Bruce Heichelbech, senior training consultant, E.ON., Louisville, Ky., is a past recipient of the Pike’s Peak Award for implementing creativity into training. His very thorough method of training with theming helped him take the honor.

“We are one of the lowest cost energy providers in the U.S. top 10 in the nation. We are in a growth mode,” Heichelbech said when accepting the award. “We have new employee training and these people get inundated with information.” So Heichelbech implemented OSHA safety theme training.

“We are in the south. NASCAR is a big deal, male and female alike,” Heichelbech said. They have trainees get in groups and designate a driver and pit crew in their group. “For $20, we found this 4x8 sheet” which is like a game board of a NASCAR raceway. They then bought all the current NASCAR cars and put them on the track. With two big foam dice, the “driver” rolls a number and the “pit crew” answers a question from the game board on the screen which was created with e-learning software. If the pit crew answers correctly within 20 seconds, they get to move the number of spaces shown on the die.

“We rotate drivers each round to keep all involved and once all the questions were answered we had automotive related prizes for everyone, things like auto CD holders, Fix-a-Flat, Rain-x, etc., again all purchased at Wal-Mart,” Heichelbech expounded.

“To have grown men and women standing around this game board cheering around these little hot wheels cars is hard to describe,” Heichelbech said. “They’re blind to the fact they’re learning the whole entire time. Whichever car is in the lead wins the grand prize. The ‘closer’ part is they have to take the object they won and relate it to something they won in the course of the game. They do a great job of summarizing the whole need-to-know stuff.”

“It was a blast watching everyone get excited about the competition and I don't think they even realized that were reviewing some 35 items from the training they had completed,” he said.

“My relationship with The Bob Pike Group began in 1996 when I attended a Creative Training Techniques taught by Doug McCallum,” he said. It changed fundamentally how he does things. “People are not getting PowerPointed to death anymore. People are asking, ‘When do I get to come to training?’ We are making a difference and that’s what makes me get up in the morning.”