This week's post is compliments of Jane Jazrawy - the VP, Product Development at CarriersEdge. In addition to be an outstanding developer of online materials, Jane is also a superb classroom trainer, having taught everything from elementary school to finance, consumer electronics, regulatory compliance, and a whole lot of other stuff.
Even though our business is online driver improvement, we recognize that people aren't going to move EVERYTHING online (in fact, companies have tried that in the past with disastrous results), but with continued cost pressures in every business, it's important to make the most out of each classroom training session.
In this industry, the biggest challenge with classroom training is getting drivers to engage. Getting drivers into the room in the first place is tough, but getting them to open up and be an active part of the session is even tougher. They may be sitting silently and not saying much. They may be avid talkers that send the discussion down a rathole. In any case, to ensure a successful session it's important to get everyone engaged, and keep them focused.
Here then, are some of Jane's tips for running a successful classroom training session.
1. Set your expectations. Make sure you're clear on what you want to accomplish through the session and what you want everyone else to understand as well. When creating learning objectives for the session, be sure to use action words like 'list', 'define', and 'describe' since you can measure them. It's impossible to measure understanding, so avoid that one.
2. It's the experience that counts. The most important thing you can get out of a classroom training session is a deeper relationship with the people attending. The content is always secondary - if you can build the relationships effectively, and foster the right attitude among participants, the content will take care of itself. Drivers with the right attitude are always more valuable than smart people with the wrong attitude, so take the opportunity to build the relationships with and among the participants.
3. Get in the room, not in front of it. It's much easier to get people communicating when you're standing amongst them. Standing at the front of the room creates a divide between "teacher" and "students" which detracts from the educational experience. When you're in the middle of the room, you get better participation, and there's no longer a way for people to hide at the back. If you really want to change the dynamic of the room, give them an exercise then go stand at the back of the room while they complete it.
4. Use icebreakers to your advantage. Instead of the standard introduction format of "who are you?", "where are you from?", "why are you here?", mix it up. Ask participants which regulation they dislike the most, or which one is their favorite. Try asking them what they think the session should focus on. That not only makes them think, but it gives you a better sense of where their head is at before the class really gets going.
5. Use flip charts and whiteboards to your advantage. Flip charts are fabulous tools for tracking ideas, questions, and off-topic discussions during a session. Use these in combination with the tip above, to track the comments made during the introductions. Good instructors fill up lots of flip chart pages because there's always lots of unexpected things that come up during a session and it's important to document them.
6. Close-ended questions get more answers. If open-ended questions aren't generating the discussion you'd like, try using more close-ended questions. Specific questions, with specific answers, will often generate better results. Open-ended questions can often be like staring at a blank piece of paper - it's hard to know where to start so you end up doing nothing.
7. Follow-up. It's inevitable that there will be unanswered questions at the end of a training session, so make a point of following up in a timely fashion, and be sure all the participants get the answers. As trainers, we're there to provide a service to the people participating in the training, so it's important that the service is followed through until all the questions are answered.
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