Several years ago, I was working on a proposal for a prospective client. The client had come to the company I worked for and said, “We have a problem with a high employee turnover rate. We want a training course on the history of the company to reduce that rate.”

We gently suggested that if they had a high turnover rate, it was probably not primarily due to employee ignorance of company history, and would they like us to look into other possible causes?

Yeah, we didn’t get that contract. Oh darn.

In Chapter 3, we’ll take a look at how to set good goals for learning, but before you get to goals, it’s really important to define the gap you are trying to fill or the problem you are trying to solve.

If you don’t start with the gaps, you can’t know that your solution will bridge them. You can build a suspension bridge to cross a crack in the road, or try to use a 20-foot rope bridge to span the Grand Canyon.