Building a strong learning and development program doesn’t start with complex theories or endless data; it starts with clarity. Many training programs fail because they lack a clear framework that links purpose, delivery, and learner impact. That’s where Brady’s Four E’s come in.
This simple, practical model helps L&D professionals benchmark training content and design programs that actually work. By focusing on how we educate through policy, empower through feedback, equip through innovation, and expand through accessibility, it turns training from a task into a tool for growth—both for the business and for the people within it.
| Key Takeaways |
|---|
| 1. Educate: Build training on policy and procedure first—without it, learning goes off-track. |
| 2. Empower: Real empowerment comes from listening and acting on stakeholder feedback, not just surveys. |
| 3. Equip: Use innovative tools and foster collaboration to make learning practical and engaging. |
| 4. Expand: Make content accessible and easy to use so every learner can benefit. |
| 5. Self-Sufficiency: Training should enable learners to grow independently, not just attend courses. |
Finding Clarity: The Search for a Simple Framework
- You create and deliver content. Your content is captivating.
- You command an audience. You’re charismatic.
- You have professional training experience and certifications. You’re qualified.
- You have to develop a training program. You don’t know where to start!
I have been there. When tasked with creating a training program early on in my L&D career, I was at a loss. I knew that there needed to be a framework. This framework would guide my decisions for which content and programs needed to be delivered, which ones needed to be shelved, and which ones needed to be scrapped. I needed a framework to help me benchmark training content. How do I know what is important?
I started by reading everything on leadership, training, program development, productivity, accessibility, and company growth I could get my hands on. I furiously highlighted, underlined, and memorized an intense amount of content. I listened and spoke to many of the great minds on these topics for hours on end.
After this massive ingestion of content, combined with the years of frontline work in L&D, I realized that a learning and development program was not built on complex jargon that only the greatest minds could understand; it is built on simplicity. That simplicity came to me in a version I call the Four E’s.
The first E is the foundation…
1. EDUCATE – Policy and Procedure
All companies exist – and stay open – at their base level on policy and procedure. These are what guide many company processes and decisions, as well as ethical behavior. If employees are trained without policy and procedure as a foundation, then the training can go off the rails. The other four E’s can’t exist without this one.
“You can have a course on how being late for a shift is unethical behavior, but it is just a business ethics course if it isn’t based on company policy.“
Consider the employee who is consistently late. Their behavior elicits groans from the other employees, and their supervisor is stressed out by their tardiness. So, the supervisor asks you to ‘set them on the right path’ by instructing them on tardiness and its impact on productivity. When you ask for the policy for reference, they tell you that it is just common sense.
So, you spend a considerable amount of time developing the course, then deliver the content. However, the employee still comes in late, almost like the course never happened. You can have a course on how being late for a shift is unethical behavior, but it is just a business ethics course if it isn’t based on company policy.
2. EMPOWER – Effective Training & Employee Feedback
I have created hundreds of courses on topics ranging from sexual harassment, improved communication, better leadership, to how to use AI. My baseline has been to get verbal feedback during the course, then offer a course survey afterward. I have also sent multiple company-wide yearly training needs assessments to gauge the impact of the training at a greater level.
The content will not reach its mark in part if it is not gauged for impact upon delivery. These surveys and assessments ask what training they would like to see offered, as well as the overall impact of the content they have watched, read, or attended.
If we are using the surveys and assessments as our only measuring line for improvement, we will always miss the mark on empowering training. We can slog through to find the most impactful survey and assessment questions, add them to ours, and send them to our learners. This is a fantastic start. You can certainly improve the content you deliver after reviewing the feedback surveys.
“The truth is that real empowerment happens in the discussions with stakeholders away from the training room.“
You can even review forums, podcasts, books, and articles on how others have improved their content for delivery. These are great! The truth is that real empowerment happens in the discussions with stakeholders away from the training room. Allowing people the opportunity to be heard is one of the most empowering things you can do as an L&D professional. The buy-in to the content created from the discussion will almost be automatic.
3. EQUIP – Innovation & Collaboration
I am all about policy and procedure being the baseline. On the other hand, I believe as an L&D professional that innovation is necessary. For example, when I started in L&D, my presentations were done on massive flipcharts and transparency projectors! PowerPoint was a lightning rod for presentations. Technology continues to advance for training delivery.
As technology advances, our learning delivery methods need to advance as well. Hour-long, in-person courses, being the peak of content delivery, are no longer relevant. If we fail to magnify our process to reach learners of all learning types, as well as refine our process, we will become irrelevant. Learners don’t need quantity – they need quality. Innovative authoring tools are what will help achieve it.
Video creation tools such as Camtasia, SOP e-authoring tools such as Scribe, e-authoring tools such as Intellek Create), and AI tools such as ChatGPT, Copilot, and Perplexity are available for L&D professionals to use for program and content enhancement.
Collaboration is also a key part of equipping our learners. If the tools we use hamper collaboration, we are stifling productivity, and in turn, possibly contributing to employee dissatisfaction because of the results they aren’t achieving.
4. EXPAND – Accessibility & Ease of Use
You’ve done it. You created a How-to Guide masterpiece for Outlook. Eighty glorious pages, size 11 font, Times New Roman, with no pictures. Even better, you have bolded some words and made them red.
Yes, you have created the greatest doorstop the world has ever seen.
You may think, “I understand it. It makes sense to me. And this red font is flashy.”
You have a point – you understand it. That is good news for you as a trainer. However, the audience you are trying to reach needs visual aids, and a color they can see. Not everyone can see red. So, how do you improve the color and add photos that make sense?
Using the Snipping Tool (for Windows) is one place to start. If you need to see how someone who has colorblindness will see the page, use the free tool Coblis – the colorblind simulator from Colblindor.
[Editor’s note: Try out this free tool for checking if your color choices are accessible and compliant with WCAG contrast requirements.]
If you have learners with mobility issues, conducting training sessions via Zoom or Teams is vital to ensure they can access the content without unnecessary travel. It can also be done for people who are several time zones or miles away. If the session can be conducted remotely, do it.
Stop Checking Boxes. Start Building Capability.
Training content is great to absorb as a first-time learner. If we force-feed people a monthly required course on Outlook 101, Keyboarding, and How to Use a Mouse – courses exaggerated for effect, although I have seen some required courses like this! – We will reduce impact, increase reliance, and decrease our value. Why learn it when they can just continue to attend a class and re-learn it?
Or, if we make a course so difficult to understand by how we deliver it, we are ultimately having a course for the sake of having a course. We checked the Quantity box ☑️
“We are not just in the business of education; we are in the business of self-sufficiency.“
Training to educate is a great thing. It improves the knowledge base of our learners. We are not just in the business of education; we are in the business of self-sufficiency. Our goal is not to teach in such a way that people come away from our training session by thinking we are experts on our content, but aren’t able to use the knowledge themselves.
4 E’s to Benchmark Training Content
We should start people on the path to better understanding, but the goal should be to give them the tools and confidence to do it themselves. If they are not growing outside of our sessions, then we need to re-evaluate our deliverables.
The Four E’s have laid the foundation for successful training programs in several different companies, in several types of industries. Once you have your foundation to benchmark training content, all the L&D programming will fall in place. You may use the four E’s, or change the letters to match your industry. Make it your own, and do the best you can, with what you have, where you are.
With over 25 years of experience in designing and implementing impactful training and leadership development programs, Brady has consistently driven organizational success by enhancing employee performance, fostering leadership capabilities, and delivering measurable cost savings. His expertise spans multiple industries, where he has successfully tailored programs to meet diverse business needs while aligning with strategic goals.
