Abstract:

Aim:
The purpose of this presentation is to evaluate the real effectiveness of four teaching tools used in the training of executives and students: what is the real power of immersive stories relating experiences? What is the real power of memorizing an exhibit summarizing a concept? How are the times of exchange between participants value-creating for the participants? Is explaining the best way to transmit knowledge? These four questions are fundamental and affect all disciplines.

Context:
The experience presented is in a training session for a group of 57 executives on the theme of strategic management. All participants had a recognized professional experience. The trainer was thus clearly asked not to use a traditional teaching method but to imagine an innovative teaching scenario where other alternative ways would have three benefits: to impact the participants, to provoke their commitment in the training time, to memorize key messages.

How:
The innovation was first of all to deport the transfer of knowledge on a platform where future participants found various resources to read: book chapters, professional or academic articles, testimonials in the form of video. The face-to-face time is devoted to scenarios. A series of tools for strategic analysis have been worked out by systematically using the four steps: Explain: point of theory on the concept studied / Experiment: narrative of a success story on a mini business case / Exhibit: summary on an easy to memorize graph / Exchange: use the experience of participants to enrich the theme.

Participant’s satisfaction:
A training evaluation questionnaire showed that the fourth "Ex" devoted to exchanging under the guidance of the teacher-trainer was the most appreciated. In contrast, the "explaining" aspect is the least expected of the "4 magic Ex". Indeed, the participants having committed to work the documents beforehand, this part can be lightened.

Innovation:
The innovation comes from the new pace of animation that entails this finding: successive use of the four "Ex" in a weighted manner depending on the session and audience.
The technical innovation comes from the support of an instant sharing tool (Padlet). Speed, interactivity, ease of memorization, creativity are the main contributions of this method.

Limits:
This method requires a real commitment from each participant before and during the session. Supplements in the form of reading are also necessary. The professor must be very concentrated during the exchanges: it is no longer a course prepared in advance, but an adaptation to the different contributions of the participants.

Benefit for the audience:
This is a real innovation. It will be useful to all trainers who are aware that traditional teaching methods do not work when one really wants to use the experience and skills of his audience.
But this presentation also poses a fundamental question to the audience: the transfer of knowledge comes not primarily from the art of explaining concepts but that of engaging participants in their own learning process.

How:
The ease of implementation is based on a two-dimensional technology: a good LMS + the use of an instant sharing tool. On the pedagogical level, success rests on the ability of the professor to take into account the participants' points of view and then to synthesize the diversity of exchanges in simple messages.

Keywords:

Flipped teaching, executive education, transmit vs explain.