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Will Thalheimer, PhD

Dr. Will Thalheimer is devoting his time to disseminating his research findings on learning-and-performance and applying what he's learned to help instructional designers, e-learning specialists, trainers, and performance consultants build more effective learning solutions.


Background

Will has a unique combination of real-world experience and research savvy. He began working in the "training" field in 1985 and has since worked as an instructional designer, trainer, instructor, consultant, multimedia developer, and simulation architect. His clients have included Allen Interactions, Type A Learning Agency, Questionmark, Rockwell, PPG, Pfizer, ADP, Boeing, Raytheon, Nabisco, AMD, Kodak, IBM, AGFA, and the US Postal Service.

Will began his research efforts in 1990 at Columbia University's world-renowned Teachers College and has devoted the last eight years to understanding how research can improve the practice of learning and performance. Will has taught courses at Columbia, at Teachers College, at CUNY's Hunter College, and through the internet.


Research Program

In the mid 1990's, Will became increasingly alarmed at how the learning-and-performance field hopscotched from one fad to another at the same time its instructional-design canon perpetuated myths about how to design learning. In 1997, Will began doing research to help provide an anchor for the field---a clear sense of what works and what doesn't.  His goal is to provide practical prescriptions based on proven research, not just anecdotes, wishful thinking, and unproven speculations.

Will continues to delve extensively into the body of psychological, learning, and instructional research, cutting through the jargon and building a knowledge base of basic principles for the learning-and-performance field. He disseminates his findings in publications, conference sessions, workshops, and by doing learning audits, and consulting.


Personal Vision for the Field

Will envisions a learning-and-performance field where well-respected professionals apply their deep understanding of human learning to issues of productivity, innovation, management, personal development, and social responsibility. Learning events will be more than twice as effective as they are today. Practitioners will hold themselves accountable by measuring their results and continually improving their instructional efforts. Researchers will do more applied work and will compile their results into useful, practical, and readable prose. The field will have a common body of knowledge required of all its participants. Discussions of what works will be productive and evidence-based, pushing the field forward instead of bouncing it from one fad to another. Researchers and practitioners will learn from each other. The field will include a large cadre of research-practitioners. Salaries for practitioners will double. Researchers who focus on applied work will be honored within the academy.


Work-Learning Research

Will founded Work-Learning Research in 1998 to bring research-based knowledge to the learning-and-performance field and narrow the gap between research and practice. His efforts continue as he shares his work with researchers and practitioners from around the world.


Education

Will earned BA in psychology from Pennsylvania State University, an MBA from Drexel University, and a PhD in human learning and cognition from Columbia University.

 

 

 

 

   
   

 

   
 

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