Wednesday
Jun082011
Training is not a presentation
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 8:56PM
Several times in recent weeks I've been working and consulting with teams and organizations who see 'training' as delivering a PowerPoint slide show. And handing out copies of the slide deck as 'the workbook'
Such a presentation can be information transfer, it can be knowledge sharing. But rolling through 65 slides in two hours doesn't transfer skill or build capability.
This approach - of an expert, in full-flight 'tell' mode - is a presentation. It's ok to call it that. You can call it a briefing or a lecture too. But don't mislead managers, people leaders, or employees by calling it training, or worse, a workshop and lifting their expectations that they might get to participate or contribute - and then not allow that to happen.
Whether your organization's learning and development team are involved or not, be clear about what is building capability in your business and what's sharing information, what is changing attitudes vs what is shifting behaviors.
Then design your learning and training experience from there. There will likely be segments where you'll have to tell participants some content, but there are endless ways to engage with people and 'ask' them what they know and share that knowledge. Then reinforce that with a concrete application of the message or chunk of content. And it doesn't need to involve any PowerPoint slides!
A structured process for adult learning can create engaging, creative and changing experiences. So have a look through the latest training session you're working on. Is it all tell and no ask? Is it you the expert rather than you the facilitator of learning? Is it full of PowerPoint slides?
Then pull the plug and start again!
Your "participants" will love you for it.
Such a presentation can be information transfer, it can be knowledge sharing. But rolling through 65 slides in two hours doesn't transfer skill or build capability.
This approach - of an expert, in full-flight 'tell' mode - is a presentation. It's ok to call it that. You can call it a briefing or a lecture too. But don't mislead managers, people leaders, or employees by calling it training, or worse, a workshop and lifting their expectations that they might get to participate or contribute - and then not allow that to happen.
Whether your organization's learning and development team are involved or not, be clear about what is building capability in your business and what's sharing information, what is changing attitudes vs what is shifting behaviors.
Then design your learning and training experience from there. There will likely be segments where you'll have to tell participants some content, but there are endless ways to engage with people and 'ask' them what they know and share that knowledge. Then reinforce that with a concrete application of the message or chunk of content. And it doesn't need to involve any PowerPoint slides!
A structured process for adult learning can create engaging, creative and changing experiences. So have a look through the latest training session you're working on. Is it all tell and no ask? Is it you the expert rather than you the facilitator of learning? Is it full of PowerPoint slides?
Then pull the plug and start again!
Your "participants" will love you for it.
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