A day or week in the work-life of a Target trainer is not typically routine. Even with a full schedule of training sessions, it is what comes in between that brings diversity into my workdays. My participants range from managers to office assistants to HR specialists to young apprentices. All use English in their jobs – but to different extents with different needs. In a given week, I could be involved in any of the following tasks:

My participants provide me with most of my training topics. By using day-to-day situations, the training is most effective and realistic for them and makes it so much easier for me. 

It’s a challenging and creative job with little monotony. And, at the end of my week, I am ready to leave it all at work and to enjoy a great weekend. 

Prepare for first training session of the week

With my day fully planned in advance, I arrive at my desk to find an email marked “urgent”. I had wanted to review my folder before my 9 o’clock 1-to-1 session. Instead I open the email to see if I can take care of it before the lesson starts. Luckily it’s short - Simone, one of the sales assistants, needs to send a mass email this morning. I phone her and together we fine-tune a few phrases.

1-to-1 session

I have a 1-to-1 session with Inge. She’s very talkative and the challenge is always to stop these sessions from losing direction. We’d agreed that we’d use the sessions to get her to talk me through the new compliance laws. This helps us to double-check the vocabulary she needs, helps her to get her thoughts clear, and gives us a chance to practice her presentation skills. My initial plan was to play “dumb” and ask lots of questions – and to be honest it’s not that difficult. The depth of the information she needs to present is quite staggering. At the end of the session we decided to practice delivering the same information next week but in smaller, digestible chunks. This will be handy when she needs to make presentations using Netmeeting.

Team Leader Group

Every week I run a training session with 4 team leaders. They use the opportunity to update each other on what is going on, and to discuss those things that they never have a chance to talk about. I tend to set them up with a meaty question and then sit back and observe, feeding back when necessary and stopping them when I see a gap or a chance to review certain structures. They enjoy having this “down time” and from a training perspective it’s great – fluency practice on relevant topics with specific feedback. The attendance is always high and now and again we agree to run a breakout session for them and their teams. The last one was on “communicating bad news”.

Catch up on emails / write feedback

The last session went well. I grab a coffee and return to my desk. For Simone, I create a 5-minute email lesson to help her understand the difference between “by” and “until” and send it off. On-the-job training is what makes us so valuable; the regularly scheduled sessions, though important, are not as urgent. These quick OTJ’s arise more than you might like. Because people might be waiting on you, it usually comes down to a simple judgment call and it always seems to work out fine.

With that finished, I write up the feedback for the 9 o’clock session and send it off to Inge while our session is still fresh in our minds. I build a HotPot exercise to reinforce the vocabulary we practiced and made a note for myself to follow up with a review exercise later in the week.

I quickly check my emails again and find a request from a secretary who needs help with an email that has to be finished before lunch. She has attached a lengthy document full of various foreign city names written in their local language (i.e. Warszawa instead of Warsaw; Lisboa instead of Lisbon, etc.). With this short deadline I google “exonyms” and find a clever self-translating map which I send off to her straight away. I then ask a colleague to follow up with her.

Lunch at desk

I generally eat lunch at the canteen with some of the participants based in my office. Today I opt for a sandwich and banana at my desk. While working at my desk, I get a call. Jörg wants me to look over some changes to a set of slides he’s made, and asks if he can pop over. We then chat about the wine harvest - his father owns a small vineyard. When participants take the time to come to me, and my immediate work is not urgent, I simply drop what I am doing and take on whatever question is at hand.
On average, these interruptions take around 10 minutes, so it is not a big thing. Yet it’s exactly what on-the-job training is all about. Jörg’s question just gave me a good idea for my next planned session with his group – but I need to make sure I get the time to turn the idea into something more concrete.

Group session

Twice a week, I meet the AZUBIs for training. AZUBIs are apprentices, between 16 and roughly 21 years of age, participating in a three-year training program. Although it might be assumed that most people in this age range will already have a pretty high level of English, it is not always the case.

This is probably the most traditional ESL-like training I do. Although we use a client-requested book as a basis, my AZUBIs are not really “book-learners”. I have divided the 39 of them into two different groups, with each group meeting once a week. Creativity and effectiveness become the operative words. Fortunately for me, they spend much of their time on the workshop floor learning how to use heavy machinery, and I love machines. As they all work together in this one large room, I am able to get around to all of them at least once per visit to briefly chat with them before the respective group meets for more concentrated learning on their assigned day. Training groups are run in a rather traditional ESL manner, but chatting with them about their work while they are actually operating the machinery is interesting for me and most effective for them. I guess it is appropriate to throw in here that if I felt that their loss of concentration might contribute to the loss of an eye or limb, I would hold back on the conversation until they were finished with what they were doing on the machinery. I’m not into blood or independent limbs flopping around on the shop floor; it tends to be counterproductive.

Again, this is not typical training for an InCorporateTrainer^®™, but it is a bit fun and provides for some diversity in the work week and a chance to really dress down while working in the factory area.

Plan a coaching session

Last week two participants left a training session still feeling a little unsure of the English they had worked on that day. They had just been told they needed to travel to a plant in Ohio, and lead a seminar. This meant that they had a lot to prepare in only a short time. I knew that I would have to follow up with something ASAP that would alleviate their concerns and keep them positive about their upcoming trip – a first to an English-speaking country. I decided to try to set up an ad hoc coaching session before they left, and I also knew that I would have to take the initiative.

I called them both and asked if they could possibly find an extra couple of hours before leaving so that we could meet. Not only were they able to find the time, but they both seemed relieved at having another chance to “get their English ready”. After scheduling the meeting, I went into their training log. In one of the three meetings we had had before this last session, I had asked them to work together in sharing with me how they thought the workshop would run. As they gave me the information, I took it all down, word for word, steno-style on my laptop. I was going to use it after their return in a review exercise. I take all the information and assemble the vocabulary and phrases they had the most trouble with, along with how to use it (something we had already reviewed before). I now send it to them with the following instructions:

“When you come to the training session on Thursday, be prepared to include this in a mock opening session of the actual workshop you will be giving in Charlestown. When you come into our training session, you will have immediate control over the meeting; I will only be a seminar participant – not your language trainer. Bring along whatever you need to make it as realistic as possible for you. Be sure to try to find some time at home to review this before the session in order to make it more effective!”

I figure that if they feel confident enough to get the first part of their seminar off the ground, the rest will follow. I also decide to use this material as a basis for another group with similar jobs next week – if it’s just happened to these 2 guys, it might happen to them too!

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