Save money, improve morale

Have you ever wished you could reduce your organization’s depen­dence on out­side train­ers? How about devel­op­ing your own work­shops? Join the ranks of orga­ni­za­tions that have ben­e­fited from devel­op­ing their inter­nal resources, saved money, and improved the rel­e­vance and qual­ity of their training!

What’s Not Working

Over the last few years, I’ve worked with dozens of agen­cies to develop their own “home grown” train­ers and tailor-made cur­ric­ula. Why? Agen­cies tell me it begins with dis­sat­is­fac­tion with cur­rent options:

1. Send­ing employ­ees out to work­shops adver­tised by national com­pa­nies. Though some of the infor­ma­tion is valu­able, the work­shops are generic. Typ­i­cally par­tic­i­pat­ing are a hun­dred peo­ple or more, from all indus­tries. One or two from your orga­ni­za­tion that attend may ben­e­fit, but the value to the agency may end there.

2. Bring­ing in train­ing experts. Though some­times nec­es­sary and very appro­pri­ate, bring­ing in experts can be expen­sive. These spe­cial­ists may pro­vide a “one-size-fits-all” train­ing — after all, they just gave this same pre­sen­ta­tion in Cleve­land a week ago. And what hap­pens if you can’t find an expert in your very spe­cific sub­ject area?

Explor­ing Options

The term “train­ing of train­ers” (TOT) can mean dif­fer­ent things. To some, it means train­ing peo­ple the “ins and outs” of a spe­cific pro­gram, the ulti­mate goal being their abil­ity to teach that pro­gram. For exam­ple, a local health pro­mo­tion orga­ni­za­tion trains ele­men­tary school teach­ers to use its pack­aged cur­ricu­lum. They assume that teach­ers will use their already-established train­ing skills with the prod­uct. This type of TOT’s focus is on con­tent.

A more flex­i­ble type of TOT focuses on process. It usu­ally includes how to design a les­son based on adult learn­ing prin­ci­ples, how to inte­grate a vari­ety of par­tic­i­pa­tory exer­cises, how to enhance pre­sen­ta­tion skills, develop learn­ing aids and eval­u­ate the learn­ing. The best TOTs include strate­gies to ensure learn­ing occurs and to iden­tify and ana­lyze train­ing needs from the out­set. Using these new strate­gies, par­tic­i­pants often develop and present a les­son based on their area of exper­tise that they can use immediately.

Steps To Develop “Home Grown” Trainers

Once an orga­ni­za­tion decides to “grow” its own train­ers, there are two major invest­ments: a one-time invest­ment in train­ing and an ongo­ing invest­ment of time.

• When pos­si­ble, gar­ner enthu­si­as­tic, vis­i­ble sup­port from the top.
  When lead­ers overtly sup­port trainer devel­op­ment, all employ­ees get the mes­sage that learn­ing is a val­ued and impor­tant ele­ment of work.
• Select peo­ple to become “train­ers in train­ing.“
  These can be peo­ple with train­ing exper­tise or just a strong inter­est, as well as sub­ject mat­ter experts who tra­di­tion­ally have “bored the pants off” peo­ple while trans­mit­ting infor­ma­tion. Clar­ify expec­ta­tions, time com­mit­ments and poten­tial rewards for participating.
• Pro­vide an expert Train­ing of Trainers.
• Pro­vide reg­u­lar Trainer Devel­op­ment Meet­ings. These meet­ings usu­ally take place once a month. Train­ers meet to dis­cuss what is work­ing well and to debrief issues and chal­lenges. Often a dif­fer­ent trainer will model a “chunk” of cur­ricu­lum or an activ­ity each month.

Wouldn’t it be great to use the resources you have right at your fin­ger­tips to develop or expand your agency’s train­ing poten­tial? “Home gown” train­ers ben­e­fit per­son­ally from enhanc­ing their skills, the agency ben­e­fits from increas­ing its train­ing abil­ity and other employ­ees ben­e­fit from increased train­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties. “Home-grown” train­ers play an impor­tant role in cre­at­ing an orga­ni­za­tional cul­ture of learn­ing, inno­va­tion and self-reliance.

TRY THIS! To help a group cre­ate its mis­sion state­ment, try the “Coat of Arms” method.

• Break the group into teams. Give each paper and lots of bright felt pens.
• Ask each team to draw a “coat of arms” that rep­re­sents their orga­ni­za­tion. (Show them a model of a coat of arms.) Tell them to con­sider three areas: “who,” the “prod­uct” and the “customer.”)
• Have each group present their coat of arms to the larger group.
• Work from the draw­ings to develop a writ­ten statement.

This method helps clar­ify the mis­sion and gain con­sen­sus on it. “Coat of Arms” also offers an oppor­tu­nity to work col­lab­o­ra­tively using pow­er­ful metaphors. The group will expe­ri­ence a high level of energy and cre­ativ­ity — it’s a great way to get away from our depen­dence on writ­ing.

Ana­gram Puzzler

An ana­gram is a word or phrase made by rear­rang­ing the let­ters of another word or phrase. See if you can fig­ure these out — (if you can, I don’t want to play Scrab­ble with you!)

Dor­mi­tory	Dirty Room
Des­per­a­tion	A Rope Ends It
Slot Machines	Cash Lost In ‘Em
Snooze Alarms	Alas! No More Z’s

And how about this?

“That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.”

“Thin man ran; makes a large stride, left planet, pins flag on moon! On to Mars!”

Amaz­ing, isn’t it?

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Ask, Don’t Tell!
(But What’s The Best Way To Ask?)Top-notch facil­i­ta­tors and train­ers use a vari­ety of ques­tion types to increase par­tic­i­pa­tion and cre­ative think­ing. Each ques­tion type is appro­pri­ate and use­ful — at dif­fer­ent times. Think about the two ques­tions below:(A) Did you have a good week­end?
(B) If you could cre­ate a per­fect week­end, what would it look like?Let’s ana­lyze these!(A) Is a close-ended, “micro­scop­ing” ques­tion. Micro­scop­ing ques­tions nar­row in, draw­ing out details. (An exam­ple: “What kind of com­puter equip­ment are you using?”)

 

(B) is an open-ended ques­tion. It also falls into the cat­e­gories of “Tele­scop­ing” and “Magic Wand.” Tele­scop­ing ques­tions broaden what they bring out. (An exam­ple: “Say a lit­tle more.”) Magic Wand ques­tions stim­u­late cre­ative think­ing and break through con­ver­sa­tional bot­tle­necks. (An exam­ple: “If time and money were no obsta­cle, what sort of sys­tem would you design to accom­plish these tasks?”)

If you’re ever frus­trated with one-syllable answers or “dead” dia­logues, I encour­age you to replace a few Micro­scop­ing ques­tions with Tele­scop­ing ques­tions and an occa­sional Magic Wand. You’ll be impressed at the difference!

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Read more arti­cles about Train­ing Devel­op­ment. Learn about Guila Muir’s Trainer Devel­op­ment Workshops.

Guila Muir is the pre­miere trainer of train­ers, facil­i­ta­tors, and pre­sen­ters on the West Coast of the United States. Since 1994, she has helped thou­sands of pro­fes­sion­als improve their train­ing, facil­i­ta­tion, and pre­sen­ta­tion skills. Find out how she can help trans­form you from a bor­ing expert to a great pre­sen­ter: www.guilamuir.com

© 2007 Guila Muir. All rights reserved.
You may make copies of this arti­cle and dis­trib­ute in any media so long as you change noth­ing, credit the author, and include this copy­right notice and web address.

Related posts:

1. What Sep­a­rates Great Train­ers From the Merely “OK?”

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