We’ve got an engagement problem in L&D, and it’s not what you think.
It’s not that learners are distracted or have short attention spans. It’s not that they need more gamification or flashier interactions. The real problem? We’ve become so obsessed with making learning “engaging” that we’ve forgotten how to make it compelling.
There’s a difference between “that’s cool” and “I need to know what happens next.” And right now, due to AI and a range of other tools, most of our training is landing squarely in the “that’s cool” category before learners click away and forget everything.
The Shiny Object Syndrome
Walk into any L&D conference and you’ll hear the same conversations. VR this, AI that, complex branching scenarios, microlearning, social learning platforms. Everyone’s building the latest shiny thing, convinced that the right tool will finally crack the engagement code.
But here’s what we’re missing: Your favorite Netflix series doesn’t keep you binge-watching because of glamorous lighting or special effects. It keeps you watching because it creates stories that make you need to know what happens next.
Your learners aren’t looking for cool. They’re looking for compelling. They want to care about what they’re learning, not just complete it.
Boring Branching is not Compelling
The solution? Let’s do more branching. But let’s talk about branching scenarios for a minute. They were supposed to be the answer to boring, linear training. Give learners choices, let them see consequences, make them active participants instead of passive consumers. The idea is compelling: real engagement through real decision-making.
And in theory, that should work brilliantly. The problem isn’t with the concept – it’s with how we’re executing it.
Everyone knows (or should know) how to build them. The technology has been around for years, it’s relatively easy to produce, the templates are everywhere, and they check all the “interactive learning” boxes.
So why do most of them suck?
Because we’re creating Choose Your Own Adventure books with characters we wouldn’t care about in real life. “Meet Sarah, a project manager who needs to have a difficult conversation with her team member, Bob, about his performance.”
Yawn.
Sarah and Bob are cardboard cutouts. There’s no tension, no stakes, no reason to care what happens to them. We get the structure right but completely miss the story. And when people care about the outcome, they actually remember what you taught them.
What Makes People Actually Want to Engage in Learning?
Think about the last time you fell down a Wikipedia rabbit hole or got sucked into a documentary series. What happened there?
You encountered something that didn’t quite make sense. A gap between what you expected and what you found. A story that started in one place and took a turn you didn’t see coming.
That’s what we need to build into learning – not the “aha, that’s interesting” moment, but the “wait, what? I need to understand this” moment.
Real engagement comes from that uncomfortable feeling when things don’t quite add up. When learners encounter something that challenges what they thought they knew, their brains literally can’t let it go until they resolve it.
Why Your Brain Loves Unfinished Business
Your brain has a built-in bias called the “Zeigarnik effect” – discovered by psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik in the 1920s when she noticed waiters could remember incomplete orders better than completed ones. This effect means you remember incomplete or interrupted tasks better than completed ones.
That’s why cliffhangers work, why you can’t stop thinking about unsolved problems, and why the best learning leaves you with questions instead of answers.
The Story Your Learning Should Tell
Every piece of effective training tells a story, whether you realize it or not. The question is: what story are you telling?
Most training tells the story of “Here’s some information you need to know.” That’s not a story – that’s a manual.
The stories that stick tell us about change, conflict, and resolution. They show us people facing real challenges with real consequences. They make us care about the outcome because we can see ourselves in that situation.
Instead of standard learning objectives: “This module will demonstrate how to handle difficult customer conversations.”
Write to set the stage: Picture this! “Marcus just hung up the phone. His biggest client is furious, the solution isn’t working, and they’re threatening to walk. What happens next depends on Marcus’s next move.”
See the difference? One is information delivery. The other is a story that makes you want to know what Marcus did and whether it worked.
But here’s what’s really happening in your learner’s brain when they encounter Marcus’s story: instead of passively receiving information about ‘conflict resolution techniques,’ they’re immediately thrown into problem-solving mode. Their brain starts running scenarios, weighing options, predicting outcomes. They’ve become an active participant in Marcus’s dilemma before you’ve even started teaching them anything.
That mental shift from passive recipient to active problem-solver is what creates truly compelling learning. When learners are invested in the outcome – when they genuinely want to know if Marcus saves his career – they’re primed to absorb and remember whatever tools and strategies you’re about to give them.
How to Build Learning That Creates “I Need to Know” Moments
- Start with Real Stakes: Every learning scenario should have something meaningful at risk. Not “you might get this question wrong” but “this decision could impact real people in real ways.” Stakes create investment.
- Use Incomplete Information: Don’t give learners everything they need upfront. Let them wrestle with partial information, make decisions based on what they know, and then reveal additional context that might change everything.
- Build in Genuine Surprises: Show learners situations where the “obvious” solution doesn’t work, or where following best practices leads to unexpected results. These surprises create the cognitive tension that drives deeper learning.
- Create Characters Worth Caring About: Stop using generic “Sarah the project manager.” Create people with specific backgrounds, motivations, and challenges. Give them quirks, histories, and reasons for making the choices they make.
- Connect to Something Bigger: Help learners see how individual decisions connect to larger outcomes. Show the ripple effects. Make them understand that what they’re learning matters beyond just completing the training.
Making This Work in Different Formats
Online Learning: The Serial Approach. Structure your content like a series rather than standalone episodes. Each module should end with a question or situation that makes learners want to continue to the next one. Think of this as a cliff hanger for learning!
Virtual Sessions: The Investigation. Present your group with a complex situation that unfolds throughout the session. Give them pieces of information at different points and let them build understanding together. Think of this as a Murder Mystery Club only for learning!
Classroom Training: The Case That Evolves. Start with a real case study, but don’t reveal everything at once. Let it evolve throughout the day as new concepts are introduced, showing how each piece fits into the larger puzzle. Think of this like an investigative reporter, how does your story evolve with new information?
Let’s Wrap This Up
We’ve become so obsessed with learner satisfaction that we’re afraid to leave anything unresolved. But learning doesn’t need a rom-com ending where everything gets wrapped up perfectly. Sometimes the most powerful training sessions are the ones that end with more questions than answers, where learners walk away still thinking, still wrestling, still engaged with the ideas days later.
So here’s your challenge: Pick one piece of training you’re working on right now and resist the urge to wrap it up neatly. Leave learners with a question to ponder, a scenario to consider, or a tension to resolve on their own. Then schedule a follow-up session a week or two later to see what happened. Ask them what they discovered, what questions came up, what they tried in their real work. You might be surprised by how much more they remember, how deeply they’ve thought about it, and how much more they actually apply what they’ve learned.
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