WHO IS THE “REAL” FATHER OF HPT?

Abstract

SEVERAL AUTHORS HAVE identified Tom Gilbert as the father of human performance technology. We respectfully disagree—and think he would have too. Gilbert was a brilliant and creative professional who made major contributions to the field, and it seems safe to say that HPT would not have progressed as far as it has without him. But he was not alone. Those of us who have been in the field since the early 1960s can identify a number of other contributors who were significant and even crucial to the early development and expansion of the technology. The early days of HPT were an exciting time. We had a powerful technology that many of us believed could change the world, but it was a new technology and limited in its scope and applications at that stage. Conferences and meetings were characterized by lengthy discussions (sometimes heated, and often extending into the hallways, coffee shops, and bars) about the technology itself, what the field really was, and its potential applications. If we were forced to point to a single initiator of HPT, it would probably be B. F. Skinner, with the publication of The Science of Learning and the Art of Teaching in 1954. But the development of the basic principles that Skinner articulated into a far-reaching technology was the work of many. A number of those people (including Gilbert, Ogden Lindsey, and Dale Brethower) were graduate students under Skinner; others were attracted by the potential power of the principles in Skinner’s writings. Among the candidates for “father” of HPT, in addition to Gilbert, are Lloyd Homme, Jim Evans, Charles Slack, George Geis, Donald Cook, Frances Mechner, Stewart Margolis, Lew Eigen, Bill Deterline, Bob Corrigan, Robert Glaser, Bob Mager, Bob Gagne, Norman Crowder, Bob Morgan, Bob Branson, Walter Dick, Arthur Lumsdain, Dave Klaus, Matt Israel, Jim Holland, Gabriel Ofiesh, and Harvey Block, to mention just a few (including both of us). And they were not all “fathers” either; people like Susan Markle (another Skinner student) were also contributing. In addition several “youngsters” who worked with many of the people listed above also contributed to the growth and development of HPT. These include Brethower, Geary Rummler, Danny Langdon, Joe Harless, Don Bullock, Margo Murray, Stephanie Jackson, and Roger Addison. In this zeitgeist, ideas were pouring in from everywhere. At least a hundred or more names could be added to this list of HPT heroes. It would be impossible to discuss everyone who contributed to the birth of the field, so we have presented just a few of the people we worked with to give a taste of that early formation period. Many people were involved in the early days of instructional systems design, and just as important, many of them were also working to extend the principles of HPT into other areas: juvenile crime reduction; business operations and management; prison rehabilitation; classroom design; mental health; group processes; Job Corps; and a host of other areas, including continual, disappointing forays into the world of education. In the interest of capturing some of the heritage of HPT, each of us has written short sections on the contributions of a few HPT pioneers we worked with. We will dispense with the term “father of . . .” and identify some of the people whom we consider to be an important part of HPT history: a few of our HPT heroes.