There are lots of train the trainer qualifications out there in the L&D world - everything from coaching to being an accredited trainer for a particular specialism. So is there room for another one? Yes, I believe there is. Soft skills are a core part of most trainers' work, yet this is still a largely unregulated industry. Demand for soft skills (an umbrella term, I know!) is soaring - from Malaysia to Madrid, the UK to the USA, China to Canada, soft skills are desperately sought. Governments are investing in employability schemes (of which soft skills are always a key component) and individuals invest in this area of personal development, perhaps because they know that it is these skills which will ultimately give them the competitive edge in this crazy climate of economic uncertainty, fierce competition and rapid change.
Perhaps it is useful to define first what 's understood by soft skills before looking at a qualification for trainers. When I ask people to define soft skills for me, they will come out with things like working in a team, leadership, negotiation skills, communication styles, public speaking skills and many more. Dig deeper and they start to pull out more specific competences such as being resilient, curious, taking risks, being adaptable and creative. and many others. These are not skills that are taught consistently or well in most mainstream education systems, yet they are the very skills that will allow us to get ahead, work well and enable organisations and individuals to thrive.
Since January this year, we have been piloting a postgraduate certificate in delivering soft skills and experiential learning, fully validated by Roehampton University. The programme has proven to be amazing, challenging and incredibly demanding for both facilitators and the participants. The pilot participants come from a range of backgrounds with a wealth of experience and other L&D qualifications between them. We have a Church of England lay minister, seasoned corporate trainers and a lecturer in social media as well as a secondary school teacher. Several of them say that this programme consolidates and affirms all their experience and existing qualifications. All of them say that they have never been so challenged or stretched by any qualification.
Right now they are in the middle of their training practice trying out new methodologies like applied improvisation, masks as metaphor, singing and many other experiential learning activities. I say 'new' methodologies because each participant is actively encouraged to stretch themselves and try out new things within their current training environments. The gold standard for the 'soft skills industry' comes from the academic robustness underpinning everything they do. This includes defining experiential learning and soft skills, designing needs analysis and training programmes (often with different client groups than the ones with which they normally work), best practice facilitation skills, how to get learners to reflect (key for building self-awareness as many experiential learning activities tend to focus on the activity without the necessary reflection part), measurement, coaching skills, assessment, evaluation. All of this is assessed through an extensive portfolio at Masters' level - this PG Cert earns 60 Masters' credits. And another important part of this programme is, of course, the participants' own personal development and reflection processes.
In future we hope to include APL (advance prior learning) on the course so that those with coaching qualifications and other credentials can have these formally recognised.
We intend to run two or three flagship programmes a year at Roehampton - our next one starts 25th May. It's a mix of face-to-face, webinar, blended learning and training practice. Later this year, we intend to run programmes in Romania and India too.
If you're interested in knowing more, we'd love to hear from you. Or find out more here at www.unimenta.com under personal development.
