It is interesting to see that the development process and especially the problems have changed little in the past 20 years. I was one of a half dozen or so instructional designers at the ill-fated University of Mid-America which was supposed to be the U.S.'s equivalent of the British Open University, that is, provide distance learning via broadcast television for the nontraditional learner.
We had teams consisting of designers, subject matter expert's, video producers, print and video editors, writers, script writers, video researchers, print researchers, evaluators, secretaries, and it seems anyone else who decided to join in. Plus, we had pools of "potential" students for formative evaluation. The vice-president, in his wisdom, decided to pay the subject matter expert and video producer more than the instructional designer to cause "creative tension" to stimulate the team. There was as much disagreement between team members as there was between the team and management.
The major flaw was the split role of the instructional designer between doing design and project management (budgets in 1975 ranged from $150,000 to $500,000 for a project). Often, the decision was to either finish the task on time or to design the instruction properly to avert later problems.
Video and print production did have a major advantage over IMM, when the team said it was done, it was done. There were no bugs!
Were your plans too ambitious? Never, projects were well planned (in scope) before starting.
Did you bite off too much to chew? Nope. Plan for very little, deliver more.
If you did it again, what would you change? Separate the role of the designer and project manager. Give the designer all the authority, but no responsibility!
Would you ever do it again? I am now older and much wiser and would not want to subject myself to so much stress. However, if my memory should slip, I would start with a very lengthy design phase with just myself and the subject matter expert(s). After completing the design phase, I would bring in the rest of the team.
Did you have enough funding? Yes, but there is never enough!
Did it take longer than you thought? Our subject matter expert had his own airplane and offered to fly the tapes to the funding committee if needed on the project due date (Federal Express did not exist). We finished about a week early (amazing considering we were shooting 16mm film (later transferred to two inch Quad video) on pre-emergent herbicides in September when the corn was being harvested).
Did the project finish? Yes.
Is it in use? The five half-hour programs were accepted for broadcast on the Public Broadcasting System.
Are you satisfied with the result overall? Hmmmm. Yes and no. It looks good. It seemed to do what it was supposed to do. Still, I would like to have done more design work prior to the script writing.
Are you satisfied with the instructional design? No.
Are you happy with the way it looks? Very much so. With video, I found that a good scriptwriter and producer could do wonderful things with nothing, if given the freedom.
Did parts of it turn out differently than you envisaged? Yes, the film/video was superb. (It helps to have an Emmy award winning crew.)
Were there arguments about who said what, when? Yes, many times on debates of the scripts. In fact, the first producer quit in August (project due date was the first week of December). We hired a second producer within a few days who managed to complete the project on time and within budget.
Did design flaws surface late in the project? Two. The first program was four minutes short of the 29:30 minutes target time. The talent said "desk" rather than "disk" on camera.
Are there bugs in the program? How many? How much effort did it take to get rid of them? No, one of the nice things about "old" technology.
This five, half-hour series was sponsored in part the Environmental Protection Agency. A law was passed to require farmers to gain certification before they use controlled pesticides. A group of five states worked with the University of Mid-America to produce a course that could be used to train the farmers. Students watched the tapes and read a supplemental student guide (about 4-5 pages per program). Then they took a test prepared by the EPA.
In 1976, I would not change the program. Today, with new technology available I might consider a different approach if I knew the target audience had computers and either Internet access or CD-ROM drives.