The Adoption of Performance Support Solutions in Organizations

Abstract

Performance support solutions integrate steps, procedures, information, and advice and make them available to learners at the moment of need in the flow of their day-to-day work. These types of solutions were introduced in the early 1990s but have not had significant traction in organizations despite many espoused benefits. This study examined detailed accounts of how 18 learning and development (L&D) leaders have implemented performance support in their organizations. The goal of this research was to identify common themes and best practices of successful performance support implementations and adoption that can better educate and assist learning leaders who are considering performance support. The results of this study culminated into a new adoption framework including organizational, innovation, individual, and external factors that influence adoption decisions and implementation. The organization’s learning culture, the L&D leaders influencing skills, and the ability to experiment and demonstrate success are key factors that drive adoption. The Coates Performance Support Adoption Framework© can help accelerate successful performance support implementations in organizations. This research contributes to a limited body of academic literature on performance support and can help advance the discipline of performance support within the learning and development community.