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Using Morae Software for a Team Debriefing Exercise at the United States Air Force Academy

Terence S. Andre, Lt Col, USAF

The Behavioral Sciences and Leadership Department at the United States Air Force Academy (USAFA) formed a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the TechSmith Corporation based in Okemos, Michigan. Through this CRADA we were able to use a new usability evaluation tool called Morae™. Morae consists of three components that record and synchronize user actions with detailed application and computer system data for the analysis of human-computer interaction. Morae provides an all-digital solution to record usability sessions without the use of traditional hardware recording and editing equipment. Morae is primarily used in a new Human-Computer Interaction Laboratory (HCIL) in the Behavioral Sciences and Leadership Department.

As a novel use of Morae, the Behavioral Sciences and Leadership Department recently conducted a field test where the recording software was used as an advanced debriefing tool for the Leadership Reaction Course (LRC). The LRC is a field environment at USAFA consisting of team-building obstacle courses. Teams of cadets and/or faculty can use the LRC to strengthen planning, communication, and teamwork skills by accomplishing the obstacles and then going through a debriefing of their task with expert facilitators. The expert facilitators provide an external feedback source to point out strong and weak points of the team when accomplishing the obstacle. The novel use of Morae involved videotaping one of the obstacle courses with a camcorder and microphone and identifying “critical incidents” as the team attempted to accomplish the obstacle. A critical incident is something good or bad the facilitator wants to highlight for the team during the debriefing session. Using Morae, the facilitator could insert a marker for each critical incident that would later be available for viewing on the digital video recording for debriefing. The intent of using Morae in this way was to provide a memory help to the facilitator and allow the team to see and hear the actual incident that contributed to either good or poor performance at that particular point.

To implement this field test, the Morae software was installed on a laptop computer and connected to a video camcorder via a firewire cable. The laptop and camcorder were positioned on an elevated walkway above one of the obstacle courses in the LRC as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Setup of laptop computer with Morae software and camcorder for video recording.

The camcorder was positioned to capture the team's planning and execution that was occurring below in the obstacle course as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2. A team of new faculty members planning how to accomplish a particular obstacle.

Once the session was complete, the laptop computer was set up in the back of a vehicle where a large monitor could be used for the debriefing. The facilitator and the team of faculty members gathered around so they could see and hear the debriefing session as shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3. Computer setup for debriefing session.

The facilitator was able to see the markers inserted during the recording session and quickly go to that exact point on the video to discuss each example of either good or poor execution by the team (see Figure 4).

Figure 4. Example screen shot of video debrief and markers used by facilitator.

In order to clearly see the video, the facilitator expanded the video window so that it covered the desktop activity behind it (see Figure 5).

Figure 5. Video window expanded to easily see the debriefing session.

Feedback from those receiving the video debrief found it helpful to actually see and hear the context of their planning and execution. Many also found it humorous and educational to listen to their communication and see their planning go wrong at times. Morae was not designed for an environment such as the LRC, but its capability to mark events during recording that are easy to access after an event provides a quick debriefing tool for facilitators who want to have the team see and hear specific events in a teambuilding exercise. Although a simple video recording of a teambuilding exercise could also capture the required video/audio, the ability to click on a marker saves the facilitator and the team from watching the entire session when time is short.

Our use of Morae for the LRC application was just a trial case. This test helped us understand the technical requirements of setting up a portable lab in the field and how to best use Morae's marking capability for video debriefing. Shortly after conducting this trial case, we have learned of other teambuilding courses and exercises at USAFA where Morae could be used to facilitate a quick debriefing session. In the next year, we plan to compare traditional debriefing with Morae video debriefing in an effort to learn where it can have the greatest impact on learning.

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