Trainer’s Tip: Have To or Want To?
This exercise from Tony Boon helps delegates look at what they want and think about the consequences of their choices. Get them to split a piece of flipchart paper down the middle, and write “have to” on the left, and “want to” on the right. They will write things like “breathe” and “eat” in the […]
Trainer’s Tip: Ten Steps to Marketing Success
Make sure that employees realise the superb training on offer with these ten tips from Graham O’Connell. My tips for marketing are: Think beyond needs analaysis and consider marketing research – find out wants and expectations as well as needs; look at the differences in different ‘segments’ of the organisation. Work to a high quality, […]
Trainer’s Tip: Arrest the Time Robbers
This exercise, from TrainingZONE member Bryan Edwards, helps delegates address their time-wasters. I use a “time robbers” exercise that asks delegates to identify their time thieves, whether they are self-imposed (S.I.) or imposed by others (I.B.O.) and the reason for the time robber. It’s really important to identify the reason, so we get a solution […]
Trainer’s Tip: Gallery
This imaginative exercise, from Sean Kirk, asks delegates to describe themselves in a picture. A useful exercise that I have used with an HR department was one I call ‘Gallery’. It’s a simple exercise were you give everybody a piece of flipchart paper and different coloured flipchart pens. Ask them to find a quiet space […]
Trainer’s Tip: Training Key Performance Indicators
Lisa Young gets some advice on key performance indicators for training from Graham O’Connell. There are a whole host of measures that you could use but I would be inclined to prioritise them around the critical performance requirements of the business. The types of performance tend to fall into the following categories: quantity, quality, cost, […]
Trainer’s Tip: Changing Training Tactics – Making The Business Case
Darren Rhodes gets advice on just how to convince senior management to change tired training methods that no longer work. In my experience managers usually respond when you hit them where it hurts – in the financial area.Perhaps if you can make a business case to justify the improvements by demonstrating the cost to the […]
Trainer’s Tip: Managing Self Development
An excellent tip offering advice on CPD the DIY way. Lynn, while books are great for knowledge, there is nothing to beat human interaction for real development. There are a number of forums including TrainingZONE that not only offer discussion boards but groups meet regularly and share experiences, sometimes hiring wellknown presenters to run special […]
Trainer’s Tip: Ten Year Career Development Programme
Kon Stoilas gets advice from member Mike Morrison on how to develop a ten year career development programme for a large motoring company. Had this have been asked ten years ago I would have said easy. In ten years will the company even be building cars? Technology is changing so fast in this arena that […]
Trainer’s Tip: Competency Workshops
Buffy Sparks gets advice from member Mike Burney-cumming on content for a workshop focusing on competencies and competency-based interviewing. Here is an exercise I have used successfully in the past. It works work well with competencies and appraisals.It involves having a collection of Paintings, A3 size. Any Art type pictures or scenes will do, even […]
Trainer’s Tip: Training Academy For New Entrants
Heather Stockwell gets advice from member Rich Lucas on how to set up a training academy to ensure new employees have the required levels of soft and IT skills needed to work on a technical services desk. Have a good induction This can take care of most of your company procedures etc. After induction is […]
Trainer’s Tip: How Much Delivery Should Training Officers Do?
Glenn Bracey replies to Mandy Hetherton’s question about how much training should be delivered by training officers tasked with delivering courses rather than designing or developing them. If you want to stimulate, create and sustain burnout go for five out of five days. By doing this for any sustained period (in just a few weeks) […]
Trainer’s Tip: Training Feedback Forms – Suggested Questions
Eddie Newall offers some suggestions under the headings of trainee job role, presentation, trainer, environment and outcome. Trainee Job Role:How relevant was this training to your current responsibilities?Irrelevant 1 2 3 4 5 Highly relevantComment: To what extent did this training meet your expectations?Not met 1 2 3 4 5 Fully metComment: Presentation: What was […]
Trainer’s Tip: Trainer – The Definition
Debra Smith offers her views on how to sort the wheat from the chaff when it comes to identifying the genuine article from the cowboys. I think the actual terminology of ‘trainer’ conjures such a mixture of expectations that rarely do people know what they actually want, let alone what they get and as a […]
Trainer’s Tip: Training For The Unemployed
Rich Lucas offers Jane Morrison advice on how to package an innovative training programme for unemployed clients looking to enter the labour market with particular reference to the customer service and retail sectors. You may be doing this already but rather than just teaching skills throughout the training, build a plan of how it’s going […]
Trainer’s Tip: How to Effectively Chair Meetings
Adele Finnegan offers Buffy Sparks an exercise. I have found the following exercise to be very effective in running meetings workshops. 1. Split the group into teams of four to six people. 2. Each person has to pick a topic of their choice and prepare to facilitate a two minute discussion on that topic. 3. […]
Trainer’s Tip: Learning and Development KPIs
Lindsay Campbell gets feedback from Martin Schmalenbach on the hottest, learning and development performance indicators around. In generic terms I’d suggest a score card comprising the following categories – I’ve included a few example measures to give you an idea: 1. Results: return on investment, new behaviours being demonstrated. 2. Customers: satisfaction levels, percentage of […]
Trainer’s Tip: Training the Trainer with No Budget
Mike Morrison suggests ‘free’ ways to continue professional development. If you’ve been in training roles for a long time you may just need some ‘light’ refresher training – you can often get this by going to free presentations and watching and learning from others. Depending upon your skill base you may need to be ‘fed’ […]
Trainer’s Tip: Overcoming A Learning Block
Nik Kellingley suggests ways to help a trainee who just ‘doesn’t get it’. I like Mike’s idea of passing the buck back to the learner it’s a tactic I’ve used with success in the past. You could also see if their more succesful peers could help them to learn – sometimes it’s just you that’s […]
Trainer’s Tip: How Many Days Training Can You Do In A Week?
Mike Morrison explains the targets. As an independent trainer the recommended target is 100 days – but this allows for marketing, finance admin etc. As an employee things are different. If you are doing four days a week, every week this does sound a little excessive – however what else are you paid to do? […]
Trainer’s Tip: Dealing With Customer Complaints
Neil Wilkins outlines a plan. Hi Dyfrig, You mention that the team have had “generic knowledge in dealing with unhappy customers over the phone and in writing’ however that they need to ‘’up’ their performance in dealing with their customers” therefore would the team benefit from either sales and or customer loyalty training? Unless they […]
