How Socrates and Generative AI will change the face of corporate learning

If your manager were to suggest you take more corporate training to improve your skill set, what would be your first reaction? Would you be excited to come to class and learn something new? Or would you be instantly filled with dread, making you wonder what you did to deserve this?

Unfortunately, we all know the answer is usually the latter.  Corporate learning programs have an image problem at a time when they are needed most. Advanced technology like generative AI is disrupting many job roles and forcing employees to reskill. But too many professionals feel their corporate learning programs are ineffective and don’t meet their needs.

Most corporate programs take a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach with little to no personalization for individual employees. This forces some participants to waste time relearning information they already know while the same material goes over the heads of others. By customizing the content for each person’s skill level, organizations could see significantly better results, but it is usually too expensive to consider.

Perhaps even worse is static content doesn’t drive any meaningful engagement, causing students to quickly forget what they’ve learned. According to the German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus’ Forgetting Curve, without any form of reinforcement, people tend to forget roughly 50% of newly learned information within a day after learning it and 90% within a week. Unfortunately, corporate classes typically become an exercise in memorization with the sole aim of passing a multiple-choice test to get class credit, after which people go back to their day jobs and rarely apply their newfound knowledge.

A tutor focused on you

Ironically, while generative AI is having professionals wonder about what it will do to their careers, some new approaches to its use will give corporate learning a much-needed makeover.

Generative AI will make it possible to provide every employee with a personalized virtual tutor - one that understands each person’s specific learning needs and desired skills. This way, employees are presented with the most appropriate information to help them take their current skills to the next level, making learning programs much more efficient.

Learning won’t be just an isolated event confined to a few hours in a classroom – generative AI will make constant learning possible, in the moment, to help people become more skilled professionals. The virtual tutor will be a perpetual companion, available 24 x 7 to reinforce lessons, provide real-time feedback, troubleshoot issues, and coach people through any task.

Socrates enters the (GPT) chat

To usher in this new age of learning, we need to step back many centuries to reimagine a time-tested learning theory - the Socratic Method. This approach encourages teachers to engage students by asking probing questions and then using the answers to stimulate critical thinking and guide students to uncover deeper insights. This two-way dialogue fosters better learning retention though constant interaction and knowledge application based on a dynamic dialog with the individual student.

This is quite different than how people generally use generative AI today, which is typically more of a one-way conversation – users ask the AI model questions using prompt engineering, and the AI model delivers a response. Using new Socratic AI techniques, organizations will now be able to turn the tables and instead have generative AI models play the role of the inquisitor.

For corporate learning, this means generative AI models that continually evaluate employees to understand their knowledge level. Then the models can instantly customize lessons based on what they know about the person. Instead of teaching to the lowest common denominator, the lessons adjust to meet students where they are, making learning much more enjoyable and efficient.

Perhaps more importantly, this also makes learning more effective. The Socratic tutor will not only present information, it will also ask the student to reflect on how they would apply it to their specific job roles. By being asked to explain the concepts back to the AI model, students will better retain the information. Students put the information to use right away, which helps them ingrain the knowledge by connecting the new information to prior experiences.

The models can even probe into students’ learning preferences and then frame information in ways that are more relevant and understandable. For example, if the student is a sports fan, the models can reframe information using sports metaphors to better connect with students. Or prompts can create model-based “professors” who mirror the personalities with which a student best interacts. The more the models understand the individual, the better they can create optimal lessons for each person.

Endless possibilities, wide reaching benefits

Once the models powering these virtual tutors are in place, they can have even wider applications – from hiring and onboarding, to skills assessment, to partner and customer education.

The impact this will bring to companies will be wide reaching. Organizations can turbocharge their corporate learning programs to better educate even more employees for a fraction of traditional costs. With a more skilled workforce that is learning on a continual basis, companies can increase retention and loyalty while achieving their goals faster. And with more engaging content, employees become more motivated to learn new skills, which helps improve job performance and expand career opportunities.

Socrates was a forward thinker, but it’s unlikely he ever envisioned his theories being applied to something like generative AI. Thanks to both these innovations - born ages apart - corporate learning will turn over a new leaf. Learning will be something every employee will seek out rather than something to avoid. Organizations that can master how to apply generative AI learning across their workforce will have a tremendous advantage that will pay dividends for the organization and employees for years to come.