I’ve long been interested in technology and its potential to make life easier and more efficient. However, I’m definitely not a pointy-headed tech nerd. Tech jargon user-unfriendly pieces of software drive me insane.

One of my particular pet peeves is the ability of the tech world to make something simple and every day sound much more complicated than it actually is.

One of my favourite toe-curlers is ‘boot up’ or ‘reboot’. For the ordinary folk in the room, ‘start’, ‘switch on’ or ‘restart’ seems like a perfectly reasonable and well-understood alternative.

And it’s amazing how, just when you thought you had heard all the weird and wonderful terms that the tech world can come up with, you discover a new one.

I honestly don’t know if this has come into use recently with the arrival of AI or if it has been around for a while and I’d just never come across it before; but a newly discovered tech term for me is ‘ingest’ or ‘ingestion’.

Now the standard usage, of course, would be in a biological or medical context.

But in the best traditions of tech jargon, this slightly obscure verb/noun combination, which is definitely not used much in everyday speech, has become the standard way to describe how a file or doc has been uploaded and chunked by a GPT’s knowledge base.

Granted, it is a term that most people will more or less understand; and, ‘yes’ there is some logic behind its use. In a biological/medical context, of course, it describes the full consumption/digestion of something into something else; and this is clearly the intent behind the tech usage.

But really? Couldn’t we just say, the files have been uploaded and chunked?

Of course, the annoying thing about all of this jargon is that once it’s established, if you are working in a tech context in which it is used, at the very least you have to make the effort to understand it; and (shudder) eventually you’ll almost certainly find yourself using it.

In short, sometimes you have no choice but to learn to speak the tech ‘lingo.’

If you have read some of my recent posts, you’ll know that I’m in the early stages of building an AI-powered app for L&D called PerformaGo. I’m also keeping a diary-like blog which is documenting the journey ‘behind the scenes.’

I’ve divided the diary into 4 broad sections, one of which is called, ‘Learning to speak API’. It’s all about understanding, unpacking and explaining the tech ‘lingo’ and concepts so they make sense to me and to ordinary readers like you.

So, why not follow along if you are interested. And if you’ve got any particular tech-speak pet-peeves, I’d love to hear from you.

This isn’t the first time that I’ve made reference to what I call Storyline’s ‘secret weapon’. A Storyline ‘advanced’ feature that gets buried away in the background because it’s not very ‘sexy’ nor particularly easy to market. Yet learning to use it can transform the e-learning courses you build.

In case you are wondering? I’m talking about Storyline variables.

However, the purpose of today’s post is not to write extensively about Storyline variables. (If you are interested, I have written about Storyline variables here).

What interests me today is the fact that lots of software/technologies often have some kind of ‘secret weapon’. In other words, a hidden something that a majority of users don’t know about, which is incredibly powerful or useful but somehow never gets the attention it deserves.

Typically, the hidden something is conceptually abstract or technically a bit complex; so, it takes some care and effort to explain it clearly and easily. And it often takes some care and effort by software users to really reap the benefits of it.

Which usually leaves it friendless. Tucked away in an obscure corner of the interface by UX and UI designers. Shunned by the marketers (just not ‘sexy’ enough). Glossed over by the technical writers and technology evangelists.

And you can understand why. In the push to get a piece of software or a technology widely adopted as quickly as possible, the most popular and easiest to use features are, inevitably, going to get the most attention.

And in lots of ways, that is a good, user-centred approach. After all, if the software or technology in question isn’t obviously solving some kind of problem or making it easier or possible to do something that was previously difficult or impossible to do, what’s the point?

But this also misses an important point. Hiding that more difficult-to-explain feature probably results in inferior user output. Returning to the example I opened with, this is absolutely true in the case of Storyline variables. It’s not that you need to use them in every single course that you create. But never using them at all will absolutely reduce the creative potential and the effectiveness of your instructional design.

So, why am I obsessing about all this, at the moment? Well, you may already know that I’m working on a new software tool for L&D called PerformaGo. And the AI technology that this software is designed to help L&D folk like yourself unleash, definitely has its own buried treasures. (Something I’ve been writing about here). In essence, it’s about how you provide specific knowledge to your custom GPT so that you get reliable, accurate output when it’s being used by a learner.

Which means that this particular ‘buried treasure’ is going to play a very significant role in making the PerformaGo tool a success. The question of how that specific knowledge is packaged up and accessed can’t be glossed over, in the hope that some users will find it and work out how to use it. It needs to be front and centre.

And that will be a challenge. Because in some respects this element is a bit abstract. It will definitely require some careful thought around how it is presented and explained to users within the software interface itself and in any related ‘help’ content or software onboarding.

But once you consider the benefits for L&D folk of getting this ‘buried treasure’ front and centre, the challenge of achieving that goal seems small by comparison.

If any of this interests you, or you like the idea of becoming an early adopter or pilot user of PerformaGo or you would just like to find out some more about the tool, why not join our early-bird waitlist.

And you can follow a more ‘behind-the-scenes’ take on the journey to build the PerformaGo software tool in my online diary.

I think there are many people in an L&D role who spend their days quietly tearing their hair out in frustration. They are what I call the order-takers. They came into the profession, like most of us do, because they like and care about people. They believe that learning can (and should) make a meaningful difference in someone’s professional life and career. Perhaps they experienced this in their own lives and wanted to help others achieve the same.

But somewhere along the way, something went horribly wrong. The job they thought they would be doing wasn’t the job they actually found themselves doing.

They became a harassed (and not very well-respected) internal supplier. Taking orders for courses and workshops others demanded from them. Courses and workshops that satisfy the demands of the order-giver but don’t do much to benefit the learners or the organisation they work in.

Perhaps this describes your situation right now. Or perhaps you’ve been there, done that and escaped to pastures new. Either way, being caught in a cycle of delivering training that doesn’t really solve problems and doesn’t really improve workplace performance is deeply frustrating and ultimately, very demotivating.

I’ve worked with scores of L&D teams over the years and witnessed people caught in the order-taking trap in a variety of sectors and industries. Almost everyone wants change. But how? How can we make the impact and build the influence that we keep saying we want, if just delivering excellent training is not enough.

The truth is, we need to get better at enabling performance. Which means getting much, much closer to our learners’ real moments of need. For example, when someone is:

• facing a new challenge on the job
• making a decision under pressure, or
• trying to apply a skill they should remember, but can’t quite recall

Those are the moments where performance can either bumble along as always or start to excel given the right support. Things like a timely nudge; a helpful prompt; a short, smart answer that moves someone forward, in the flow of work.

I learnt the importance of supporting those moments of need about 15 years ago, during a workshop run by Jim Kirkpatrick. And since then, I’ve spent years deeply frustrated by the fact that the concept is simple; but effective implementation of that concept is not.

However, that frustration is no more. Right now, I’ve finally found a way to do something I’ve wanted to do for years. A way to help L&D professionals design and deliver intelligent, contextual support for those very moments of learner need just described above.

This is not about trying to replace the learning experiences we already do well. It’s about adding a layer of performance-first thinking that gives our work more credibility, more relevance, and yes, more respect.

The future of L&D isn’t about smarter content. It’s about smarter integration with how workplace performance actually flows.

So, this is my new mission. And over the coming weeks, I’ll be sharing more about the journey that’s got me here — and the tools we’re building to help others add that layer of performance-first thinking.

If any of this resonates and you’ve felt the same frustrations, then I hope you’ll come along with me.

And if you would like a more personal take on this new mission of mine? I’m keeping a ‘behind the scenes’ diary of this new journey. You can follow the story here.