Building trust, credibility and validation

I began looking at the products Kajabi set out, beginning with the organisation of its mini-course, comparing them to the knowledge that we've built up for decades, —maybe even centuries and millennia— on learning theories.

What happened next?

Diagram: The backend of Kajabi course authoring suite

I took heed of the following sentence in the Kajabi course authoring guide.

We will provide you with best practices and strategies, but it will be up to you to fine-tune your business into a well-oiled machine.

Commercially speaking, the statement alludes to the fact that authenticity and uniqueness sell. However, pedagogically speaking, it also testifies to the fact that every lesson taught should be valued as a localised and focused encounter. And, yes, I noticed how the advice also emphasised a marketing view, as shown in Kajabi’s link to Jodee Peevor, rather than a pedagogical or metacognitive one.

Diagram: Kajabi ambassador, Jodee Peevor.

Despite this, I had no trouble adapting the message to a less commercial one since Jodee Peevor’s methodology is all about building trust, credibility and validation. To paraphrase what I came to understand as the foundation of Kajabi’s course authoring advice I’d say …If you don't lead with who you think the course is for, then you’re in danger of teaching nothing to no one.

Thus, I began to see there was no problem staying focused on non-commercial educational outcomes. In a nutshell, it is the understanding of both the power and limitations you have of changing people’s ideas, feelings and behaviours that learning-about-learning gives you.   This is what I'd spent 40 years doing.

So in framing Kajabi courses for Clare, I began to wholeheartedly use the Kajabi platform to seek out a ‘learning edge’ that would benefit the relationships she wanted as an author in the brave new world of making online courses. Ironically, in fact, the platform is enabling me to discuss approaches to learning with others through working with people who don’t see themselves as professional educators but who have aptitudes that actually make them natural teachers.