The Sixfold Course Development Process
The Sixfold Course Development Process lists the important milestone events in the development of a standard course. Based on the planned course date, all prior milestone dates are calculated automatically (but can be amended where special considerations need to be taken into account).
The Milestones:
- Customer sponsor nominated
- Course content defined
- Draft material produced
- Internal review
- Customer approval
- Course Summary approved for print
- Course confirmed
- Venue confirmed
- Travel, accommodation, supplies checked
- Pre-course e-mail
- Copy deadline
- Materials print ready
- Attendee list closed
- Rehearsal
A specific client individual must be nominated as the course sponsor. This person must have the authority to sign off the developed course material on behalf of the client
The agenda, the key learning points, specific exercises and supporting material are defined and agreed
Draft versions of all instructor and delegate material are ready to review
The first quality check is carried out at this stage. As well as checking for accuracy and consistency, the material will be reviewed against the initial course objectives and learning points to ensure that these are fully acceptable to Sixfold standards
Final approval of all the materials at this stage rests with the customers sponsor
This is an optional step
This is the point of no return. The course will now take place on the date scheduled
Check customer has all venue arrangements in place and has been supplied with facilities checklist
Check that customer and Sixfold arrangements are synchronised and complete
Draft ready to send to customer including pre-course material and any special instructions
Beyond this point Sixfold changes to the course material is frozen
All course materials complete and approved by customer
Check that customer attendee list is complete and numbers have been confirmed
This is the second quality check and is performed with both the Quality Manager and selected Sixfold team members. Ideally, the client will be involved at this stage, but this is often subject to customer resource constraints.
Material Checklist
The following is a standard material checklist for most courses. Clearly from time to time specific courses will require different materials:
- PowerPoint presentation (if used)
- Instructor guide
- Delegate copy of presentation
- Delegate post-course handout
- Delegate exercise guide
- Delegate exercise materials
- Action planning sheets
- Delegate feedback sheets
- Completed course facilities checklist
- Guidance notes for passing learning on to others
- Miscellaneous additional materials list
Additional Consideration for Customised Courses
In order to prevent instructor illness or unavailability from affecting a planned course schedule, it will be necessary to ensure that a minimum of two instructors are able to deliver each course. In order to do this Sixfold will build into a plan the concept of a lead and a deputy instructor. Both the lead and the deputy will work together on developing the course material and will both attend the first two or three delivered events. The number of dual events will be chosen by Sixfold to be confident in its ability to provide competent alternative course leaders in an emergency.
The lead instructor will deliver the first course, share the delivery of the second with the deputy, and should it deem necessary, quality assure the full delivery of the third by the deputy. This will ensure that for the full roll-out two instructors are able to deliver each course and that course tuning is achieved effectively.
