Creating Learner Personas as part of Needs Assessment
The Tool
Learner personas, a tool borrowed from UX design - read more about creating personas
The Purpose
Learner personas help communicate the needs of your learners to stakeholders in a way that tells a compelling, relatable story.
Use Case
Creating learner personas requires you to access a representative sample of learners for surveys and, ideally, interviews. They serve as a supplement—not a substitute—to a broader needs assessment aimed at identifying training needs.
Instructions
When planned correctly, the creation of learner personas can be part of conducting a needs assessment, without adding a lot of additional work to your project plan.
To create these personas:
Review any current learner feedback. Try to get a sense of the pain points learners in your organization experience.
Design your interviews with personas in mind. Focus not just on demographic data, but on your learners’ technology usage, emotions, and goals.
Conduct interviews or focus groups. Ideally, you should speak with high, mid, and low performers to gain a deeper understanding of their needs. Establish rapport with your learners and reassure them their answers will remain anonymous.
Focus on the learner journey during analysis. Rather than just focusing on the expected training outcomes, consider the journey learners will take to reach those outcomes. Bring that journey into your personas.
Summarize your findings: After gathering your data, create 3-5 learner personas (fictional “characters”) that are representative of your audience. These personas should tell stories that bring the data to life.
A strong learner persona should include:
A fictional name and photo
Career or job-related goals
Attitudes, beliefs, and opinions about their daily work
The skillsets they demonstrate in their work
Pros
Creating learner personas personalizes the story of the problem your learning design will solve for your stakeholders, without relying on the debunked myth of learning styles.
When grounded in real user data, personas can fill out the gaps in your Needs Assessment, giving an aggregate but in-depth answer to the question “Who are our learners.”
Personas help ensure you are not skipping important modality considerations, such as designing an e-learning for users who may be better served by a printed job aid.
Cons
Personas should be rooted in strong research, not stereotypes. If your audience is diverse, carefully review your work for any potential biases, and ensure your personas reflect the actual data you’ve collected rather than assumptions about who your learners are. Avoid oversimplifying—real learners are complex.
Takeaways
Learner personas can enhance your needs assessments and help you design learning experiences based on research, not assumptions.
More resources about learner personas
Worksheet: Learner Personas Template
Blog: Learner Personas: What they are and why you need them
Blog: How to develop learner personas for effective training
