I enjoy sitting at the intersection of learning and EdTech products. Daily, I learn something incremental about each. I am optimistic about the role of AI in learning because I see AI assistants collecting interactions over a long time period and adapting to maximize learning efficiency.
Learning a mental skill (like a physical skill) requires a behavioral change so that it becomes a habit, which is triggered without conscious intent. This is a branch of learning called
In a recent blog post, Dr. Philippa Hardman commented about a University of Pennsylvania study on behavioral interventions stating that “this behavioural research confirms conclusively the importance of shifting away from focusing on the design of content to a focus on the design of context.” To do so, she recommends:
“a shift away from our collective habit of asking, “What does the learner need to know?” and ask instead:
What is the habit that we want our learners to form?
How do we build an environment in which we can encourage, normalise and automate this habit?”
What does this have to do with EdTech products? Selling also involves a change in behavior. A customer needs to replace an old new behavior (and product) with a new behavior (and product). How can we do this? What interventions can be used? Dr. Hardman provided examples of a range of interventions (from weak to strong) for a range of training. While the example of product training is aimed at salespeople, it is apropos for EdTech companies working to acquire and keep customers (see graphic below).
Interventions are relevant for EdTech buyer journeys and customer retention. Treat these processes like you are teaching. I strongly recommend that EdTech companies use this notion, especially for customer engagement and retention. Many companies benefitted from the pandemic and AI-related spending. I worry that renewals will fall as schools rationalize their EdTech toolkits. In my own experience, I rate customer engagement by EdTech companies to be very poor. There is no excuse with an array of excellent no and low-touch RevOps tools.
