Technical Reflection

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Artifact: Red Robin POS CBT from ED TEC 795A
Red Robin project documents

Project Description / Situation:

My project partner, Gary Grant and I were asked to work with Amy Lane Park, Director of Instructional Design & Development for Red Robin Gourmet Restaurants. Red Robin wanted to develop computer-based training for their Point-of-Service (POS) system to replace the paper-based workbook they use for new service team members. They had previously worked with an intern who was supposed to design and develop the entire CBT. The project turned out to be larger than they anticipated and as result the intern had only completed about half of the design work when Gary and I were assigned. 

Outcome:
To save some time, we decided to split the work. I worked on the content and Gary started to develop a template for the CBT using Adobe Captivate. We determined that the best way to design the CBT would be to group tasks based on common criteria and divide them into modules. Once we identified all of the tasks, we broke them out into five modules. With the help of a Red Robin Senior Trainer, we documented the remaining tasks and steps. All of the content was compiled into a Detailed Lesson Plan. At the same time, Gary worked with the Red Robin IT contact to test and revise the CBT template until we were confident that it would work on the Red Robin POS terminals. Once the first module content was approved, Gary began to develop the first module in the CBT and I continued to work on the design of the remaining modules. While we fell short of our plan to have completed the entire CBT by the end of the semester, Gary and I felt satisfied that we had left Red Robin in a good place. The CBT template would give Red Robin the tool they needed to develop the remaining modules and the Detailed Lesson Plan would provide them with all the content.

Challenges:
Anyone who has ever picked up a project already in development can understand what a challenge it is to take on someone else’s work. Essentially, Gary and I had to start from the beginning and identify the tasks and steps of the POS system that should be included in the CBT before we could begin to develop the technical tool. 

There were also technical challenges. Red Robin had to ship laptops to each of us as well as separate Captivate software. The laptops did not have any other design software (i.e.; Word and SnagIt), which made it difficult to keep all of our design documents in one place. As a result, we had to use both the Red Robin laptops as well as our own work laptops, which had Word and SnagIt. Red Robin also did not have a learning management system, so the new CBT had to work on the POS terminals at the restaurant locations, which use touch screen technology.  

Growth:
As an Instructional Designer, I have designed and developed computer-based training for my company – already knowing some of the challenges I might face. It was interesting to see what challenges other companies have in the way of technology and how they work through it to complete the project. Working with Red Robin has given me a new appreciation for the other projects I work on and ideas for how to resolve my own challenges.





Copyright © 2010 by Janet L. Saman for the Department of Educational Technology at San Diego State University. All Rights Reserved.