Who you gonna call when handwashing compliance is low?
Personal Best Academy
When training fails because old habits die hard. A fresh approach to improving learning and transfer of training in infection control,
eradicating bad or unsafe habits, correcting misconceptions and other persistent behaviours
hand washing behaviour change | changing habit patterns | why old habits die hard | improving hand washing compliance | proof of concept | hand washing compliance program | ordering

Hand washing rapid behaviour change program

This behaviour change program:

  • can greatly improve hand washing compliance
  • can quickly correct hand hygiene habits
  • can speed up transition and conversion training
  • can greatly improve transfer of learning
  • increases employee flexibility and adaptability to change
  • is being used by both large and small corporations, government departments and small businesses
  • uses a learning method proven in workplace trials
  • is backed by published research, case studies and workplace trials
  • is readily adopted and used by infection control staff, workplace trainers, instructors and coaches as part of their professional toolkit
  • is available on CD (Windows computers) or a Flash-based online course (Windows & Mac).
-up

Habit patterns

Trainers, teachers, instructors and sports coaches try to get it right the first time with their trainees, students and athletes but invariably end up spending a lot of time trying to correct errors, misconceptions, non-compliance, technique faults and bad habits that somehow develop.

Because these errors were not corrected early, and were inadvertently repeated over and over, i.e., practiced, many error patterns are actually learned, habitual and automatic and therefore much harder to eradicate.

For example, Tony never washes his hands after patient contact; Mike always has to be reminded to wear his safety goggles; John always writes "recieve" instead of "receive" Mary always slices her golf swing; Susan always follow cars too closely when driving; and Geoff is mentally still following the previous aircraft’s pre-flight checklist even though he's converted to another aircraft.

We all know that old habits die hard and many habit patterns are resistant to conventional change methods.

These limitations of traditional teaching, coaching and training programs are apparent in all settings including sport, workplace training, education, therapy and personal development.

Re-training or re-education, the typical solution to these problems, improves things only slowly, if at all.

Although learners may appear to pay attention during instruction and practice their new, correct, skills and knowledge over and over, the next day when placed under performance pressure or when unsupervised and left to their own devices, they seem to have forgotten what they’ve learned and the same habit pattern errors, e.g., old entrenched attitudes, beliefs, misunderstandings, work practices and routines, faulty procedures, poor techniques and unsafe behaviours, resurface.

A prolonged adjustment period and poor transfer of learning are the typical outcomes of education, training and coaching efforts worldwide.

All this wastes talent and resources and makes change and transition programs so much less cost-effective. There has to be a better way.

Fortunately, a cognitive science discovery called Old Way/New Way® Learning offers a:

  • new perspective on the transfer of training problem
  • cost-effective and user-friendly method for rapid skill and technique correction and habit eradication
  • fast and practical method of transition and conversion training.
-up

Old habits die hard

One of the most time consuming and costly aspects of infection control programs is that, despite quality education and training, people keep falling back to old ways.

From the point of view of the person who is trying to change his or her established habit of not washing hands, the explanation of how proactive habit interference blocks or slows down learning and change is like this:

  1. People are not a blank slate; not even beginners. Self-teaching attempts and observation of others have taught them at least some ideas, some basic skills. Unfortunately, concepts and skills may be incorrect or incomplete. New employees sometimes "get it wrong".
  2. Experienced employees' knowledge and skills can also become incorrect, incomplete or outdated over time, making them less effective performers. They then face having to change.
  3. If not corrected early, their outdated or faulty knowledge and skills soon develop into learned errors, misconceptions and ingrained bad habits, e.g., unsafe or inefficient working practices.
  4. Habits are automatic, reflex-like acts and behaviours that are not under conscious control - by the time you realise what you've done wrong, its too late to stop.
  5. In training sessions the trainer points out errors, shows employees a better way and then they copy and practice it.
  6. During training they appear to catch on and can actually do the right thing, at least while the trainer is nearby and therefore serving as a cue for the correct performance.
  7. They may do the right thing afterwards, too, at least for a while, but they have to concentrate hard each time on exactly what to do.
  8. The new idea or procedure feels strange having done it the other way for so long.
  9. Because the new idea or procedure differs from the old idea or procedure there is a conflict or tension between them.
  10. Your brain detects this conflict and instantly activates proactive inhibition (PI for short) or proactive habit interference, a well researched knowledge protection mechanism.
  11. PI protects and preserves all your learned knowledge and skills, right and wrong, and strongly resists and slows down any attempt to change your prior knowledge and skills.
  12. We all have this knowledge protection mechanism but it is stronger in some people. It is an unconscious mechanism and we have little or no control over it.
  13. The level of PI a person has is not associated with their intellectual ability or "IQ".
  14. PI is why old ideas, attitudes, beliefs, skills, habits and techniques die hard and why self-improvement is so difficult, slow and frustrating under conventional training methods.
  15. PI causes accelerated forgetting (within minutes or hours) of the new way and this is why you revert to your old incorrect understanding or way of working when you return to the workplace.
  16. You know what you're doing wrong and what you should do and you're highly motivated to improve but your brain (force of habit, i.e., PI) won't let you change.
  17. Problems in adapting to change, then, are caused by what you already know, not by what you don't know.
  18. It is a sobering fact that with conventional methods it can take you up to 2,000 repetitions of the new way before you are comfortable and competent with the new approach and it replaces your "old" way.

Proactive habit interference is a major cause of a wide range of workplace change management problems including:

  • non-compliance with SOP's
  • poor or unsafe work habits
  • problems of skill development
  • poor transfer of learning from workplace training and coaching to work on-the-job performance
  • transitioning problems
  • slow and low uptake of new technology by management and others
  • problems with goal setting, focusing and coping with distractions
  • many team problems.

PI is the real reason why a lot of training programs fail, i.e., why employees go back to their "old" ways and it takes a long time to have a lasting effect on employee work habits, procedures, methods and techniques.

Now you know what the problem is and what it feels like, you are ready for the solution. Being aware of PI and it's effects, however, is not enough to overcome it. Simply re-teaching a skill or procedure to fix non-compliance, even when supported by specific videotaped feedback to improve awareness, is unlikely to work quickly if at all. You need an alternative workplace coaching method that bypasses habit interference altogether in order to accelerate learning and skill development. This coaching method is called Old Way/New Way®.

Old Way/New Way® can overcome workplace performance difficulties permanently and more quickly than conventional, i.e., currently available, workplace coaching methods.

-up

Hand washing behaviour change program—what is Old Way/New Way® Learning?

Old Way/New Way® Learning is an innovative metacognitive learning strategy that has been used successfully at ALCOA in workplace trials with safety training and work habit change. It enables an employee to mediate change, i.e., to stand between the old and the new and sort out their differences so that learning is greatly accelerated and employees become more flexible and adaptable and empowered to take personal control of the change process. Old Way/New Way® is a unique synthesis of past and emerging psychological research into learning, sport psychology, coaching science and training science.

Personal Best Academy uses and teaches Old Way/New Way® to workplace educators, trainers and coaches, occupational medicine practitioners, physiotherapists, Alexander Technique practitioners and other individuals seeking to improve safety and performance at work.

Old Way/New Way® has been taught to workplace trainers and coaches at KAAL Pty., Ltd, a joint venture of Kobe Steel and the Aluminum Company of America, in Geelong, Victoria.

Old Way/New Way® is not like behaviour modification, brainwashing or hypnosis, nor is it psychological conditioning

It is readily incorporated into what workplace coaches and trainers normally do and is well-accepted by employees and management - it is very user-friendly as well as cost-effective

Based on a novel interpretation and synthesis of well researched and accepted learning principles, Old Way/New Way® is far superior to conventional approaches to facilitating and managing transition problems, changing work habits and and developing new skills

Old Way/New Way® is done in practical, hands-on situations where the facilitator works with the employees and their workplace trainer or coach

With Old Way/New Way® there is no need for special equipment, although the use of video feedback, stop-motion analysis and kinaesthetic feedback can be helpful with complicated performance skills

Old Way/New Way® works with the brain, not against it, to accelerate the natural process of change.

-up

Proof of concept

Old Way/New Way® behaviour change program workplace trials and research evidence

An annotated bibliography of published research and case studies on Old Way/New Way can be found here and here.

Changing Work Habits: More Gain, Less Pain, Australian Safety News, October 2000, pages 58-59. National Safety Council of Australia Ltd. By Graham Weaver, Training Coordinator, KAAL Pty Ltd., Point Henry, Geelong, Victoria. Paul Baxter, Mediational Learning Consultant, Department of Training & Industrial Relations, Brisbane, Queensland and Harry Lyndon, Department of Education, Training & Employment, Adelaide, South Australia. "KAAL Australia (a joint venture of Kobe Steel and ALCOA) writes about a new process of Skill Mediation (Old Way/New Way®) which aims to change behaviour at work in the name of good OHS." More ...

The Education Boom. Jarek Czechowicz. Management Today. November-December 2000. Pages 12 and 13. Australian Institute of Management. Knowledge is an enterprise's greatest resource. Online management development is fast and cheap. By 2002, more than half of all training will be technology based, with the remainder taking place in the classroom. This article discusses the proactive habit interference mechanism that slows down change and continuous improvement in knowledge and skills. The solution, Old Way/New Way®, accelerates human learning and allows the rapid uptake of new knowledge and skills.

The Airline Training Pilot. Second edition. Tony Smallwood. Ashgate Publishing Ltd. 2000. Chapter 6, pages 113-130. This chapter on the process of learning contains an in depth discussion of the theoretical background to Old Way/New Way® and its application to pilot training. Section headings include:

  • Behaviour change
  • What do we do about non-compliance or non-achievement?
  • Why do people keep falling back to old ways?
  • Error analysis: diagnosing non-compliance and performance difficulties
  • Unlearning of misconceptions
  • Your old (prior) learning can interfere with new learning
  • The "attitude problem" fallacy
  • The "employee education is what's needed" fallacy
  • Accelerated forgetting
  • A new way of changing and improving: Old Way/New Way®.
-up

Hand washing behaviour change program—a new model for workplace learning | on CD or as a Flash-based online course

Old Way/New Way® offers an entirely new approach to changing work habits and procedures, skill development, technique correction, performance slump recovery and other workplace learning difficulties, whether these be physical or mental. Although highly innovative, this methodology is readily integrated into what workplace trainers and employees normally do in their quest for skill development and continuous improvement.

  1. Old Way/New Way® is a unique example of successful collaboration between researchers and practitioners to design the most effective training protocols.
  2. Old Way/New Way® is basically a Neo-Constructivist model - the employee is the one who is responsible for learning, understanding and changing.
  3. The coach's ability to identify and diagnose the change problem is critical, as is his or her ability to identify, explain and demonstrate to the employee the "correct" way. This befits the trainer's and coach's role as the expert.
  4. The employee can be empowered through Old Way/New Way® to take on personal responsibility for improving.
  5. The employee's prior knowledge and skills (incorrect as well as correct) must be incorporated into any change strategy.
  6. If no conflict is likely between new and pre-existing knowledge and skills, then a conventional training/coaching strategy is OK and new knowledge and skills will consolidate and build on old.
  7. However, when prior knowledge and skills are likely to conflict with the new, the employee needs to follow prescribed Old Way/New Way procedures and not just attempt to practice the new while ignoring pre-existing knowledge and skills.
-up

Orders

Training in Old Way/New Way® Learning is available on CD or as a Flash-based online course, the latter either with or without email support. Training workshops for small groups are also available. Here are the four options.

On CD

The course is designed by professional educators and follows modern instructional design principles. The Flash-based course is self-paced, very interactive and self-contained. Step by step instructions, examples and case studies teach you all about Old Way/New Way® Learning and how to apply it to a wide range of human performance problems in your field of interest, including hand washing.For Windows computers. AU$59. Order form.

Online course

Same content as the CD course. Windows & Mac. AU$59. Order form.

Online course with implementation support

Same content as the online course with the addition of implementation support by email and the ability to select your own target behaviours to change. AU$395. Order form.

Workshop

The one-day training workshop provides face-to-face instruction and follow up support for small groups of practitioners, e.g., workplace trainers, nurse educators, behaviour change specialists, and so on. Email us for more information.

-up