Thank you to everyone in the LinkedIn group Effective and Fun Training Techniques who shared their knowledge so we can benefit from it.
This is part one of your great work.
A failure to establish an effective “participants’ agreement” between trainer and students at the outset or none at all. These are powerful tools to draw back on later if some students appear uncooperative or choosing not to suspend judgement.
Corian Francais
Call to Action: Establish ground rules.
The inability to capitalize on the experience in the room. Instead of trying to explain all the concepts ourselves we can use the expertise in the room.
Hadi Youssed, MBA
Call to Action: Ask others to share their experiences.
Looking back at my beginnings, I think that one of the most common mistakes is the belief that a trainer should be the brightest star and the smartest person in the room. As a result, the trainer is overly active and the participants are not involved in the training.
Krzysztof Szewczak
Call to Action: Get learners involved.
Lack of preparation – or at least a misunderstanding of what effort is needed to deliver top-quality training.
Plenty of people judge preparation effort by what they see: the one-day session. They don’t see the 5-10 days of design that’s taken place before it, trialling exercises and labs, tweaking and fine-tuning content.
Dave Smith
Call to Action: Build in planning time.
Thinking that they have to know everything.
Bill Schabel, M.Ed.
Call to Action: Be kind to yourself – you don’t have to know it all.
Not embracing different learning styles of participants learn differently: for instance, you may use the kinaesthetic, auditory, and visual learning styles model. The bigger mistake is not learning how to adapt materials or curriculum to reach those learners. If the materials a trainer is using does not have strategies built in for the different adult learning styles then trainers need to be flexible and quick enough to change his/her delivery on the spot.
Frank Idzik
Call to Action: Design and deliver to appeal to all learning styles.
Not engaging the group early enough and recognising adults need a desire to learn. Many new trainers I have developed think that once you get people into the room they will listen, rather than understand that in the first few minutes they will DECIDE whether to listen. All new trainers should relate the training to real life or work life and demonstrate the benefits early.
Richard Armitage
Call to Action:
Keep in your mind the following words…’why should I do this?’…as this may be what is going through the head of the people in front of you. Answer this question early and you will have a more engaged audience.
Sticking to closely to their trainer notes and not being confident enough to stray off the path and then move back onto it…..
Lindsey Macdonald
Call to Action: Use your trainer’s notes as a guide to the path.
Trying to fit too much material in too little time!
Rob Christopher
Call to Action: Less is More.
Trying to replicate someone else’s training style. I recognise that all trainers and facilitators ‘borrow’ ideas from others but I don’t think there’s anything more awkward than watching someone ‘try’ to be funny or energetic where it simply is not their natural delivery method.
Mark Brooks
Call to Action: Be yourself.
There will be more blogs to come on this subject.
If you are a new trainer or an experienced trainer, please let us know your thoughts in the comments box below.
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