In 2020, many companies have needed to move their internal trainers from classroom to virtual training delivery. Outside of the circumstances and impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the advantages of virtual training delivery are obvious. With virtual training, you reach more people, training can be deployed faster, more regular training events can be set up, and it costs less. We’ve been delivering virtual training solutions for more than ten years, and we know that the transfer to virtual training delivery can be smooth when the trainer understands the differences between classic face-to-face training and virtual delivery, and is able to adapt and develop him/herself.
We were recently asked about this topic by an in-house training team for a global company who train the company’s technicians on customer service and product updates for their range of consumer household machines. They asked us:
What are the new skills that internal trainers need to master in order to train virtually?
How quickly can our existing trainers master these skills and how can we help them to do it?
How can we train trainers with no experience of virtual training to be confident with it?
Part 1 of this post is about the key facilitation skills for virtual training delivery, which we identified and worked on with our client’s new virtual trainers. In Part 2 you will learn how we designed a session planning template to support them. Part 2 includes a download of the template for your own use.
Essential facilitation skills for virtual training delivery
1. Using your voice effectively
Why this is important? – You won’t be able to communicate using body language and eye contact in the virtual classroom. You (and your trainees) will rely entirely on your voice. The challenge with listening to someone’s voice is that it’s just more difficult to pay attention, due to lack of visual stimuli. This adaptation is a challenge for trainers new to the virtual training delivery environment because it takes a lot of practice and self-adjustment.
How to develop it – We worked with trainers on adapting 3 voice elements:
Clarity – pronounce words more carefully by stressing each syllable, avoid complicated terms, and repeat repeat repeat. After each segment, check in with trainees by asking, “Was that clear?”
Speed – you can reduce the strain on listeners by just slowing down. This takes a lot of conscious effort in practice; a technique we suggest is to imagine you are speaking 50% slower and you will probably speak 25% slower (which is an improvement!)
Pace – listening to a continuous stream of speech is a strain, so trainers need to practice pausing regularly. This gives listeners a chance to catch up and process what they heard. Try the 3 second rule – pause after each sentence and count to 3 in your head before continuing
2. Ensuring active participation
Why this is important – In a virtual classroom the trainer won’t have much idea who is paying attention, and trainees can easily become distracted by what’s going on around them and other things that pop up on their computer or phone. The only way to overcome this is to keep them engaged because (unlike the physical classroom) they are not a captive audience.
How to develop it
Make sure everyone participates by calling on trainees by name to answer questions or share their thoughts; we recommend making a note each time someone contributes so that you can call on those who haven’t yet contributed. Of course, this is easier in smaller groups; beyond 20 trainees it becomes a challenge, but you can still use the technique.
Make the session active by giving participants something to do; this can be a task (e.g. discuss this problem together for 5 minutes and present your solution) or using the tools in your virtual classroom (polls, icons, annotation, etc.) to ensure active participation.
Ask questions regularly (as often as every 90 seconds works well) but avoid closed questions (e.g. yes/no questions) and avoid asking questions to the whole group as you will probably be met with silence; instead use the nomination technique described in the first point above.
3. Managing time and attention spans
Why this is important – Technically it is possible to run an entire day of virtual training but in practice this doesn’t work because it’s much more tiring and harder to keep trainee’s attention compared to the physical classroom. GoToWebinar researched the most popular length of sessions in thousands of training sessions and found it is 60 minutes. So, aim to break up longer training into shorter segments. Within sessions there are tips that trainers can follow to manage both time and attention spans, which you can read below.
How to develop it
Plan less than you would for a physical training session; we see that trainers who are new to virtual training find that the time just runs away, partly due to technical issues but also because the tips and techniques you have read about in this post just take more time.
Break up your session into shorter segments; if you have a longer training segment you can still break it up into chunks. This gives everyone a ‘cognitive’ break, which addresses the increased strain of concentrating in a virtual classroom.
Don’t plan anything for the first 10 minutes; allow this time for participants to log on, test their connection and greet each other. We also recommend wrapping up 15 minutes before the finish, to allow for extra time you might have lost during the session, and also take questions. This will all impact the amount of content you can plan for a virtual session, which is the first point you read above.
Part 1 conclusion
We found that identifying and working on these three key skills areas can help internal trainers make the jump to become virtual trainers. In part 2 of this post, you’ll learn more about the elements of planning an effective virtual training session. If you want to continue reading, here are a few recommended posts on the topic of virtual training delivery.
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https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/virtpres.jpg8981362Stephen Jennerhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngStephen Jenner2020-12-21 14:27:162020-12-21 14:28:15How to develop internal trainers for virtual training delivery – Part 1
Virtual teams have clear advantages, but they also come with a set of unique challenges; building trust and getting people to work together is just not the same in a virtual environment. If you are leading virtual teams you will already be aware of many of these challenges. If you are not, or if you are new to this, or if your teams are not telling you everything; this post is for you! In over ten years of working with virtual teams in global companies we have collected the challenges that they have shared with us. We can now share with you some of the most common challenges we hear time and again, and some suggestions for how to help with them. This post is even more relevant in our current situation, when teams are going virtual out of necessity rather than design. So, we hope that this post will be a valuable resource to you as you adapt to the new normal of virtual working!
Challenge 1: Connecting across different time zones
Knowing when to connect with someone halfway across the world is a key challenge that people share with us again and again. Technology allows us to send communications at any time of the day or night. But it does not tell us when we can expect a reply. Delays in response can lead to miscommunication and frustration; not something you want in any team.
How a team leader can help
It really helps to have a whole team discussion about the time zones people are working in. Don’t assume anything; we often find that some virtual teams are completely unaware what time it is for their counterparts! But don’t limit the discussion to just the time of day; in addition, bring in people’s preferred working patterns. We have found that these types of discussions can help people manage their own expectations and tailor their communications more effectively to their remote colleagues.
Challenge 2: Getting to know other team members as individuals
It is much simpler to know our colleagues’ working styles and flex to them in a co-located space because we can see how they work. In a virtual team these things are more hidden. Virtual teams who don’t know each other are more likely to fall into conflict and work to separate agendas.
How a team leader can help
The secret to building intimacy in virtual teams is to do more of it and be explicit about it. Explain why the team needs to make extra efforts to get to know each other and the benefits of doing it. Plan time at the start of meetings for personal check-ins, encourage people to reveal non-work related things about each other. Host a ‘virtual’ breakfast or coffee meeting for people to socialise. One team we worked with devised a set of 20 questions for new teams to break the ice; simple, non-threatening questions like ‘Do you prefer coffee or tea?’ can start things going and encourage people to open up. The time you create for personal bonding will pay rewards later. But the key is to realise it doesn’t happen naturally in virtual teams.
Challenge 3: Holding each other accountable and giving feedback
This is even more critical in a virtual team because we simply can’t see what other people are doing. Distance can too easily undermine the things we do more naturally in co-located teams such as giving feedback and holding each other accountable.
How a team leader can help
Ensure that the same processes and standards are applied for giving honest and timely feedback and holding each other accountable. DEEP and DESC are two approaches that work extremely well. In the office you may stipulate that feedback and performance conversations happen face to face. In a virtual team this means video calls; don’t let email take over just because it’s more convenient.
See the next challenge for a technique that can help drive team accountability.
Challenge 4: Keeping focused and engaged
Individuals will need to work more independently and with less supervision in a virtual environment but will also become more easily distracted and may lose focus due to competing work/life priorities.
How a team leader can help
Borrow a very effective technique from the iterative, agile approach; ‘Stand Up’ meetings are a short daily meeting to check-in and align with each other. In the meeting, team members are asked to share what they will be working on today and what obstacles they may face. For a team leader this provides valuable insights into problems that you will need to work on that day. For team members this is a routine event than can help them focus and energise.
Challenge 5: Making it more personal
Technology has introduced many more personal features today but teams that we work with still say that having a screen between them can make virtual teams feel impersonal.
How a team leader can help
Virtual hugs or pats on the back, telling jokes and playing games can all help to make things more personal. But the number one thing that creates the biggest impact is to turn on the webcam! As humans we connect to faces instantly and, according to the Mehrabian studies, our body language accounts for 55% of how we express emotion and attitude. It still surprises us how many virtual teams do not switch on their cameras. It’s a small step that makes a very big impact.
Challenge 6: Scheduling too many (and too long) meetings
Meetings can be draining in a physical environment. For virtual teams they can feel even longer due to the lack of physical interaction and interruption from technical problems. So, it’s important to manage meetings a bit differently in a virtual environment.
How a team leader can help
Acknowledge that virtual meetings are more of a strain and mitigate this by making them shorter and more frequent. Ensure that meetings are timetabled with people’s time zone and schedule considered; remember that these things are not as visible as they are in a co-located space. Use the tools you have in meeting software to involve everyone and keep people attentive and engaged; for example, hand raising, emoticons, breakout rooms. Check out the links below for specific posts on meetings.
Challenge 7: Knowing how much to communicate
When we are not working physically together it’s difficult to know what is too much, or too little communication. If we get it wrong we risk over-burdening our team mates, or feeling isolated.
How a team leader can help
Finding that ‘Goldilocks moment’ of just the right amount of communication means agreeing together when and what to communicate. It’s also worth thinking about which tools to use for which kinds of communication and the differences between synchronous (real time e.g. video calls) and asynchronous (delayed e.g. email). Successful virtual teams we have worked with use some simple techniques to manage their team communications, e.g. asking before interrupting, having agreed communications ‘black out’ times, and simply sharing their preferences.
More information on this topic
For more advice and tips on virtual teams, see these posts:
Virtual teams work across time, space, and organizational boundaries—and they are becoming increasingly common. As these virtual teams interact through technology and only occasionally meet face-to-face, it is important to rethink and sharpen the way we collaborate and communicate . In this short video Scott Levey, a director at Target Training outlines 3 simple steps you can follow to make sure your virtual team makes an impact.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/virtual-meetings.jpg9041651Guest Authorhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngGuest Author2020-11-16 15:06:152020-11-16 15:12:25How to help virtual teams deal with the real challenges they face
Storytelling is a topic of great interest in the business communications world. Conferences and speakers around the world are praising the power of storytelling and attracting audiences. Why? Humans have told stories since our earliest beginnings. We all tell stories. It was part of our survival and development. Stories are all around us, from campfires to multimillion dollar movies, so why do we have to make a case for it in a business environment? Why do people want training on something that comes naturally? In a business context, perhaps we don’t want reveal too much of ourselves, show too much emotion or not be taken seriously at work. Our storytelling seminar gives participants the skills and determination to tell more stories and better stories in the workplace. This post shares five lessons learned about storytelling in business.
Lesson 1 – What does your listener want?
What attracts audiences to the telling of a story? We identified three things:
emotion
energy
authenticity
Children will demand expressions of the energy of the characters, the emotion of the plot and telling the story “like you mean it”. Telling bedtime stories to children is a practical example of the standards adults have for stories as well, though many may not say it. Adults need the same things to be engaged.
Lesson 2 – What makes a good story good?
As Aristotle observed, a good story starts with a character in trouble. The character is one the audience can identify with–not too good to be in trouble and not too bad to deserve the trouble to come. The story progresses with the development and deepening of the trouble to create a sense of fear in the audience so the resolution of the problems leaves the audience with a sense of relief.
Aristotle referred to the stages as pity, fear, and catharsis. Stories from Greek tragedy to Toy Story follow this model in one way or another.
In the workplace we can tell stories about problems, consequences and solutions to reflect Aristotle’s model.
“Storytelling comes naturally to humans, but since we live in an unnatural world, we sometimes need a little help doing what we’d naturally do.”
Dan Harmon
Lesson 3 – Crafting stories that fit
The STAR Model is a basic and effective format for telling stories in a business environment. The model fits the needs of business audiences as it sets the scene, describes the action in it and talks about what happened to resolve the situation. This model is very effective in behavioral interviewing, answering questions about past performance and offering a status update.
Situation – clearly explain the facts and assumptions that make up the context of the action.
Task – detail the task to be completed or the goal to be reached.
Actions taken – describe all relevant actions taken to complete the task.
Results achieved – describe the immediate outputs and eventual outcomes of the actions taken.
Lesson 4 – Courage to connect
If work for you is simply an exchange of power, storytelling and other enhanced communication tools are not important. Others will translate what you say into orders if you are in a power position just as you may interpret orders from your superiors. If you want your workplace to be a place where people build something together instead of following the orders of the few, storytelling is an active strategy to humanize the workplace for you and your co-workers. It provides opportunities for meaningful connections that inspire trust.
Lesson 5 – From stories to action
A good story can set the stage in a business environment and yet we often need to make the purpose clear once it is complete. We can achieve that Socratically through a debriefing method or by simply telling the listeners what we had in mind directly.
A clear explanation of the purpose of the story provides a natural, logical connection to the observation of what the teller and the listeners need to accomplish in a business environment. When listeners can connect the story to their current situation, they become involved in the process of identifying what to do and why it needs to be done—without having to be told.
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https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/performance.jpg8961494James Culverhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngJames Culver2020-09-29 12:36:442020-09-29 12:40:00The power of storytelling in business: 5 lessons learned
I often find myself in the business section of the book store and I’m always struck by how cleverly these books position themselves. Titles like “How to Have A Good Day” or “The Art of Thinking Clearly” seem to speak directly to me and this is the reason I pick them up and sometimes even buy them. If you are involved in writing offers and proposals (RFQ’s, tender responses) you are looking to create a similar impact – you want the reader’s attention and interest from the moment they pick up the document. The secret to doing this, just as with business books, is to make them ‘reader-oriented’. Over the years we have worked with many companies that have great products and services but sometimes find it challenging to write commercial offers which appeal to readers. In this post we will explain exactly what ‘reader-oriented’ means and how to achieve it.
What do readers want to read about in an offer?
Think for a minute; if someone sends you a proposal for a product or service they want you to buy, what do you want to read in it?
Now read this quote: “Don’t come into my office and tell me about the perfect solution you have. Instead, tell me how you can solve my business problem and then I’m all ears!” Max Bittner, CEO Lazarda
Every proposal or offer exists to solve a problem, which your client is unable to solve on their own. So, as Max says, make sure your client’s problem or challenge is front and centre in your proposal. This means starting with a detailed and accurate description of the problem. You want your reader to think “This organisation understands my business and its challenges” because this will establish your credibility to solve their problem right from the start. It sounds obvious I know…and yet when running proposal writing workshops I am almost always asked “But where do I write about us and what we do? Normally we start with this!”
Key Learning Point 1
If you want to get your proposal read, start by talking about them not you.
What will they actively read?
Proposals have many different elements and different stakeholders will focus on different parts; legal will study your T&C, finance will look at your figures, procurement will study your value statement. But the three most important elements, and probably the ones that will be read by the decision maker, are:
1. The title
A good title can create a great first impression and get your proposal higher in the pile of many proposals. And the trick is to make the title speak to the reader. Compare these 2 different titles for the same proposal and ask yourself – which proposal would you read first?:
Proposal from Company X for Internet Connectivity Services.
Creating Opportunities for Company Y’s Customers by Connecting Remote Islands in the Western Pacific.
An effective title will contain 3 things; name the client, include a verb (to indicate what the proposal will do) and an outcome (which of course is focused on the client’s business).
2. Contents page
The contents page is there for a reason. At a quick glance, a reader can assess what’s in your proposal, whether it is worth reading, and where to start. Spending time on the contents page will also help you to:
Plan the proposal before you start writing it
Check that nothing is missing
Order the sections of your report so they are logical and connected
Craft headings for each section
Again, it’s all about the language. Compare “Context and Background” to “What Problem is Company Y Trying to Solve?”. The second heading is more specific and engaging, and it uses a question which is a good way of getting readers’ attention. You probably noticed that this post uses questions for each section.
3. Executive summary
The Executive Summary is critical – it may be the only part of the proposal read by a decision maker, before she or he passes it to specialist teams with their comments and recommendations. Think of the Summary as the text you read on the back of a book; it should tell you what’s in the book and encourage you to read it.
Executive Summaries should be short (I would recommend no more than 1 page) and written in clear and simple language; avoid technical or specialist language as your reader could be more of a generalist if they are a C-level decision maker. Giving it to someone else to read is a great way to get feedback and make improvements.
The next section in this post will give you ideas on how to craft the content of your Executive Summary. You can also find help and advice on writing in clear and simple English and editing your writing in these two posts:
Key Learning Point 2
Focus on the 3 elements of the proposal that will make the biggest impression. Craft them to grab your reader’s attention with how your product or service will benefit their business.
Is there a winning structure for offers?
Yes there is! There is a structure that we recommend and organisations we have worked with tell us it works. N.O.S.E. can be a powerful structure to engage and persuade your reader because it starts with answering the question “Why should I read this proposal?” just as Max Bittner explained in the quote your read earlier. In fact, it would be a great structure for your Executive Summary!
Here’s the structure, described from two perspectives; what you write about and what your client is looking for:
NEEDS
You: What problems/needs does the client have?
Client: I want to see that you understand my problem
OUTCOMES
You: If the problems/needs are addressed, what would be the positive result for the client’s business?
Client: I want to know how this will benefit my business
SOLUTIONS
You: What is the product/service will provide this outcome?
Client: I want to believe you can solve my problem
EVIDENCE
You: How will you deliver the solution on time, to budget and with quality?
Client: I want to trust that you can do what you say
Key Learning Point 3
Use a structure that persuades by starting with the client’s needs before you explain your solution.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/laptop-product.jpg9711551Scott Leveyhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngScott Levey2020-08-13 10:53:472020-08-05 13:19:22How winning offers and proposals are written
This week’s Secret L&D manager is Hungarian and is a Learning & Development Specialist for a global chemical company. In this post, he talks about the journey and the challenges of building and encouraging a learning culture in a large organization.
You were the first L&D manager in the organization. What sort of training budget were you expecting to have to work with when you joined?
Before I came here, I was working in a huge worldwide corporation where learning and development had a lot of money working – close to about €400,000 per year. Looking back, we were definitely spoiled, and I was expecting something similar when I came here. That was my expectation. When I arrived, I was given a budget of €10,000 and most of this was already allocated to translation work!
I wanted to be able to build a learning culture (see this post for more information). One of the things I have been doing (and haven’t yet finished) is to build a large library of free learning. This does take time but there are a lot of free, good quality things on the internet. You just need to be able to invest the time to find and assess them. I used our skills and competency models as the basis to build this and then I just matched these skills and competencies with an index of releavnt e-learnings, learning nuggets, MOOCS, e-books and podcasts.
I have also created internal webinars. My first step was to establish subject matter expert groups within our company and then we started to create something like internal TED Talks. People could learn about and from the different groups and different fields within the company. For example we would have one subject expert talking about dealing with difficult customers. It was a 1 ½ hour session and it was advertised, and people could join via Zoom.
How did you raise awareness of these learning opportunities and events?
Here I used 2 types of advertising; one is definitely the usual and very boring e-mail communication. I’m not sure it was very helpful but people did join as a result of this kind of communication channel. The other was creating and printing leaflets and brochures and placing them around the corridors and also in the canteen. This was definitely more helpful and effective. I based them on a silly cartoon that was going around on Facebook a couple of years ago.
These initiatives have helped to prove the worth of learning. Now I’ve got the management to actually spend and dedicate a real budget for learning this year, although with the coronavirus crisis who knows what will happen? But I’m pretty sure that this time I will be able to spend more and I’ve very concrete ideas of what I want to do. So for example I want to still further develop these internal webinars and I also want to continue with e-learning creation and creating the content internally.
The other thing that I’ve been planning on doing for a long time is implementing virtual learning and actually this is also a very timely thing. As you know I have been in talks with you regarding implementing this. When you think of the flu symptoms and all the sickness that are going around the world right now I think one of the best tools, let’s call it a tool not a method, is to use e-learning and virtual learning. Virtual learning, and it is not to be confused with e-learning, is when you go for an interactive training session but you don’t have to go anywhere. You can do it from your home or you can do it from your office. It fits our company and the situation.
The “secret L&D manager” is actually a group of L&D managers. They are real people who would prefer not to mention their name or company – but do want to write anonymously so they can openly and directly share their ideas and experience with their peers.
A Global Customer Services Director recently came to us with a challenge: We have customer service teams spread all over the world, helping our telecommunications customers with technical troubleshooting. Some of them are really excellent, experienced agents, others are relatively new and still learning the ropes. Some are good with the technical side, others better at working with people. The question is – how do we get them all working to the same standard?
We proposed the RATER model, a five-point framework which describes how customers evaluate the service they receive. We have found RATER is a tool which everyone can learn from and improve, whatever their level of experience. In a previous post we introduced the framework. In this post we will add some information and provide tips on how to put it into practice, based on real experience we’ve had working with clients like the one above.
Reliability
Is your organisation able to deliver services consistently, accurately and on time? Of course, sometimes things go wrong. If you work on a customer helpline, ‘reliability’ becomes the measure of how quickly and effectively you can put things right.
Manage customer expectations by explaining honestly what can and cannot be done. Being open and transparent is the foundation of reliability.
Never feel pressured to promise something you are not 100% sure you can deliver. Declining customer requests is not pleasant, but it will build trust in the long term because your customers will value your honesty.
Being pro-active by identifying and communicating problems before they happen is another great way to help your customers see you as reliable.
Assurance
How much do your customers trust you? If a customer is buying a service from you this is particularly important because the transaction is built on the customer’s future expectation that you will deliver what you say you will.
Find out what your customers’ real needs are and show that you are focused on the benefits and outcomes for them.
Build your credibility by demonstrating your specific skills and expertise; customers expect you to be an expert in the product or service your organisation offers.
Ensure that you are giving consistent information to all customers. If customers hear different things from different people in your organisation, they will not be assured that they can trust your answer.
Tangibles
Tangibles are the way the customer interacts with your organisation; through physical spaces as well as your web site, apps, phone lines and email. If you are a customer service agent, some of these things will be beyond your control but there is still a lot you can do to make the customer journey a good experience.
Consider the steps the customer went through to get in touch with you and how that can impact their mood and expectations. For example, apologising for waiting time is a respectful thing to do.
Smile, be friendly and interested, show respect. These are all tangible elements that contribute to a customer’s impression of your service.
If you have different customer communication channels, find out which ones different customers prefer and use them to personalise your communication approach.
Empathy
Do you customers feel that you care about them as individuals? And importantly, how do you show them that you care?
Empathy means putting the customer at the centre of communication; you will achieve this by talking less, listening more, and asking effective questions to ensure you understand.
Avoid phrases like “I understand how you feel” and “I apologise for the inconvenience” which are over-used and sound scripted and unnatural.
Listen to the customer’s emotions and acknowledge them; a phrase like “I can hear that you are feeling upset” shows the customer you are paying attention to their feelings and they have a right to feel that way.
Responsiveness
The whole reason for having customer service is to respond to customer questions and problems. So, customers will judge you on how quickly and effectively you do this.
Don’t wait until you have the full solution before re-contacting a customer; giving updates on progress and steps you have taken will assure customers they have not been forgotten and are still a priority.
Provide customers with specific deadlines and timelines but always make sure these are realistic and do-able, otherwise you will undermine their trust in you.
Manage communications across multiple channels (if your organisation has them) to make sure you pick up and deal with customer communications quickly.
The RATER model in action
When we used the RATER framework with this team, participants reported that they found it extremely useful to have a model to draw on – not just for planning customer interactions but also to reflect on which of the RATER dimensions was important for a specific customer and how the agent addressed this during the interaction. RATER became a common language which this team could use to support and debrief each other.
If you would like to know more about our experience of working with global companies on developing their customer service communication, or the RATER model, feel free to contact us.
Practical customer service training, challenging you to assess & improve your service approach with the world-class RATER model.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/trendsinleadership.jpg8321349Stephen Jennerhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngStephen Jenner2020-06-29 15:59:252020-06-29 16:00:40How to Meet Customer Expectations with the RATER Model
This week’s Secret L&D manager is Hungarian and is a Learning & Development Specialist for a global chemical company . In this post, he talks about the journey and the challenges of building a learning culture in a large organization.
When you joined the company, what kind of learning culture did you find?
I think it’s really easy to answer this question, because when I joined my company, I can say that there was no learning culture. If I can take a step back, people have different understandings and definitions of the term “learning culture” . For me “learning culture” means there are people who like learning, there are learning resources and opportunities that people are encouraged to access whenever they need something or expect to need something going forward, and managers enable and encourage learning . Here, in all cases, there was nothing, so people were not, really empowered to learn. The second thing is that there were not a lot of resources available for learning. One of my priorities, and it’s also one of the reasons I was hired, is to create this kind of learning environment and then along with this also create a learning culture.
How were managers and the leaders in your organization seeing learning before you arrived?
I think, and this is only my perspective, that the management was saying, “Learning is very much needed” but when it came to the point where they had to invest they said, “We don’t have the budget for that”. On the one hand they definitely like the idea of learning. They talk a lot about learning and do want to enhance, improve and develop their employees. But actually, when an employee comes to them and says “OK we agreed that I need negotiations training” and they say, “OK go, have fun”, the employee has to find the seminar or resources. Employees would just Google something and then went come back with a course they had found that cost €20,000. For me this was the first problem because nobody knew if it was a good course quality-wise, who the provider was and if they were a fit, whether the investment was reasonable or if the training was needed. And then usually 99% of the managers said “sorry but we don’t have the budget for that”.
So how have you gone about building a learning culture?
What I did first was convincing management that learning and development really matters to our success as an organization. I used storytelling approaches to help them see why it is good to invest in learning, and how a company actually benefits from having a learning culture. Then I showed them that, even if they don’t want to spend a lot of money, using informal or on-the-job learning is still going to create a lot of benefits for the company. For example, using job rotation or on-the-job development does work and can make a tangible difference. Approaches like mentoring and internal coaching can and should be done. The managers in my company really bought into this idea. The first 2 or 3 things that I managed to do were ideas which didn’t cost a lot of money but were still very beneficial.
Another example where I actually created value and showed the management why learning helps an organization is when we set up the first e-learnings. We built these internally using a tool called EdApp https://www.edapp.com/. It’s a very good and intuitive tool and easy to use. There were a lot of templates that we could instantly just choose and work with. I worked with our technical experts and together we created e-learning activities on areas such as regulation, process management and . tendering, and product management. We then rolled the e-learnings out to 200 people and the feedback from the participants has been really great. Because of this tool we’ve been able to gamify the learning too.
What else have you done to continue building a culture since?
Communication is key. Whenever we have a new product or new system (e.g recruiting, performance management) we connect it to the learning. For example, in our performance management you have an annual meeting about your performance with your manager, and you have to talk about your development. Of course most people consider meeting a mandatory step and find it boring. I have worked with the managers to help them individually use this moment to create a better dialog with their employees, be more confident when giving feedback, setting goals etc etc. This combination of building a catalogue of recommended training providers and training courses, building e-learning, leveraging managers and looking for single moments where we can connect learning to the business process shows why learning is important in a company and is the first steps of building a learning culture.
The “secret L&D manager” is actually a group of L&D managers. They are real people who would prefer not to mention their name or company – but do want to write anonymously so they can openly and directly share their ideas and experience with their peers.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/tablet.jpg8901671Guest Authorhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngGuest Author2020-05-13 09:29:402020-07-01 10:43:29The Secret L&D Manager: Building a learning culture in a global organization
In the 2020 State of Remote Work survey, respondents identified loneliness as their top struggle with working from home. Even among experienced home-workers, loneliness and isolation are challenges. This year, millions of workers are suddenly sent home to work, indefinitely and with no preparation. Only a select few will be able to thrive in perpetual solitude; the rest will probably need a little help. This post offers seven exercises you can do to overcome loneliness and isolation when you are working from home. Think of these as your ‘daily to-do list’. In fact, this list is a good practice for looking after your mental health in normal circumstances; in present circumstances it has become a lot more relevant.
#1 Talk to someone
Loneliness is a cycle. The more alone we feel the more we think that other people don’t want to talk to us, and so we don’t reach out. Break the cycle by having at least one conversation a day, with anyone. Talking about how we feel can help see that other people are feeling exactly the same and that we are not alone.
#2 Talk to yourself
We are all doing this most of the time, but we don’t realise it. Psychologists call this our ‘inner dialogue’ made up of recurring thoughts and emotions whirling inside our heads. If we don’t listen to this dialogue, we won’t be able to control it. Luckily, there are some proven techniques to help us listen more intently to ourselves; daily journal writing, labelling the emotions we are feeling, writing a letter to our third person self. These techniques allow us to view ourselves as an outside observer in order to tackle negative thoughts and emotions before they become actions and behaviours.
#3 Keep fit
‘Healthy body – healthy mind’ is not just an expression. Science has shown that physical exercise has a positive effect on our mental state. Intense physical activity releases mood-lifting chemicals called endorphins into our blood stream. Even just going for a walk can make us feel better, due to the fresh air, change of scenery and being around people (at an appropriate distance!). If you can’t, or don’t want to go outside, there are lots of free videos on the internet offering live fitness routines!
#4 Tune out
News channels and social media are full of one story at the moment and while it is good to be informed and in touch with what’s happening on the outside, the noise this makes can be over-whelming and reinforce negative feelings. Tuning-out from news and media can help us to tune-in to ourselves, find some peace and quiet from the noise and focus on doing something that makes us feel good. This is an example of a term that has become highly popularised in recent years – ‘mindfulness’.
#5 Take charge
Get a piece of paper and draw a circle. On the outside of the circle write the things that worry or bother you. This could be anything from becoming ill to a noisy neighbour. Now work in the inside of the circle and write all the things in your life that you can directly control. For example, you can’t control your neighbour, but you can ignore the noise. You can’t control events, but you can definitely control your reactions to them. The area inside the circle is your zone of control. This is the area you should work on and put your energy into because being in control of things gives us positive feelings, compared to worrying about things we can’t control or influence. When you start using any of the exercises in this post you have actually started to take control already!
#6 Do something for someone
Human brains are reward-driven, which means our senses become heightened when we enjoy things. Recognition and gratitude from other people are among the most common types of reward which our brains seek. A good way of doing this is to offer a kind act to someone else. For example, giving a compliment, holding a door open, giving a nice smile. It makes no difference if these things are reciprocated or not; just the act of doing them makes us feel better about ourselves and more connected to others, lighting up those important reward centres in our brains.
#7 Do something for yourself
Acts of kindness also extend to yourself. Being isolated can be a struggle but it’s also a potential gift. Is there a book you’ve been meaning to read, a recipe you haven’t had time to try, a new hobby you’ve been interested in but not had the time? Doing something new can help take your mind away from feeling lonely and build purpose and self-esteem.
We hope you enjoyed reading this post. If you did, and it helped you, you could choose to ‘pay it forward’ by sharing it with someone else – a little act of kindness that could make a difference. You can also share your tips and advice for dealing with working at home, in the comments section below.If you would like to know more about our experience of helping teams with remote working, feel free to contact us. We also offer training on managing your focus, energy and impact when working from home and leading peoplewhen they are working from home.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/homeoffice.jpg8891367Scott Leveyhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngScott Levey2020-04-20 10:17:552020-05-13 15:31:22Seven Exercises for Overcoming Loneliness and Isolation when Working from Home
When workers are suddenly sent home to work they will face plenty of challenges, especially if they’ve never done it before. Team leaders will face an additional challenge: Leading a team that is working from home. In this post we offer a range of tips and advice for how you can do that. To keep it simple and easy to implement we’ve stuck to a 3-step approach:
Start by understanding the challenges
Keep the team working together
Lead your team as they work from home
What are the challenges?
Technical
An immediate priority for leading a team that is working from home is to ensure that team members have the tools to do their jobs remotely. This includes both productivity and communication tools. As a leader you can approach this with the whole team by checking they have what they need and discussing which kinds of communication technologies work well for them. Not everything will work as it did in the office and as a team you may need to decide to use ad-hoc technologies as a temporary solution.
Emotional
Some team members may feel isolated and this can have a serious impact on motivation. This is best discussed in a one-to-one setting. Individuals will all have different emotional and psychological challenges and you need to know what these are in order to help them. A simple question like, “How are you looking after yourself?” can open up a discussion and go a long way to making team members feel supported individually. Read more on this topic in our post Dealing with Loneliness and Isolation when Working from Home.
Personal
Don’t forget to also look after your own needs and work through your own personal and logistical challenges. If you don’t address these, you won’t be as effective at helping other people with their issues. Get advice on how to do this in our post Three Steps to Adapt to Home Working.
How do I keep the team working together?
In the 1970s, MIT Professor Thomas Allen discovered that team cohesion is strongest when employees are physically closer. His ideas have been taken forward by some of the most successful companies who engineer ‘collisions’ between employees to strengthen bonding and group affiliation; simple things like coffee-machine conversations, team social events, sharing stories, etc. So, how can you do this with a team that works in physical isolation from each other? Here are some ideas we have seen that work:
Set up daily check-ins or ‘stand-up meetings’ at the start of each day where the team shares their priorities for the day and any impediments they face. This can give team members a reassuring routine which is both work and socially focused and help to overcome feelings of isolation. It also gives you a helicopter-view of what’s happening each day.
In team meetings always add an agenda item with a question like, “How is this arrangement working for us?” This helps to address emotional/psychological issues of individuals and build trust. Avoid closed questions (asking “Is everyone ok?” won’t give you much information) and use “us” and “we” to reinforce team togetherness.
Monitor team communication patterns to pick up on problems, side issues and tone that team members are using with each other. This doesn’t mean using spyware! You just need to go over conversations that are happening on Slack, Teams and other conversation channels.
Use video in team communications; humans bond much better to faces than to voices and non-verbal communication sends powerful signals of belonging and empathy. Seeing faces also puts more energy into calls, which helps to overcome feelings of isolation.
Create and manage social interaction to replicate what normally happens in the office; have a virtual lunch together, share internet memes, play games together, just get people laughing and having fun. Social interaction is the base of creating trust in a team; you just need to do it a bit differently in a virtual work setting.
Which skills do I need for leading a team that is working from home?
You don’t need new skills to become an effective leader of a home-working team, but you will need to use some of them more. Here is a short list of where to focus your leadership skills:
Be available
You may have an open door policy in the office but that won’t work in a remote team. So, be explicit about when and how team members can contact you. If you haven’t heard from someone in a while, check in with them and ask how they are. At the same time be careful that you also ring-fence the time you need for yourself and your own tasks.
Solve problems
This is probably the biggest thing your team will need from you, at least at the start. You may need to be flexible and change processes if necessary, for example lifting constraints on how and where data is stored and shared. Focusing on outputs rather than processes will help push the team towards purposeful activity and away from missing their old physical environment.
Make rules and hold people accountable to them
It’s important to establish some ground rules with the team, for example on which communication tools to use for different tasks, how and when to contact each other. You then need to monitor that the team is sticking to those rules and jump in when they are not.
Continue to manage performance
Research shows that employees value their performance being managed and they rate managers highly when it’s done well. This is still true in a home-working environment, but it will take more communication and more regular, smaller steps to address the distance and isolation. A practical start is to set some short term performance goals on adjusting to home-working at the beginning.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/leading-from-home.jpg8991368Scott Leveyhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngScott Levey2020-04-13 11:10:262020-07-01 13:57:52Leading a team that is working from home
In March 2020 it is estimated that a quarter of the world’s population is confined to their homes in some form or other. For millions of workers this means having to adapt to working from home. In this post you will read about the 3-step approach to make that change a bit smoother and a little less painful. Even after this current crisis has ended, there may be times in the future where we need to make a radical and sudden shift in the way we work due to external circumstances. This could be anything ranging from unemployment or re-location, to geo-political events. So, we have put together the advice and approach in this post to be helpful in any situation where we need to change the way we work.
Step 1 – Acknowledge
The first step to dealing with any big change is to acknowledge what is happening. If we don’t do this, we may get stuck in a little bit of denial, which will prevent us from dealing with the present situation effectively. Here are examples of what you can acknowledge in the current situation:
For a lot of people right now, being asked to work at home full time is not voluntary. This is a decision made for us, not by us.
This situation may last a long time. At the moment, authorities and businesses are talking about isolation as ‘indefinite’.
‘Working from home’ is not the same as ‘being at home’. There will be obstacles you will need to overcome, from dealing with family members to the state of your home internet connection.
You will need to adapt by making changes to both home and work life. Put another way; you will need a new set of rules for both.
There will be other things you need to acknowledge – everybody’s situation is different. Spending a little time considering what is different or missing from your new home working situation is a good way to prepare to make some changes, which is our next step.
Remember that difficult periods can also be
personally rewarding. As someone once said, “the worst that
can happen is that you might learn something about yourself”.
Step 2 – Make Changes
Now that you have acknowledged the situation, you’re ready to make the changes you need in order to adapt to it. A good way to approach this is to make a list of difficulties/things you miss and then come up with counter-measures to each one. We did this exercise recently in our own team, and we discovered that although our team is made up of experienced remote/home workers, they still have challenges that they need to work on. Here are some of the things from their lists:
Difficulties I Face/Things I Miss:
Making a mental and physical separation of work and home life
Knowing how to organise my day
Being able to stop and tune-out from work
Seeing and socialising with colleagues
Little routines e.g. morning coffee with a croissant in the canteen!
Interruptions and distractions from family members
Feeling like I’m at work rather than at home
Team huddles and bouncing ideas off each other
Counter-Measures:
Find a dedicated space to work (can be anywhere) and put on work clothes in the morning
Start the day with a ‘stand up’ team meeting on Skype – hearing others’ priorities can help us shape our own priorities and organise our days
Set up rules for family members e.g. knock on your home office door if they want something, put a sign up ‘Can talk/In a meeting/Busy until 11.’ etc.
Stick to your old routines where you can e.g. schedule a coffee break to go grab a coffee somewhere local
Use technology to connect to colleagues and agree how to use them, e.g. WhatApp group for idea bouncing, Zoom for team meetings
Make time for fun with colleagues to relieve boredom and lift your mood (e.g. sharing internet memes, funny videos, doing online challenges)
Talk often to colleagues about feelings on working at home
Fix a daily schedule and stick to it (share it with family members and colleague so that they can help you)
Step 3 – Look After Yourself
Sudden changes to our lives can be traumatic. In Step 1 we advised spending time acknowledging the change. Step 3 is all about managing your mental and physical health through a period of sudden change. Here are some practical ways you can do this:
Get some exercise
Even if you don’t wear a fitness gadget on your wrist, you will soon realise that working from home means moving much less compared to being in the office. So, plan some exercise into your daily routine, even just a 30 minute walk at lunchtime can help. Research shows that lack of exercise and fresh air has a real impact on our mental capabilities.
Ask for help
From colleagues and especially your manager. This could be asking for solutions to technical problems, or for a bit of slack if the home/work balance is getting overwhelming. We are all in the same boat and asking for and giving help and support is what we need to do now. You can read our tips and advice for managers in the post How to Lead a Team that is Working from Home.
Be kind to yourself
You are not going to make this change successfully in one day or even one month. It’s ok to be frustrated, angry, impatient and it’s healthy to consider the emotions you are feeling and where they come from. It’s also important to understand the emotions of those around us – whether family or colleagues – and be kind and understanding of those people too. You can find tips and advice on dealing with the emotional side of home-working in the post Dealing with Loneliness and Isolation When Working from Home.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/homeoffice3.jpg8591380Scott Leveyhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngScott Levey2020-04-07 10:37:092020-05-13 15:45:01Three steps to adapt to working from home
People have always told stories and they are a vital part of our communication. Today, storytelling has become accepted (and sometimes expected) in a professional context. We’ve seen a rapid demand for ourpractical storytelling in business training solutions. Whereas 8 years ago there was sometimes a need to convince people that a storytelling approach was valid, we rarely get any pushback today. This change in attitudes can be partly attributed to the power of the TED talk format, partly to our push back against death by PowerPoint and people speaking to us in bullets … and mainly because storytelling never went away. When done well, storytelling connects with people in a way no other communication approach can. This post outlines the essentials so you can get started.
What is a story? And why should I use them?
Every story has …
a plot
a beginning, middle and end
often involves overcoming a problem, challenge, obstacle, dilemma
but above all …. a story connects on a human /emotional level
This last point is the key. A story is not a series of events or a case study. It should connect with people and create an emotional reaction.
This connecting makes stories easy to remember. When done well stories bring meaning to information and have the power to move people. Depending on the story and the skill of the storyteller our brains …
produce cortisol during the tense moments in a story, which allows us to focus
produce oxytocin, that promotes connection and empathy
release dopamine which makes us feel more hopeful and optimistic
This means you can choose to use a story in a wide range of situations. We often use stories when presenting, influencing, teaching, leading or just in day-to-day discussions. Consider using stories when you want to aid memory, celebrate, challenge assumptions, connect, convince, encourage, energize, entertain, explain, impress, inspire, motivate, persuade, reinforce values or beliefs, scare or shock, sell, support, teach or warn.
How do I build a story?
Learning to build a great story is a skill, and it can require practice. If you want to build a story you need to start with your audience. Your first question has to be “What do I want them to feel?”. Sometimes the emotion you arrive at may surprise you. Secondly ask yourself “What do I want them to understand? think? do?”. Then think back over the situations you’ve been part of, or have observed. It is far easier and far better to tell stories that mean something to you and are your stories. You can share other people’s stories but make sure you have the information and the understanding to bring it to life. Again, a story works because it connects on a human /emotional level.
This post goes behind the scenes with 2 of our staff, discussing the challenges some professionals have when building a story and how they approach this in a training environment.
If you are struggling to build a story, then try using the IDEAS approach:
Identify the emotion you are trying to create. Then identify what you want your listener to understand and do.
Decide which story would best accomplish this and connect with your listener
Expand your story. You have the bones, now put the flesh on them.
Anticipate their questions and reactions. Now choose to deal with these within your story or intentionally leave this out to provoke discussion once you’ve finished telling the story.
See the story as you tell it.
Finally, don’t assume you can just get up and tell it. You need to practice your story, if you want to make it matter.
How do I actually tell my story?
If the story means something to you, you will already have the content and the structure. Make things personal and tell tough stories. If your story is tough and personally matters to you, you will naturally find the pace, the tone and the body language you need to make your story captivating. When you are developing and practising your story, follow these 3 great pieces of advice:
Invest time in building it
Practice out loud
Make it personal to you
When you are delivering the story …
see the story as you tell it
use outer and inner language. Outer language is what physically happened, while inner language is how the person was feeling thinking. An advanced tip is to avoid eye contact when you are sharing the inner language.
use plenty of LOTS (language of the senses). This includes what you saw, heard, smelt, tasted, tough or felt
take your time. If your rush your story, you will rob it of its richness. You wouldn’t want to read a story structured into bullet points, would you?
And if you want to get really good …
use memory devices e.g. words, phrases or images repeated in different places
use a tangible object or image as a starting or closing point
when doing dialogues adopt a different voice/body/position for each person
consider your space – roam the room or sit on a chair – BUT actively think about it!
What should I not do when telling a story?
Telling a story is NOT the same as making a presentation. A lot of the techniques you’ve learned on presentation seminars are story-killers and using them will rob your story of its emotional content. For example:
Don’t put your key message up front
Don’t tell them what you’ll tell them, tell them, tell them what you told them
Don’t start with the structure, start with the emotion
We would also suggest you avoid the phrase “Let me tell you a story”
Storytelling is a learnable skill! It starts with identifying your goal and understanding your audience. You need to know the emotion you are looking for. From there you start hunting for the right story, which you then craft through practice. Don’t rush it, do not “present” it, and have the courage to just tell a story person to person. You’ll be surprised at the impact you can make.
And if you’d like support, whether it be coaching or training then do get in touch. We’d love to help you be even better at storytelling.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/ict2.jpg9121375Scott Leveyhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngScott Levey2020-03-12 09:48:422020-07-01 13:57:52A practical guide to storytelling in business
As an InCorporate Trainer, I provide business English training and support to an engineering multinational within their offices. Most of my participants attend meetings with clients, partners and colleagues, and sometimes it’s necessary to reschedule a meeting via email. My participants are concerned about the tone of the email, letting others down, and losing trust and credibility. Based on my work with them, here are a few examples, tips and phrases that you can use when you need to reschedule a meeting in English.
Reschedule with as much notice as possible
This gives others the chance to use their time as efficiently as possible and reduces the impact and inconvenience. Waiting until the last minute to reschedule the meeting, means no one else will have a chance to schedule another activity during this time. If it happens frequently it damages your emotional bank account. As you can see from the example mail below, the reason for the change has been given. Transparency is valued and builds trust. If you have a reasonable reason for rescheduling the meeting and you share this, others will find the change easier to accept. If you are informing them a few days in advance a polite email to is usually fine. This email has 3 steps:
Shares the reason why
Says sorry for the inconvenience
Suggests another time
Dear Ralf,
I’m very sorry, but I need to reschedule our status update meeting set for Thursday. I need to stand in for my colleague who is unexpectedly unable to lead a client workshop. I am aware that our meeting needs to happen before we can move on the next quality gate, so I’d like to suggest that we meet on Monday 6th instead. I believe everyone is able to attend, right? If not, please let me know and I’ll look for another alternative. Sorry again for the inconvenience and I hope that we are able to find a suitable solution.
Thanks in advance,
Reschedule at the last minute
How you handle rescheduling your meeting at the last minute depends very much on whom you’re meeting, why you are meeting and how big a problem it is to reschedule the day before. Sickness and family disasters aside, rescheduling on the day of the meeting really does deserve a personal phone call. Using the phone is personal, shows you care and also speeds up the process of finding a new date that fits both sides. On those very rare occasions when you need to cancel a meeting an hour before then get ready to eat humble pie. Again, do it by phone, apologize, explain why and show you want to find a new date – even if you can’t do this right then and there. Then consider showing you appreciate their patience by following up later with a thank you email. For example …
Dear Ralf,
I just wanted to write and say thank you once again for your flexibility. I really do appreciate it. Talking though our options regarding the NCC presentation is very important to me and I’d like to reschedule quickly and find a time that suits you. I can move things around and find time to meet on Monday (10:00 – 14:15) or Thursday (9:00 – 13.00). If neither of these work for you then please make some suggestions and I’ll do my very best to find a solution. Once again, I’m very sorry for the inconvenience and thanks for your understanding.
Phrases
Explaining the reason
There is an urgent work-related problem which I need to solve.
I’ve been called away to deal with a problem.
I’ve been double booked and need to prioritize the client meeting. I hope you understand.
I need to cover for a colleague who is out of the office for several days.
I have a family situation I need to prioritize.
Showing appreciation
I appreciate your flexibility.
Thank you in advance for your understanding.
I really appreciate your support/help.
Phrases for apologizing
I’m sorry, I’m afraid I will need to move the date of our meeting.
Can we please find a new date? I’m really sorry, things have changed on my side.
I’m truly sorry but I can’t make the day/time we planned.
I apologize for changing things last minute.
I’m sorry about this, I was looking forward to our meeting.
Suggesting an alternative meeting time
Does X, Y, or Z work for you?
I can offer X or Y. If neither of those fit, please make a couple of suggestions and I will do my best to make it work.
I’m available on X, or Y, at A or B.
I can offer… / I’m free on…
Anytime on Friday works me.
Fore more information
If you would like to learn more about how our InCorporate Trainers provide on-the-job support and coaching for clients then take a look at
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/blendedlearning.jpg8811352Guest Authorhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngGuest Author2020-02-04 11:04:192020-05-13 09:32:34Rescheduling meetings in English
At Target Training we’ve been delivering “train-the-trainer” solutions for over 20 years to a broad range of clients across industries. Without fail, one of the most common personal training goals we see is “I want to learn to deal with difficult participants”. No matter whether you are delivering on-boarding, technical, safety or skills training, training starts and ends with your participants. As a trainer you want to deliver training which is engaging and useful … and as all experienced trainers know, a single difficult participant can impact this. This blog post shares our advice and experience, so you are better prepared to deal with difficult participants in the training room.
What do we mean by a “difficult participant” and how common are they really?
Training is about adding value to your participants and organization, by developing their knowledge, skills and behaviours. You want your participants to have a rewarding learning experience – and you have designed your training to achieve this. You’ve identified and considered the learning goals, you’ve considered the flow so it is smooth and ties together, and you’ve designed varied activities to keep the training engaging and rewarding. A “difficult participant, is a participant who hinders or prevents the above – intentionally or not. Difficult participants diminish the impact of the training for the other participants and reduce your organizations return on investment.
All participants have the potential of being difficult, and this depends upon a variety of factors – ranging from the context of the training to the training design, and from personalities to an individual’s situational circumstances. We all have bad days. However, truly destructive participants are thankfully rare. I’ve been involved in delivering training for over 23 years, and looking back I can only think of a handful of “difficult” individuals. Unfortunately, I remember them clearer than the rest. So, what can you do? Before the training starts, you can minimize the risk of participants becoming difficult before the training even starts, through some simple steps.
Know who the participants are
If you are delivering internally, then get a list of the participants in advance and make the time to speak with their line managers. By doing this you can learn more about the “perceived” context for the training, and the participants knowledge, experience, needs and attitudes. If somebody is cynical, silent or a talker, then the line manager may flag this. Alternatively, just ask straight out “Are there any participants I should keep an eye on?”. You can also encourage the manager to speak with her participants and reinforce that they value training and have expectations. Line manager involvement is key to successful training (Clemmer 2008) and ensures your organization makes the most of its training investment.
If you have a chance to meet the participants before the session, you should take it. Give them an impression of who you are. Build rapport before they enter the training room. Introduce yourself, find out what they expect from the training and set their expectations (“yes, unfortunately, there will be some role-plays”), or just make small talk for a few minutes. For you, the trainer, it makes a huge difference to walk into a room with ten strangers (not knowing what they want), or to walk into a room with five strangers and five people you already know (whose expectations you’ve already set).
Design the training so it respects and engages everyone
Use what you’ve learned from speaking with the line managers to ensure your training content is appropriate, relevant and challenging. By doing this you can minimize the likelihood of a wide range of difficult or disruptive behaviours – from boredom to frustration to challenging. You also want to ensure that your training respects the range of personalities and learning styles. Give your participants the opportunity to reflect, consider and contribute both as individuals and in groups. Plan “loud” and “quiet” times so both extroverts and introverts get what they need– not everyone enjoys brainstorming and discussions. Do consider the flow of energy within the training day and consciously design your training around this e.g. after lunch will you energize the group, or give them some reflection time to look back on the morning?
Anticipate tough questions, difficult learning points and likely areas of resistance
If this is a new training solution, then take the time to play “what if”. Write down all the questions that you hope they will ask, know they will ask, don’t want them to ask, and dread they ask. Then think about your answers. Practice your responses out loud and ensure your answers are brief, to the point and authentic. As the trainer you have a lot of knowledge and experience – and synthesizing all this into a clear and brief response can be tough.
If you’ve delivered the training before than you’ve already spotted the areas which raise questions or provoke discussions. Again, step back and consider what you want to say, how you want to say, and how much time you want to invest in which topics.
If there’s an elephant in your training room, then know how you want to tackle it
Keep your training human and keep it real. The circumstances surrounding the training can and will influence behaviours. If the organization is going through change, restructuring, laying off staff, or merging then you can expect this to impact attitudes and behaviours. You probably cannot influence these circumstances, but you can acknowledge them and prepare for possible resistance, push back or disassociation.
I remember delivering a 2-day leadership program to an automotive company where everyone knew that at the end of day 1 a major announcement would be made on the future of some plants. The training content was fixed and “motivating and driving performance “was a major part of the first day. We spoke about the circumstances openly, acknowledged that the topic was awkwardly timed to say the least, and agreed to reframe the training as practical management skills for the future, wherever they may be. Keeping the pace fast, the energy high and the themes as “archetypical” helped the training make a personal impact.
Reframe how you see difficult participants
Embrace the challenge of difficult participants. At its heart, training is about people, and we learn more about working with people from difficult situations than from “everything going to plan”. You want participants to be engaged and challenging you is actually a good thing. You want your participants to let you know if something isn’t going right for them during the training and not afterwards. And you want your participants to be themselves. I’ve only ever met one participant who I couldn’t work with at any level whatsoever, and even this was a learning moment – I learned that was ok, to accept the situation, and to focus on the other participants who clearly wanted to be there.
Always open the training in a way that sets out mutual expectations
Creating and agreeing on ground rules and shared expectations is essential. This then gives you and others the framework to hold each other accountable and have difficult conversations with difficult participants about difficult situations. Experienced trainers do this naturally and each trainer has their own style, but the core you need to agree on is
Timing (start, finish, breaks and length of breaks). Even the most experienced trainers can forget this, and participants want and need to know what to expect. You don’t need to lock yourself in to a schedule if you don’t want to but telling them you’ll break for lunch “around 12.30” helps.
Laptops open, closed, or even in bags. Phones are the bane of a trainer’s life, and when one person takes a call during the training everyone is impacted. Possible approaches could be
at the front on a desk
must be on silent
in bags and only check in breaks
take calls but leave the room before start speaking
Effective approaches to managing the pull of phone calls that I’ve seen/heard/ done have included:
make a joke of it e.g. “Is anybody expecting a child to be born they know about? No, well in that case do we really need our phones on?”
be direct e.g “Put your mobiles on silent and in your bags (not your pockets). You can check them during breaks, and if something is truly urgent your colleagues know where you are and how to find you. And if they can’t be bothered to come to the training room it can’t be truly urgent!”
charity box “Everything you take your phone out you put X in the bowl up front”
choosing a venue with no phone reception
And if none of the above are acceptable, then at least get agreement that people respectfully leave the training room when on the phone.
Communication. If the training topic is likely to be contentious or difficult then it is worth taking time to agree on expected communication styles. e.g. try not to interrupt, ask question to learn and not to show what you know, ask if something isn’t clear, close the loop by asking clarifying questions back etc.
Agreeing on ground rules allows you as the trainer to refer back to the agreed expectations and have awkward conversations safely. And of course, all of the above approaches are much more powerful when the training participants build them themselves! This allows the participants to hold each other accountable and take responsibility for ensuring the dynamics are healthy. You can expect that colleagues can self-regulate behaviours to some extent!
Start the training by keeping it real and keeping things human
The final tip is that positioning yourself above your participants will create unnecessary resistance and provoke difficult behaviours as participants try to prove something wrong, reject messages because they reject your credibility, or fight to show they know more. You are the trainer and you are human. Use this to build authenticity, credibility and trust from the outset and reduce the risk of difficult behaviours derailing the training. Share your experience, build your credibility and also show that you know how it can be challenging at first to get to grips with the specifics (“ I remember when ..”).
If you are delivering soft skills, customer service or leadership training, then avoid presenting yourself as the example to be followed. Tap into meaningful stories, share experiences and connect with the participants on a human level. My own approach is to open our Practical toolbox for managers program with “ I strongly believe in the value of everything we’ll be covering in the next 2 days, and many of your colleagues have fed back that they found it practical. Saying that, as a manager, I do not do everything we’ll be covering myself. I’m human and I have my strengths and my weaknesses”. I then see the participant’ physically relax and open up.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/woman-explaining.jpg9001515Scott Leveyhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngScott Levey2019-12-12 10:50:082019-12-09 13:10:20Train the Trainer: Dealing with ‘difficult’ participants – part 1
Recently one of our clients asked me to co-facilitate a workshop at an annual global event. The client is one of the largest building materials companies in the world, and their annual event is attended by plant managers, country directors and executives. Amongst the presentations and plenary sessions they wanted to run 2 challenging workshops which would then lead to concrete action plans. One of these workshops focused on the ambitious goal of quickly becoming carbon free, and the other on training.
Our client wanted to further strengthen their learning culture and ensure top-level management were playing an active part in this journey. Rather than asking the senior leaders “What do you need?” the question they wanted to ask was “So. what can you do?” – and the participants loved it. They were more than happy to share their experiences and opinions, and all were quite vocal when expressing that learning and development was their responsibility. As one Indonesian plant manager said “You at headquarters support us and help us, we like the e-learning and the virtual delivery offers … but we are the important ones because we need to make it happen”.
Based upon their input, and expanded through interviews with other clients, here are 17 ways that senior managers and executives can actively support training and development within their organizations.
Ensure that the message of how training connects into your long-term health and strategy is lived by all levels. This means looking for opportunities to repeat this message and using concrete and relatable stories.
Be clear to your L&D teams about where you see your future challenges. What will the critical skills be in 5 years time? What trends do you see in your market? Where do you see the skills gap? What are the core behaviours you want to see in your staff’s DNA? If you show them where you want to go they will help you get there.
Support the building of a skills matrix for roles , then with a rolling 36-month focus, ensure training is connected directly to this skills matrix. This is an upfront investment that then provides a clear framework for deciding where training budgets go.
Tap into “management by objectives“ behaviours and make learning a target for your management team.
Encourage awareness that people learn through experience and exposure. Be an example and look into include and involve upcoming talents and high-performers.
Expect your management teams to lead by example and actively join training sessions. This helps ensure that training is seen as strengthening for the future and not a sign of weakness or gaps.
Be seen to be looking for training and development for yourself. This sends a clear message that training is about becoming stronger and not a sign of weakness.
Insist that managers actively feed back to the central L&D team regarding their current and future needs, satisfaction levels, and ideas for the medium and long-term. Strive to make the internal customer surveys a formality. Your L&D teams should know in advance what is working and what is not if they are benefiting from direct conversations with the regions.
Ask to see that all training has a clear objective and that this is reinforced before, during, and after the training by line managers in person. This isn’t about checking quality, but rather showing the people involved in the before and after that you care, and these steps aren’t nice-to-have add-ons!
Connected to above, insist that all training programs lead to follow up actions by team leaders and line managers. See #4.
Ensue that clear and tangible training objectives are communicated at multiple touch points. Find stories and examples which connect the importance of learning and development to medium- and long-term goals. Yes, this similar to points 1 & 2 but we can’t emphasize it enough. If people understand the “why” then things happen.
Whenever you visit a plant or site, take the time to meet the local training dept and ask what else you can do to support them. They’ll really appreciate this … and you are again sending a clear signal that training and development is strategically important to you.
Get involved with your emerging talents programs. These people are your future. They’ll be energized by your involvement and they’ll energize you too!
Commit to actively supporting a training session once a month by joining the first 15 minutes, explaining why this training is relevant, showing interest in the people in the room and being clear about what we want to see afterwards
Show little tolerance for regions reinventing the wheel. Identify the core strategic programs needed by all regions– get these programs right through piloting them – and then make sure there is budget to adapt them to the local skill levels and languages.
Get involved when budget ownership questions threaten the actual delivery of training. Help cut through the complexity of cost centers and encourage the company to work as one organization.
When costs need cutting, defend training budgets and training availability. It’s too easy to cut it and the savings are often small compared to more painful options but the message is clear. Do you want your employees to see training and development opportunities as a bonus or as an expectation?
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/methodsandtools.jpg8101345Scott Leveyhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngScott Levey2019-11-29 10:27:282020-07-01 14:04:5617 practical ways senior managers and executives can support training and development inside their organization
This week’s Secret L&D manager is German and has been working for one of the big management consulting firms for 13 years. She is part of a virtual L&D team responsible for internal training solutions for a global group of analysts, specialists, and managers across multiple time zones. In our previous interviews she has shared how and why her organization got started with live virtual training solutions, and what they have learned along the way. In this post she shares more of her experience and looks forward to the future of virtual delivery.
Which topics have you learned work well virtually and which haven’t taken off?
As I mentioned earlier, we first used the live virtual delivery format for what we could call hard skills. This included technical skills and software training. Training on Excel, PowerPoint etc. We then used virtual delivery formats for training where there were a lot of tips, dos and don’ts. For example, how to build effective slides and engage your audience. If the training is about showing something directly and then facilitating a conversation about this, then virtual training actually works very well.
We have also had really good experiences with softer topics too. Many of our leadership programs are now delivered virtually. For example one of our management development programs has a kick-off webinar, two one-one-one coaching sessions and a wrap-up webinar —all facilitated virtual—as standard elements, plus during this journey the participants meet for a two-day residential workshop. The feedback from our managers is that this is one of our most popular and successful programs. We also have a lot of softer topics where working virtually is part of the training goals. For example, “Presenting in a virtual environment” or “Leading virtual teams”.
One big challenge or obstacle in a virtual space is how to build up trust. You have so many things which are lacking in a virtual space which are usually vital to building up trust with someone, right? This could be the immediate reaction to the other’s physical presence – smiles, body language, eye contact, even smell – anything. We’re all humans and we react to one another’s presence. But what happens when there isn’t a physical presence? Tackling this kind of virtual training topic in a virtual training environment makes absolute sense.
Are there some topics that you’d never wanted to go virtual with?
That’s actually a good question. Some training concepts are not at first glance suitable, but over the years I have learned that it is really a question of design. The technology does have limitations, but this is continually improving. I would say the obvious ones that don’t transfer as easily to a virtual deliver format easily are those programs where there are a lot of role-plays required. It’s difficult when the softer expressions, body language etc. are important training elements. But even these can be approached in different ways.
It depends on the situation, the participants’ situations and our training goals. When I want to adapt communication, soft skills, leadership training, etc. for a virtual context I think it’s possible to do that training or program also in a virtual setting. In fact, I will say that it makes a lot of sense to do it virtually as this is the manager’s reality! Yes, it can be difficult with topics like assertiveness, difficult conversations, giving feedback etc. On a tiny little screen, their body language is not really visible. I don’t know what their legs are doing, but I can see what their shoulders are doing, and maybe their arms, hands and face – and this is reality. If it’s leadership in a virtual environment or difficult conversations in a virtual environment, the virtual training setting works perfectly.
If you’re trying to practice something you only ever do face-to-face with people, then it’s not as strong but it still can work. I can only think of a couple of our programs which maybe aren’t so suitable for virtual delivery, but it’s really only a few.
Do you see a change in the way you’ll be using live virtual training in the future?
Yes and no. I think there’ll be a shift in L&D generally, and also inside our firm. On the one hand, we don’t want to fully give up on the residential trainings because it’s still a very different experience and people really do like them. You are spending maybe three days with each other, rather than three hours online. It is completely different – you get to know people, you have a different level of peer exchange, you establish defined accountability partners etc. If you are meeting in person you also talk more broadly about things which are happening in the business and topics which are very sensitive things. Often this is outside of the training, too. In these longer residential trainings, you often build friendships with colleagues that are important for the rest of their working life. It’s a different experience.
On the other hand, the internationalization of our people and company means we are finding that the people who require a certain skill and want to develop it are not actually based in the same location. Bringing people together for classical face-to-face training is certainly a cost question – but also a time and environmental one, too! I think virtual training will expand because of these factors. There is of course an additional benefit – it is also good that people from different countries, with different work styles and different backgrounds have more chances and opportunities to exchange ideas and approaches.
So, from the human side we certainly still want that people meet each other in person – but really it’s a question of the topic and taking everything into account. I expect virtual training will increase because of the benefits it offers when done well. It makes a lot of sense when you have a topic which can be actually broken down into modules, and where it doesn’t matter if you have a week in between modules (or maybe a week in between really helps!).
Today, virtual delivery is being integrated into all of our approaches. All stand-alone residential training events will also have maybe a virtual kick-off call, some exercises in between, virtual coaching calls afterwards, and virtual wrap-up meetings afterwards etc. This leads to a blended learning journey so people can integrate training into their work life and transfer what they have learned. It is easier to incorporate virtual delivery into our everyday work life. I believe it will become more and more usual.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Capture2.jpg8951459Guest Authorhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngGuest Author2019-10-16 11:11:492019-10-08 11:18:10Which topics are most suited for the live virtual training format
This week’s Secret L&D manager is German and has been working for one of the management consulting firms for 13 years. She is part of a virtual L&D team responsible for internal training solutions for a global group of analysts, specialists, and managers across multiple time zones. In our previous interview she shared how and why her organization got started with live virtual training solutions. In this post she shares more of her experience on how to deliver virtual training solutions well.
Based on your experience over the last five years, what advice would you give a fellow L&D manager who hasn’t organized virtual delivery before and is planning on trying it?
If this is your very first move into live virtual training, I would suggest you start with a hard skill. Something which is more about skills than behaviours, for example software tools, processes etc. I would then search for a pilot group. For me a good pilot group is a group who will give you clear and balanced feedback. You should invest some time in preparing the pilot group. See it like setting the scene in terms of change management. People will probably be very sceptical and may even complain. You want to help them build an open mindset and help them understand why this move to virtual delivery is a good idea for them and the organization.
If this is the very first time you’re trying live virtual training then make the time to go and talk with people one-on-one and win them over. People don’t understand actually how “live”, interactive and fun, live virtual training can be. They might be thinking about e-learning or webinars where they just listen for half an hour. You want them to appreciate that this is live and that they will be expected to contribute in the same way as if they were in the same room as the facilitator. Tell them it’s not going to be a passive and boring experience, just pick up the phone and say “Hey John, you’re suggested for this training, we have this really cool format on WebEx, and it will be working like this and we’ll get you a really good headset and this will be really fun. You’ll meet people from Brazil and from Russia and ….”. Then see what you can do to help them be comfortable with the technology. Think about setting up a WebEx call with them beforehand and show them what WebEx looks like, how it works, how you’re going to use—and a few tips on making it a good experience, like finding a quiet place for the training session without people listening in, without background noise etc.
You want to light a fire in them. You want them to talk about the pilot session to other people and say at the very least, “Hey, actually that was not too bad!”
What advice can you share on designing and delivering live virtual training?
First of all, I would also invest in finding a fantastic and experienced virtual facilitator. You want the participants to connect with them and the training and leave with a positive experience. You can either look for an external vendor or learn-as-you go internally.
If you are going external you want to find an external partner who knows what they are doing and can guide you. If I use our example of working with you at Target Training, when we first spoke, and you asked me “Do you want a producer or not?” I knew that you knew what you were talking about.
Why do you feel a technical producer is so important in virtual training?
There are many people who don’t know what a producer is and what a producer’s role is. For me the technical producer is actually a key part of virtual facilitation and this is often forgotten.
The producer takes care of the technical part and if you use a producer, you can leverage all the functionality available in the virtual training tools, like breakout rooms, polls, whiteboards, combining whiteboards and summarizing them, letting people share output from the breakout rooms, managing technical glitches, etc. There are so many things that can be leveraged so easily. When this is covered by a producer then the facilitator can actually focus on facilitating – the human part of it!
Using a trainer and a producer works very well and everyone knows exactly know who is responsible for what when they have glitches. A producer means fewer distractions. It’s really a key thing for me to have a seamless experience and I wish that producers would be standard. I am a big fan of that.
What do you think makes an effective virtual trainer?
Being an effective trainer virtually requires different approaches. Let me share our first experiences. Prior to deciding to make this jump to virtual delivery, we had of course built up over the years a large pool of trainers and training companies who we worked with company-wide. This pool had a lot of experience with us and there were also a lot of alumni amongst them. We decided to invest in them and their development and help them learn to deliver live training virtually. They knew our company, they knew our people and they knew what our firm is all about. This key learning part was completely covered.
We decided to invest in them and their development in three ways – training them, learning by doing, and giving them constant feedback about really excelling in the virtual space. When we started with live virtual delivery, we said, “Just give it a try andlet’s talk after 1 or 2 sessions about how they were delivered”. Our experience was that not every trainer can or wants to make the jump, and that is ok.
When I think about the better experiences I have had with facilitators, like your colleagues, what they all had in common was their ability to do a remarkable job in really building up trust quickly. They knew how to engage others and help people open up. I have also seen them play a lot with the pace which is so important. Generally, in the virtual training environment, people (myself included) tend to be talking much faster than they would in a classic residential training. Slowing the speed down really helps a lot, but if you are the facilitator it can at first feel kind of awkward and unnatural. The virtual facilitator can’t always see the other person and then there’s a delay and you feel as if you are talking into a black hole. But talking too fast is far worse as the participants feel they can’t contribute and are being pushed through the training as quickly as possible. For me an effective virtual trainer can adapt their pace and play around with it. And the supreme discipline for me personally is when a facilitator can use humor in a virtual setting and makes participants laugh.
How much virtual training is delivered by your own trainers and how much by external partners?
I would today it is 60 – 70% by externals and the remainder by internal trainers. We have developed our own internal train-the-trainer programs for virtual delivery. This is delivered by those pioneers who were basically there at the beginning. We offer a “train the virtual trainer” program to our internal trainers. Our experts benefit from the experience, tips, tricks and advice the facilitators themselves learnt over time. They learn about designing and delivering virtual training.
Do you see a difference regarding training design in virtual training?
Yes, it’s absolutely different! Make sure you think carefully about the training set-up and format. For virtual training, the training design and the training materials need to be approached differently. In terms of training design, ask yourself what actually makes a face-to-face training successful and how can I apply this to the virtual training design? You certainly still want a lot of exercises, so the training is engaging. And, as the learners’ attention span is much shorter virtually, you might need to play more with timing and move fluidly between trainer inputting to discussions and then to exercises.
And a final question – how large would you recommend the groups should be for live virtual training?
It very much depends on the topic. For topics which require interchange of more sensitive things, for example soft skills or anything about teams or leadership, we say five to six people per group with seven being our absolute maximum. For what we call” technical trainings” I think we can accept a few more because the exchanges, discussions and conversations aren’t as important. For these kinds of topics our maximum is 15.
In the 3rd and final part of the interview the Secret L&D manager shares her views on which topics are best suited for virtual delivery and how she sees the future of virtual training.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/blendedlearning.jpg8811352Guest Authorhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngGuest Author2019-10-08 11:10:382019-10-08 11:10:38Lessons learned: making live virtual training work for our business
This week’s Secret L&D manager is German and has been working for one of the big management consulting firms for 13 years. She is part of a virtual L&D team responsible for internal training solutions for a global group of analysts, specialists, and managers across multiple time zones. In this post, she talks about the need for virtual delivery, the challenges, and the lessons they’ve learned along the way.
When did your organization start delivering training virtually?
When I joined our L&D team four years ago, our department had already been offering live virtual training for about a year. Not everyone in the company was actively using it yet so we were kind of pioneers. The background behind our decision to introduce virtual delivery was that we had, and have, a big group of people who are spread across the world in different countries on different continents. There are people in hub locations, and these hubs are also spread across the world, and there are people who may belong to the same department but are located in some very remote locations.
The training challenge here was that if we used the classical way of offering what we call “residential” face-to-face training to all these people, we would have exceeded our budgets by far. And still we wanted to offer everyone a fair chance of having the same training options as their colleagues. We were actively looking at which trainings could be held in a virtual space and this is clearly linked to which trainings are actually most suited, or most easily converted, to virtual delivery.
We started with so-called hard skills like slide writing, using PowerPoint, Excel etc. but we then also quickly moved into other soft areas too. We were keen to make this move as the virtual approach allowed us to make a continuous learning journey out of a “one-off training” and enabled implementing learning into every-day life – this is clearly the biggest advantage.
So how quickly did you move into delivering live virtual training solutions for soft skills training, leadership development, etc.?
I think fairly quickly actually. Until about six years ago there weren’t any soft skills or leadership training programs for my global group at all because the group was just being established. The first training initiatives were the classical format – residential trainings of one to three days. However, within a year, a live virtual delivery format had been established and then it moved forwards fairly quickly. Nowadays we have a 50/50 split – half is virtual, and half is residential.
What have you learned along the way about organizing live virtual training?
We should split this question into the organizational part and the delivery and facilitating part — but we have learned a lot in both areas! Starting with the organizational side, as with residential training, too, we learned we need to block time with people, and in virtual training these time slots need to be convenient for multiple time zones. Then we needed to find a suitable and reliable tool of course. WebEx was rolled out globally in our company around this time, and we were very happy – it works well with only a few exceptions when people have a poor internet connection. Everyone has the same technology; everyone has the same starting point. This is actually a really big help.
We also learned that there is a difference between delivering the classic virtual training session and what we call a blended virtual format. Let me explain; we had training where everybody was in a different place behind their desks. What we also successfully tried is, for example, having ten people in Boston who wanted to do the slide writing training, and we also had four people in Munich, and three people in Madrid. In some locations we have dedicated video rooms—this means people are sitting on one table and in one corner of the room there is a TV screen and camera. The group in Boston sees the other groups in Munich and Madrid and the other way, too. The facilitator is live in Boston, so one of the locations does have the advantage of having a live facilitator in the same room – but the participants in the other locations have colleagues with them, too – and everyone can see everyone. So when it comes to exercises this “being in a room with colleagues” does have a really big advantage. Colleagues are motivating and challenging each other, and of course we shouldn’t ignore the benefit of group pressure when it comes to participation and focus. People are not checking emails or multi-tasking because there are other people sitting in the room in the same training. And we could offer training to locations where there were too few people to have a face-to-face training.
We did something similar for a “writing proposals” project with a sales team in the Far East. The trainer was in one room and everybody else was in another room. It can work really well.
Absolutely! If the room is set up properly, this comes close to recreating a live residential training. Of course, logistics-wise there can be some difficulties because you first of all have to have a certain number of learners in each office and then people of course change plans last minute etc. But this is similar to the challenges of classical residential training. We also had to book all those video rooms, so they were free at the same time etc. Then an important client meeting comes, and the team is thrown out; so logistics-wise that’s a little bit hard, but we found solutions. In general, the approach worked very well, and the learners said they had a really positive group learning experience.
When you made your first moves into live virtual delivery was there any resistance from people? For example, did you have people wanting to stick with the classic face-to-face training approach?
Of course – and to be quite honest there still is! Often people still frankly ask “Hey I’ve been invited to this virtual training. Is there a live residential training instead?” This is natural because many people prefer to go somewhere else to be really focused, meet people, limit interruptions etc. It’s a much more intense experience, let’s be honest. There was a lot of resistance at the beginning and we still get it sometimes. However, I would say it quickly became accepted – mainly because people have had very positive experiences with virtual training, and they have then shared their experience with others.
This is where we come to the absolute need for good virtual facilitation skills. When we started moving into live virtual delivery, we already had a strong pool of trusted facilitators. Many of them were external vendors who were brilliant in the residential live facilitation, but facilitating virtually is so different. I’m thinking back to a workshop I attended myself on “Virtual Facilitation” run by the American Talent Development Association. This trainer was a radio moderator and he gave tips and tricks on using your voice to make virtual training more engaging. One thing he said—that I have never forgotten—was that facilitating in a virtual environment feels completely awkward. It’s really like being a radio moderator. It feels like you are talking to yourself and you aren’t getting any feedback. He said you need to embrace this, and to accept the silence. You will feel super awkward at first. But people need you to act as a guide. When you ask a question, you have to wait until an answer comes, and you still have to smile into the camera—even if there is no one immediately responding. This is a big change and challenge for many facilitators. And just as with face-to-face training, space and time to think is important. It is just that the time feels longer and different in a virtual training world.
In the early days we invested in our internal facilitators. They got training on how to really adapt to this virtual training context because it requires very different tools and very different styles of facilitation. We also had to train long-term and trusted external vendors on what we needed.
Not every trainer can or wants to make that change – it’s a question of personal preferences. And of course, some trainers are much better delivering training face-to-face than virtually. It’s really a totally different skill.
In our next blog post this Secret L&D manager share more of her experience and advice on making virtual training a success
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Capture.jpg9011355Guest Authorhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngGuest Author2019-09-12 09:36:192019-12-09 10:48:58How and why we got started with live virtual training in our global firm
In our previous blog we explained what an emotional bank account is and why managers need to care about building them. To quickly recap, an emotional bank account is a metaphor coined by Stephen Covey in his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. It describes the amount of trust that’s been built up in a relationship, and when trust is high, communication is easy and effective. Every time a manager says something supportive, shows respect, helps somebody with a difficult situation, etc., they make a deposit in that person’s emotional bank account. Every time they criticize, blame, lie, intimidate, etc., they make a withdrawal. Over time, the effects of these deposits will help transform that relationship. This post goes deeper into how to build your emotional bank accounts.
How do you build a healthy emotional bank account with your team?
Every manager and team are different, and culture can play a part, but at the end of the day it comes back to our relationships and how we behave. Covey identified six ways to make deposits (or reduce withdrawals):
1) Understand the individual
You need to know what the individual wants and what constitutes a deposit and withdrawal for them. Whereas one employee might be exhilarated by presenting their project results to the board another may prefer to be in the background and their contribution acknowledged privately. Ask yourself what drives them? How do they want recognition? What makes their eyes light up?
2) Keeping commitments
We have all broken a promise and let somebody down, and when we do this, we are making a withdrawal. Keeping commitments is about doing what we say we’ll do, keeping our promises, delivering what we said we’d deliver, being on time, being where we should be, fulfilling our promises. If you consistently keep your commitments, you build healthy emotional bank accounts with people.
3) Clarifying expectations
Each of us have different backgrounds, experiences and expectations. We see the world differently. Clarifying understanding and expectations is essential if you’d like to minimize misunderstanding and wrong assumptions. By proactively investing time in clarifying expectations and building a mutual understanding of what you need, don’t need, want, don’t want etc you can minimize the “ I thought that..”, “I’d assumed ..”, “To me it was obvious that …”. And keep in mind that if you are leading people and teams virtually, then the risk of false assumptions and misunderstanding does increase, and formalizing things with communication charters does help.
4) Attending to the little things
Relationships aren’t only built by big moments but by the little things too. These are the smiles in the corridor, holding the door open, short thank you emails, remembering their daughter has just started school, not heading straight to your office but spending a moment walking through the open office to be seen. Kind words, smiles, courtesies, warmth. Human interest, and taking time when you don’t have to.
5) Showing personal integrity
Relationships are built on trust and integrity. What does integrity mean? The word “integrity” comes from the Latin integritatem, meaning “soundness” or “wholeness.” Integrity is not situational – it is a state of mind. In Covey’s words…
“ Integrity is conforming reality to our words … keeping promises and fulfilling expectations.”
What does this look like in practice? Here are 7 musts to start with…
Do the right thing for the right reasons and because it’s the right thing to do – even if it is going to be unpopular with some people.
Face the truth and talk about it. This is the reality principle of “seeing the world as it really is, and not as you wish it is”.
Be upfront in your communication. People want to know where they stand and what is going on. People won’t always like what they hear but they will value the adult-adult relationship.
Know you are sometimes wrong and that you sometimes make mistakes – and admit this.
Take responsibility for what you do and don’t do.
Put the needs of others before your own.
Be loyal to those not present – confront gossiping, complaining and bad mouthing about people who aren’t in the room.
6) Apologizing when we make a withdrawal
we are all human, and we all make mistakes and get things wrong. Know when you’ve made a mistake, admit it and apologize with sincerity. Admitting you’ve made a mistake doesn’t necessarily mean it is acceptable but it’s a start, and can be healing to a relationship. Avoid the temptation of wanting to discuss why you made it before you discuss and show understanding of the impact it had on others. And understand that if you are continually making the same type of withdrawal, trust will erode. It’s the smaller things that kill relationships in the long run. Finally, don’t try and lighten withdrawals with banter, humour or a “shit sandwich”– this is rarely appreciated.
To add to the list above , tolerance and forgiveness are also powerful deposits, as is appreciative inquiry and holding back judgment and sweeping statements.
A 10-minute practical activity for managers
Write down the names of 5 team members that are important to your team’s success.
Now look back at your calendar over the last 2 weeks and use this, plus your memory, to find evidence of deposits and withdrawals. A meeting went poorly and they left frustrated – that’s a withdrawal. They bent your ear and you listened and gave them your attention – a deposit. Build a simple balance sheet (name at the top, left column is deposits, right column is withdrawals.
Now put the paper down / close the document and go and do something.
A few hours later (or even the next day) come back and for each of the 5 team members write down what you believe motivates and drives them? What gives them energy and what takes it? How do they like to communicate? And what do they see as recognition?
Almost there … now
Look at your evidence of deposit and withdrawals (step 2) and ask yourself hwo you feel about the balance
Look at the types of deposits and withdrawals and ask yourself does this tie in with what they need? Not everyone will see public recognition as a deposit And not everyone will see direct feedback and getting straight to it as a withdrawal. Deposits and withdrawals are personal.
And now the final step. Ask yourself what can you do in the coming month differently? If possible, plan them into your calendar by finding tangible moments e.g.. You can’t enter “Tuesday 14:00-14:30 listen” but you can set up a meeting to discuss a project and make a conscious effort to listen first. https://www.targettraining.eu/listening-skills-10-areas-to-improve/ @brenda – was there an ALF download ??
And if you are keen to make more deposits then why not use a regular catch up meeting or a chat over lunch to learn from them more about what is actually important to them, what would increase their trust in you and your relationship , and what you could do more/less of.
More about our leadership and management training solutions
If you are interested in learning more about how we integrate emotional intelligence into our leadership and management training solutions, please contact us.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/discussion.jpg8221349Scott Leveyhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngScott Levey2019-08-10 13:15:072020-07-01 14:45:42Balancing your emotional bank accounts – practical activities for managers and leaders
In our Practical Toolbox for managers training program, we often hear that the time spent on giving feedback is one of the highlights, and implementing DESC frequently makes it onto the manager’s transfer plan. One of the key points they take away is that the success of your feedback/feedforward rests upon your broader relationship with your partner. Put simply, if you have invested in them as a human being then feedback conversations are far more likely to go well. To look at it from the other side, if you haven’t invested in somebody, if you haven’t built trust, and if you haven’t built a meaningful professional relationship with them … well don’t be surprised when thing go pear-shaped. If you are managing others, you need your emotional bank account with your staff to be healthy.
“An emotional bank account is a metaphor that describes the amount of trust that’s been built up in a relationship. It’s the feeling of safeness you have with another human being. When the trust account is high, communication is easy, instant, and effective.”.
The metaphor took off within the business training world because it is immediately understandable. You make deposits, save up money, and when you need that money later, you withdraw it. An emotional bank account is an account of trust instead of money. We all know how a bank account works … plus bank account sounds more business-like which helps a certain time of person accept the idea.
Every time a manager says something supportive, shows respect, invests in somebody as an individual, helps somebody with a difficult situation, makes time for them etc they make a deposit in that person’s emotional bank account. Over time, the effects of these deposits will help to transform that relationship. And conversely, every time they criticize, blame, defend, ignore, lie, intimidate, threaten, etc they make a withdrawal.
We are all human and there are times when we are making more withdrawals than deposits. Just like a bank, we can go in the red and then come out of it. The trick is to be in in the healthy green zone over the longer term.
Why should managers care about emotional bank accounts?
It is rare to hear managers dismissing the concept. Almost all managers we work with in our management and leadership solutions want positive, productive, rewarding, trust-based relationships with their staff and teams. Concepts such as authenticity, credibility and trust are valued by the vast majority of organizations, and books such as “Servant leadership in Action” and Goffee & Jones’“Why should anyone be led by you?” and have captured this.
A personal sense of self-worth and respect is important, but meaningful and strong relationships in the workplace also lead directly to tangible results. As a manager, your success is largely is dependent on your staff. Leaders who build strong and meaningful relationships within and beyond their organization give their business a competitive advantage. Emotional bank accounts are not just about the “soft stuff”. They are about delivering results through performance.
Healthy emotional bank accounts play a role in practically all of a manager’s day-to-day tasks. When a manager tasks, delegates, motivates, influences, leads meetings, communicates, reviews, resolves conflicts, gives feedback, navigates difficult discussions etc., the relationships impact the success. All of these are moments where a manager can deposit or withdraw, and each of them has a range of potential for success or failure.
To summarize: If a manager cares about their emotional bank accounts they are more likely to succeed in the short, medium and long-term. If a manager doesn’t take care of relationships and withdraws more than they deposit, then they can’t expect to see a highly motivated team delivering outstanding results.
Check your emotional bank accounts – a practical activity for managers
Write down the names of 3+ people that are important to your team’s success. Ideally try and identify a range e.g. team member, manager in another department, customer, supplier etc …
Then ask them if they have time for a meeting to reflect on your working relationship. Make sure they understand that this is truly the reason, that nothing is wrong per se, that there isn’t a second goal to the conversation.
Start the meeting by reiterating that you would like to strengthen the relationship. Ask them to share things that you have done/not done which will/can/would build trust.
Listen and ask exploratory questions to understand. Do not reframe what they say into what you wish they had said. Do not defend. Just listen.
Thank them and let things settle.
Finally, identify specifics and patterns amongst the people you’ve spoken too, and identify next steps.
More about emotional bank accounts
In our next blog post we’ll go deeper into the behaviours related to “how you build emotional bank accounts” and share another practical exercise.
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/team-ressearch.jpg8751348Scott Leveyhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngScott Levey2019-07-31 13:14:562020-07-01 13:57:53Why managers should care about their emotional bank accounts
This month’s secret training manager is Italian and has worked in a variety of fields including public research organizations and service companies. Here she talks with Scott Levey about the basic elements that make training and trainers effective.
What makes training effective?
To me an effective training is a training that uses most of the senses. Meaning: seeing, hearing, touching. The learners need to experience things and be actively engaged. Of course, the training needs to cover the thinking side, but adult learners need to learn by doing things. A good training event also has to be designed to have different activities and moments. For example, it needs moments to listen and get input and ideas, moments to pause and ponder on the theory that was just presented to you, moments to experiment, and moments to recap. I want the trainer to also plan in multiple moments where they cover again the main and salient points of the training. For me this is essential. I would also say that effective training sessions need to have a certain pace and this pace changes depending on the moment. After lunch the trainer will increase the pace to get people moving again. Alternatively, the pace may slow down if the trainer sees that the participants aren’t following what the trainer is trying to do or trying to say. So that’s what I think makes an effective training.
What makes the trainer effective? I mean you yourself have worked with many trainers and you have also trained yourself, haven’t you?
Well the most obvious answer would be that the trainer is the subject matter expert. She is an expert in her field and has real experience … but that isn’t enough. I’m going to give you a trivial example but I think everyone can relate to it. It’s about my daughter. She’s in high school right now and her math teacher is brilliant. He has a very brilliant mind … but he is not a pedagogue, so he is a teacher by definition but he is not a teacher through experience, and he is not patient with them. He knows his stuff, and is really smart, but he doesn’t know how to convey the salient points to my daughter or his class. When I think back to the many companies I have worked in, I have also seen similar experiences with internal training sessions ran in various topics. It could be IT related, quality management, HR or technical skills. Being a subject matter expert is the start but not the end.
Being an expert is not enough; you also need to be an expert in pedagogy, you need to be patient and you need to be attentive to the participants and allow them to ask questions. You need also to be able to shut down any conversation that strays from the topic because it can become difficult and you can waste time and not reach your training goals. This is not good because as we know training has an agenda and you need to stay on track.
Somehow a trainer also needs to be very confident and have some leadership behaviors, because she’s the leader of the group for the time of the training. Finally, I think an effective trainer has to have those storytelling skills where you put theory and experience into a nice little story that illustrates the point. And is easy to understand and remember
So, what I’m saying is an effective trainer is somebody who
Is a subject matter expert
Is a good communicator
Is people-oriented
Can lead a group
Has the skills needed to design training so there are the right moments at the right times
Has the skills to deliver the training in an engaging way and manage the pace
Is focused and reaches the objective set for the training
Train-the-trainer courses can really help for both new and confident trainers … but it is my opinion that nothing really beats experience. So that’s what I think makes a trainer a good trainer.
Who is the secret L&D manager?
The “secret L&D manager” is actually a group of L&D managers. They are real people who would prefer not to mention their name or company – but do want to write anonymously so they can openly and directly share their ideas and experience with their peers.
You can meet more of our secret L&D managers here …
https://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/impact.jpg8381335Guest Authorhttps://www.targettraining.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logoWP.pngGuest Author2019-06-25 12:06:432019-12-09 10:51:21The secret L&D manager: What makes training effective?
How to develop internal trainers for virtual training delivery – Part 1
/0 Comments/in Soft Skills /by Stephen JennerIn 2020, many companies have needed to move their internal trainers from classroom to virtual training delivery. Outside of the circumstances and impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the advantages of virtual training delivery are obvious. With virtual training, you reach more people, training can be deployed faster, more regular training events can be set up, and it costs less. We’ve been delivering virtual training solutions for more than ten years, and we know that the transfer to virtual training delivery can be smooth when the trainer understands the differences between classic face-to-face training and virtual delivery, and is able to adapt and develop him/herself.
We were recently asked about this topic by an in-house training team for a global company who train the company’s technicians on customer service and product updates for their range of consumer household machines. They asked us:
Part 1 of this post is about the key facilitation skills for virtual training delivery, which we identified and worked on with our client’s new virtual trainers. In Part 2 you will learn how we designed a session planning template to support them. Part 2 includes a download of the template for your own use.
Essential facilitation skills for virtual training delivery
1. Using your voice effectively
Why this is important? – You won’t be able to communicate using body language and eye contact in the virtual classroom. You (and your trainees) will rely entirely on your voice. The challenge with listening to someone’s voice is that it’s just more difficult to pay attention, due to lack of visual stimuli. This adaptation is a challenge for trainers new to the virtual training delivery environment because it takes a lot of practice and self-adjustment.
How to develop it – We worked with trainers on adapting 3 voice elements:
2. Ensuring active participation
Why this is important – In a virtual classroom the trainer won’t have much idea who is paying attention, and trainees can easily become distracted by what’s going on around them and other things that pop up on their computer or phone. The only way to overcome this is to keep them engaged because (unlike the physical classroom) they are not a captive audience.
How to develop it
3. Managing time and attention spans
Why this is important – Technically it is possible to run an entire day of virtual training but in practice this doesn’t work because it’s much more tiring and harder to keep trainee’s attention compared to the physical classroom. GoToWebinar researched the most popular length of sessions in thousands of training sessions and found it is 60 minutes. So, aim to break up longer training into shorter segments. Within sessions there are tips that trainers can follow to manage both time and attention spans, which you can read below.
How to develop it
Part 1 conclusion
We found that identifying and working on these three key skills areas can help internal trainers make the jump to become virtual trainers. In part 2 of this post, you’ll learn more about the elements of planning an effective virtual training session. If you want to continue reading, here are a few recommended posts on the topic of virtual training delivery.
Our Services
Leading people in a virtual environment – delivered virtually
Working in virtual teams – delivered virtually
Driving performance – delivered virtually
Virtual InCorporate Trainer
How to help virtual teams deal with the real challenges they face
/0 Comments/in Leadership, Soft Skills /by Guest AuthorVirtual teams have clear advantages, but they also come with a set of unique challenges; building trust and getting people to work together is just not the same in a virtual environment. If you are leading virtual teams you will already be aware of many of these challenges. If you are not, or if you are new to this, or if your teams are not telling you everything; this post is for you! In over ten years of working with virtual teams in global companies we have collected the challenges that they have shared with us. We can now share with you some of the most common challenges we hear time and again, and some suggestions for how to help with them. This post is even more relevant in our current situation, when teams are going virtual out of necessity rather than design. So, we hope that this post will be a valuable resource to you as you adapt to the new normal of virtual working!
Challenge 1: Connecting across different time zones
Knowing when to connect with someone halfway across the world is a key challenge that people share with us again and again. Technology allows us to send communications at any time of the day or night. But it does not tell us when we can expect a reply. Delays in response can lead to miscommunication and frustration; not something you want in any team.
How a team leader can help
It really helps to have a whole team discussion about the time zones people are working in. Don’t assume anything; we often find that some virtual teams are completely unaware what time it is for their counterparts! But don’t limit the discussion to just the time of day; in addition, bring in people’s preferred working patterns. We have found that these types of discussions can help people manage their own expectations and tailor their communications more effectively to their remote colleagues.
Challenge 2: Getting to know other team members as individuals
It is much simpler to know our colleagues’ working styles and flex to them in a co-located space because we can see how they work. In a virtual team these things are more hidden. Virtual teams who don’t know each other are more likely to fall into conflict and work to separate agendas.
How a team leader can help
The secret to building intimacy in virtual teams is to do more of it and be explicit about it. Explain why the team needs to make extra efforts to get to know each other and the benefits of doing it. Plan time at the start of meetings for personal check-ins, encourage people to reveal non-work related things about each other. Host a ‘virtual’ breakfast or coffee meeting for people to socialise. One team we worked with devised a set of 20 questions for new teams to break the ice; simple, non-threatening questions like ‘Do you prefer coffee or tea?’ can start things going and encourage people to open up. The time you create for personal bonding will pay rewards later. But the key is to realise it doesn’t happen naturally in virtual teams.
Challenge 3: Holding each other accountable and giving feedback
This is even more critical in a virtual team because we simply can’t see what other people are doing. Distance can too easily undermine the things we do more naturally in co-located teams such as giving feedback and holding each other accountable.
How a team leader can help
Ensure that the same processes and standards are applied for giving honest and timely feedback and holding each other accountable. DEEP and DESC are two approaches that work extremely well. In the office you may stipulate that feedback and performance conversations happen face to face. In a virtual team this means video calls; don’t let email take over just because it’s more convenient.
See the next challenge for a technique that can help drive team accountability.
Challenge 4: Keeping focused and engaged
Individuals will need to work more independently and with less supervision in a virtual environment but will also become more easily distracted and may lose focus due to competing work/life priorities.
How a team leader can help
Borrow a very effective technique from the iterative, agile approach; ‘Stand Up’ meetings are a short daily meeting to check-in and align with each other. In the meeting, team members are asked to share what they will be working on today and what obstacles they may face. For a team leader this provides valuable insights into problems that you will need to work on that day. For team members this is a routine event than can help them focus and energise.
Challenge 5: Making it more personal
Technology has introduced many more personal features today but teams that we work with still say that having a screen between them can make virtual teams feel impersonal.
How a team leader can help
Virtual hugs or pats on the back, telling jokes and playing games can all help to make things more personal. But the number one thing that creates the biggest impact is to turn on the webcam! As humans we connect to faces instantly and, according to the Mehrabian studies, our body language accounts for 55% of how we express emotion and attitude. It still surprises us how many virtual teams do not switch on their cameras. It’s a small step that makes a very big impact.
Challenge 6: Scheduling too many (and too long) meetings
Meetings can be draining in a physical environment. For virtual teams they can feel even longer due to the lack of physical interaction and interruption from technical problems. So, it’s important to manage meetings a bit differently in a virtual environment.
How a team leader can help
Acknowledge that virtual meetings are more of a strain and mitigate this by making them shorter and more frequent. Ensure that meetings are timetabled with people’s time zone and schedule considered; remember that these things are not as visible as they are in a co-located space. Use the tools you have in meeting software to involve everyone and keep people attentive and engaged; for example, hand raising, emoticons, breakout rooms. Check out the links below for specific posts on meetings.
Challenge 7: Knowing how much to communicate
When we are not working physically together it’s difficult to know what is too much, or too little communication. If we get it wrong we risk over-burdening our team mates, or feeling isolated.
How a team leader can help
Finding that ‘Goldilocks moment’ of just the right amount of communication means agreeing together when and what to communicate. It’s also worth thinking about which tools to use for which kinds of communication and the differences between synchronous (real time e.g. video calls) and asynchronous (delayed e.g. email). Successful virtual teams we have worked with use some simple techniques to manage their team communications, e.g. asking before interrupting, having agreed communications ‘black out’ times, and simply sharing their preferences.
More information on this topic
For more advice and tips on virtual teams, see these posts:
If you are interested in our training programmes on managing virtual teams, click on the links to learn more.
Virtual teams work across time, space, and organizational boundaries—and they are becoming increasingly common. As these virtual teams interact through technology and only occasionally meet face-to-face, it is important to rethink and sharpen the way we collaborate and communicate . In this short video Scott Levey, a director at Target Training outlines 3 simple steps you can follow to make sure your virtual team makes an impact.
The power of storytelling in business: 5 lessons learned
/0 Comments/in Leadership, Soft Skills /by James CulverStorytelling is a topic of great interest in the business communications world. Conferences and speakers around the world are praising the power of storytelling and attracting audiences. Why? Humans have told stories since our earliest beginnings. We all tell stories. It was part of our survival and development. Stories are all around us, from campfires to multimillion dollar movies, so why do we have to make a case for it in a business environment? Why do people want training on something that comes naturally? In a business context, perhaps we don’t want reveal too much of ourselves, show too much emotion or not be taken seriously at work. Our storytelling seminar gives participants the skills and determination to tell more stories and better stories in the workplace. This post shares five lessons learned about storytelling in business.
Lesson 1 – What does your listener want?
What attracts audiences to the telling of a story? We identified three things:
emotion
energy
authenticity
Children will demand expressions of the energy of the characters, the emotion of the plot and telling the story “like you mean it”. Telling bedtime stories to children is a practical example of the standards adults have for stories as well, though many may not say it. Adults need the same things to be engaged.
Lesson 2 – What makes a good story good?
As Aristotle observed, a good story starts with a character in trouble. The character is one the audience can identify with–not too good to be in trouble and not too bad to deserve the trouble to come. The story progresses with the development and deepening of the trouble to create a sense of fear in the audience so the resolution of the problems leaves the audience with a sense of relief.
Aristotle referred to the stages as pity, fear, and catharsis. Stories from Greek tragedy to Toy Story follow this model in one way or another.
In the workplace we can tell stories about problems, consequences and solutions to reflect Aristotle’s model.
Lesson 3 – Crafting stories that fit
The STAR Model is a basic and effective format for telling stories in a business environment. The model fits the needs of business audiences as it sets the scene, describes the action in it and talks about what happened to resolve the situation. This model is very effective in behavioral interviewing, answering questions about past performance and offering a status update.
Lesson 4 – Courage to connect
If work for you is simply an exchange of power, storytelling and other enhanced communication tools are not important. Others will translate what you say into orders if you are in a power position just as you may interpret orders from your superiors. If you want your workplace to be a place where people build something together instead of following the orders of the few, storytelling is an active strategy to humanize the workplace for you and your co-workers. It provides opportunities for meaningful connections that inspire trust.
Lesson 5 – From stories to action
A good story can set the stage in a business environment and yet we often need to make the purpose clear once it is complete. We can achieve that Socratically through a debriefing method or by simply telling the listeners what we had in mind directly.
A clear explanation of the purpose of the story provides a natural, logical connection to the observation of what the teller and the listeners need to accomplish in a business environment. When listeners can connect the story to their current situation, they become involved in the process of identifying what to do and why it needs to be done—without having to be told.
Related training services
For more information about what we can do to help you succeed globally, here are some of our leadership solutions
Delegating for results
A practical toolbox for managers
Moving from Colleague to Manager in 6 Steps
How winning offers and proposals are written
/in Soft Skills /by Scott LeveyI often find myself in the business section of the book store and I’m always struck by how cleverly these books position themselves. Titles like “How to Have A Good Day” or “The Art of Thinking Clearly” seem to speak directly to me and this is the reason I pick them up and sometimes even buy them. If you are involved in writing offers and proposals (RFQ’s, tender responses) you are looking to create a similar impact – you want the reader’s attention and interest from the moment they pick up the document. The secret to doing this, just as with business books, is to make them ‘reader-oriented’. Over the years we have worked with many companies that have great products and services but sometimes find it challenging to write commercial offers which appeal to readers. In this post we will explain exactly what ‘reader-oriented’ means and how to achieve it.
What do readers want to read about in an offer?
Think for a minute; if someone sends you a proposal for a product or service they want you to buy, what do you want to read in it?
Now read this quote: “Don’t come into my office and tell me about the perfect solution you have. Instead, tell me how you can solve my business problem and then I’m all ears!” Max Bittner, CEO Lazarda
Every proposal or offer exists to solve a problem, which your client is unable to solve on their own. So, as Max says, make sure your client’s problem or challenge is front and centre in your proposal. This means starting with a detailed and accurate description of the problem. You want your reader to think “This organisation understands my business and its challenges” because this will establish your credibility to solve their problem right from the start. It sounds obvious I know…and yet when running proposal writing workshops I am almost always asked “But where do I write about us and what we do? Normally we start with this!”
Key Learning Point 1
If you want to get your proposal read, start by talking about them not you.
What will they actively read?
Proposals have many different elements and different stakeholders will focus on different parts; legal will study your T&C, finance will look at your figures, procurement will study your value statement. But the three most important elements, and probably the ones that will be read by the decision maker, are:
1. The title
A good title can create a great first impression and get your proposal higher in the pile of many proposals. And the trick is to make the title speak to the reader. Compare these 2 different titles for the same proposal and ask yourself – which proposal would you read first?:
An effective title will contain 3 things; name the client, include a verb (to indicate what the proposal will do) and an outcome (which of course is focused on the client’s business).
2. Contents page
The contents page is there for a reason. At a quick glance, a reader can assess what’s in your proposal, whether it is worth reading, and where to start. Spending time on the contents page will also help you to:
Again, it’s all about the language. Compare “Context and Background” to “What Problem is Company Y Trying to Solve?”. The second heading is more specific and engaging, and it uses a question which is a good way of getting readers’ attention. You probably noticed that this post uses questions for each section.
3. Executive summary
The Executive Summary is critical – it may be the only part of the proposal read by a decision maker, before she or he passes it to specialist teams with their comments and recommendations. Think of the Summary as the text you read on the back of a book; it should tell you what’s in the book and encourage you to read it.
Executive Summaries should be short (I would recommend no more than 1 page) and written in clear and simple language; avoid technical or specialist language as your reader could be more of a generalist if they are a C-level decision maker. Giving it to someone else to read is a great way to get feedback and make improvements.
The next section in this post will give you ideas on how to craft the content of your Executive Summary. You can also find help and advice on writing in clear and simple English and editing your writing in these two posts:
Key Learning Point 2
Focus on the 3 elements of the proposal that will make the biggest impression. Craft them to grab your reader’s attention with how your product or service will benefit their business.
Is there a winning structure for offers?
Yes there is! There is a structure that we recommend and organisations we have worked with tell us it works. N.O.S.E. can be a powerful structure to engage and persuade your reader because it starts with answering the question “Why should I read this proposal?” just as Max Bittner explained in the quote your read earlier. In fact, it would be a great structure for your Executive Summary!
Here’s the structure, described from two perspectives; what you write about and what your client is looking for:
NEEDS
OUTCOMES
SOLUTIONS
EVIDENCE
Key Learning Point 3
Use a structure that persuades by starting with the client’s needs before you explain your solution.
More writing skills
Report writing for auditors
Writing Online Content that Readers Remember
Writing winning offers and proposals
The Secret L&D Manager: Encouraging a learning culture when budgets are tight
/in Methods & Tools, Soft Skills /by Guest AuthorThis week’s Secret L&D manager is Hungarian and is a Learning & Development Specialist for a global chemical company. In this post, he talks about the journey and the challenges of building and encouraging a learning culture in a large organization.
You were the first L&D manager in the organization. What sort of training budget were you expecting to have to work with when you joined?
Before I came here, I was working in a huge worldwide corporation where learning and development had a lot of money working – close to about €400,000 per year. Looking back, we were definitely spoiled, and I was expecting something similar when I came here. That was my expectation. When I arrived, I was given a budget of €10,000 and most of this was already allocated to translation work!
I wanted to be able to build a learning culture (see this post for more information). One of the things I have been doing (and haven’t yet finished) is to build a large library of free learning. This does take time but there are a lot of free, good quality things on the internet. You just need to be able to invest the time to find and assess them. I used our skills and competency models as the basis to build this and then I just matched these skills and competencies with an index of releavnt e-learnings, learning nuggets, MOOCS, e-books and podcasts.
I have also created internal webinars. My first step was to establish subject matter expert groups within our company and then we started to create something like internal TED Talks. People could learn about and from the different groups and different fields within the company. For example we would have one subject expert talking about dealing with difficult customers. It was a 1 ½ hour session and it was advertised, and people could join via Zoom.
How did you raise awareness of these learning opportunities and events?
Here I used 2 types of advertising; one is definitely the usual and very boring e-mail communication. I’m not sure it was very helpful but people did join as a result of this kind of communication channel. The other was creating and printing leaflets and brochures and placing them around the corridors and also in the canteen. This was definitely more helpful and effective. I based them on a silly cartoon that was going around on Facebook a couple of years ago.
These initiatives have helped to prove the worth of learning. Now I’ve got the management to actually spend and dedicate a real budget for learning this year, although with the coronavirus crisis who knows what will happen? But I’m pretty sure that this time I will be able to spend more and I’ve very concrete ideas of what I want to do. So for example I want to still further develop these internal webinars and I also want to continue with e-learning creation and creating the content internally.
The other thing that I’ve been planning on doing for a long time is implementing virtual learning and actually this is also a very timely thing. As you know I have been in talks with you regarding implementing this. When you think of the flu symptoms and all the sickness that are going around the world right now I think one of the best tools, let’s call it a tool not a method, is to use e-learning and virtual learning. Virtual learning, and it is not to be confused with e-learning, is when you go for an interactive training session but you don’t have to go anywhere. You can do it from your home or you can do it from your office. It fits our company and the situation.
More secret L&D Managers
Who is the secret L&D manager?
The “secret L&D manager” is actually a group of L&D managers. They are real people who would prefer not to mention their name or company – but do want to write anonymously so they can openly and directly share their ideas and experience with their peers.
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How to Meet Customer Expectations with the RATER Model
/in Soft Skills /by Stephen JennerA Global Customer Services Director recently came to us with a challenge: We have customer service teams spread all over the world, helping our telecommunications customers with technical troubleshooting. Some of them are really excellent, experienced agents, others are relatively new and still learning the ropes. Some are good with the technical side, others better at working with people. The question is – how do we get them all working to the same standard?
We proposed the RATER model, a five-point framework which describes how customers evaluate the service they receive. We have found RATER is a tool which everyone can learn from and improve, whatever their level of experience. In a previous post we introduced the framework. In this post we will add some information and provide tips on how to put it into practice, based on real experience we’ve had working with clients like the one above.
Reliability
Is your organisation able to deliver services consistently, accurately and on time? Of course, sometimes things go wrong. If you work on a customer helpline, ‘reliability’ becomes the measure of how quickly and effectively you can put things right.
Assurance
How much do your customers trust you? If a customer is buying a service from you this is particularly important because the transaction is built on the customer’s future expectation that you will deliver what you say you will.
Tangibles
Tangibles are the way the customer interacts with your organisation; through physical spaces as well as your web site, apps, phone lines and email. If you are a customer service agent, some of these things will be beyond your control but there is still a lot you can do to make the customer journey a good experience.
Empathy
Do you customers feel that you care about them as individuals? And importantly, how do you show them that you care?
Responsiveness
The whole reason for having customer service is to respond to customer questions and problems. So, customers will judge you on how quickly and effectively you do this.
The RATER model in action
When we used the RATER framework with this team, participants reported that they found it extremely useful to have a model to draw on – not just for planning customer interactions but also to reflect on which of the RATER dimensions was important for a specific customer and how the agent addressed this during the interaction. RATER became a common language which this team could use to support and debrief each other.
If you would like to know more about our experience of working with global companies on developing their customer service communication, or the RATER model, feel free to contact us.
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The Secret L&D Manager: Building a learning culture in a global organization
/1 Comment/in Methods & Tools, Soft Skills /by Guest AuthorThis week’s Secret L&D manager is Hungarian and is a Learning & Development Specialist for a global chemical company . In this post, he talks about the journey and the challenges of building a learning culture in a large organization.
When you joined the company, what kind of learning culture did you find?
I think it’s really easy to answer this question, because when I joined my company, I can say that there was no learning culture. If I can take a step back, people have different understandings and definitions of the term “learning culture” . For me “learning culture” means there are people who like learning, there are learning resources and opportunities that people are encouraged to access whenever they need something or expect to need something going forward, and managers enable and encourage learning . Here, in all cases, there was nothing, so people were not, really empowered to learn. The second thing is that there were not a lot of resources available for learning. One of my priorities, and it’s also one of the reasons I was hired, is to create this kind of learning environment and then along with this also create a learning culture.
How were managers and the leaders in your organization seeing learning before you arrived?
I think, and this is only my perspective, that the management was saying, “Learning is very much needed” but when it came to the point where they had to invest they said, “We don’t have the budget for that”. On the one hand they definitely like the idea of learning. They talk a lot about learning and do want to enhance, improve and develop their employees. But actually, when an employee comes to them and says “OK we agreed that I need negotiations training” and they say, “OK go, have fun”, the employee has to find the seminar or resources. Employees would just Google something and then went come back with a course they had found that cost €20,000. For me this was the first problem because nobody knew if it was a good course quality-wise, who the provider was and if they were a fit, whether the investment was reasonable or if the training was needed. And then usually 99% of the managers said “sorry but we don’t have the budget for that”.
So how have you gone about building a learning culture?
What I did first was convincing management that learning and development really matters to our success as an organization. I used storytelling approaches to help them see why it is good to invest in learning, and how a company actually benefits from having a learning culture. Then I showed them that, even if they don’t want to spend a lot of money, using informal or on-the-job learning is still going to create a lot of benefits for the company. For example, using job rotation or on-the-job development does work and can make a tangible difference. Approaches like mentoring and internal coaching can and should be done. The managers in my company really bought into this idea. The first 2 or 3 things that I managed to do were ideas which didn’t cost a lot of money but were still very beneficial.
Another example where I actually created value and showed the management why learning helps an organization is when we set up the first e-learnings. We built these internally using a tool called EdApp https://www.edapp.com/. It’s a very good and intuitive tool and easy to use. There were a lot of templates that we could instantly just choose and work with. I worked with our technical experts and together we created e-learning activities on areas such as regulation, process management and . tendering, and product management. We then rolled the e-learnings out to 200 people and the feedback from the participants has been really great. Because of this tool we’ve been able to gamify the learning too.
What else have you done to continue building a culture since?
Communication is key. Whenever we have a new product or new system (e.g recruiting, performance management) we connect it to the learning. For example, in our performance management you have an annual meeting about your performance with your manager, and you have to talk about your development. Of course most people consider meeting a mandatory step and find it boring. I have worked with the managers to help them individually use this moment to create a better dialog with their employees, be more confident when giving feedback, setting goals etc etc. This combination of building a catalogue of recommended training providers and training courses, building e-learning, leveraging managers and looking for single moments where we can connect learning to the business process shows why learning is important in a company and is the first steps of building a learning culture.
More secret L&D Managers
Who is the secret L&D manager?
The “secret L&D manager” is actually a group of L&D managers. They are real people who would prefer not to mention their name or company – but do want to write anonymously so they can openly and directly share their ideas and experience with their peers.
Seven Exercises for Overcoming Loneliness and Isolation when Working from Home
/in Methods & Tools, Soft Skills /by Scott LeveyIn the 2020 State of Remote Work survey, respondents identified loneliness as their top struggle with working from home. Even among experienced home-workers, loneliness and isolation are challenges. This year, millions of workers are suddenly sent home to work, indefinitely and with no preparation. Only a select few will be able to thrive in perpetual solitude; the rest will probably need a little help. This post offers seven exercises you can do to overcome loneliness and isolation when you are working from home. Think of these as your ‘daily to-do list’. In fact, this list is a good practice for looking after your mental health in normal circumstances; in present circumstances it has become a lot more relevant.
#1 Talk to someone
Loneliness is a cycle. The more alone we feel the more we think that other people don’t want to talk to us, and so we don’t reach out. Break the cycle by having at least one conversation a day, with anyone. Talking about how we feel can help see that other people are feeling exactly the same and that we are not alone.
#2 Talk to yourself
We are all doing this most of the time, but we don’t realise it. Psychologists call this our ‘inner dialogue’ made up of recurring thoughts and emotions whirling inside our heads. If we don’t listen to this dialogue, we won’t be able to control it. Luckily, there are some proven techniques to help us listen more intently to ourselves; daily journal writing, labelling the emotions we are feeling, writing a letter to our third person self. These techniques allow us to view ourselves as an outside observer in order to tackle negative thoughts and emotions before they become actions and behaviours.
#3 Keep fit
‘Healthy body – healthy mind’ is not just an expression. Science has shown that physical exercise has a positive effect on our mental state. Intense physical activity releases mood-lifting chemicals called endorphins into our blood stream. Even just going for a walk can make us feel better, due to the fresh air, change of scenery and being around people (at an appropriate distance!). If you can’t, or don’t want to go outside, there are lots of free videos on the internet offering live fitness routines!
#4 Tune out
News channels and social media are full of one story at the moment and while it is good to be informed and in touch with what’s happening on the outside, the noise this makes can be over-whelming and reinforce negative feelings. Tuning-out from news and media can help us to tune-in to ourselves, find some peace and quiet from the noise and focus on doing something that makes us feel good. This is an example of a term that has become highly popularised in recent years – ‘mindfulness’.
#5 Take charge
Get a piece of paper and draw a circle. On the outside of the circle write the things that worry or bother you. This could be anything from becoming ill to a noisy neighbour. Now work in the inside of the circle and write all the things in your life that you can directly control. For example, you can’t control your neighbour, but you can ignore the noise. You can’t control events, but you can definitely control your reactions to them. The area inside the circle is your zone of control. This is the area you should work on and put your energy into because being in control of things gives us positive feelings, compared to worrying about things we can’t control or influence. When you start using any of the exercises in this post you have actually started to take control already!
#6 Do something for someone
Human brains are reward-driven, which means our senses become heightened when we enjoy things. Recognition and gratitude from other people are among the most common types of reward which our brains seek. A good way of doing this is to offer a kind act to someone else. For example, giving a compliment, holding a door open, giving a nice smile. It makes no difference if these things are reciprocated or not; just the act of doing them makes us feel better about ourselves and more connected to others, lighting up those important reward centres in our brains.
#7 Do something for yourself
Acts of kindness also extend to yourself. Being isolated can be a struggle but it’s also a potential gift. Is there a book you’ve been meaning to read, a recipe you haven’t had time to try, a new hobby you’ve been interested in but not had the time? Doing something new can help take your mind away from feeling lonely and build purpose and self-esteem.
We hope you enjoyed reading this post. If you did, and it helped you, you could choose to ‘pay it forward’ by sharing it with someone else – a little act of kindness that could make a difference. You can also share your tips and advice for dealing with working at home, in the comments section below.If you would like to know more about our experience of helping teams with remote working, feel free to contact us. We also offer training on managing your focus, energy and impact when working from home and leading people when they are working from home.
Leading a team that is working from home
/in Leadership, Methods & Tools, Soft Skills /by Scott LeveyWhen workers are suddenly sent home to work they will face plenty of challenges, especially if they’ve never done it before. Team leaders will face an additional challenge: Leading a team that is working from home. In this post we offer a range of tips and advice for how you can do that. To keep it simple and easy to implement we’ve stuck to a 3-step approach:
What are the challenges?
Technical
An immediate priority for leading a team that is working from home is to ensure that team members have the tools to do their jobs remotely. This includes both productivity and communication tools. As a leader you can approach this with the whole team by checking they have what they need and discussing which kinds of communication technologies work well for them. Not everything will work as it did in the office and as a team you may need to decide to use ad-hoc technologies as a temporary solution.
Emotional
Some team members may feel isolated and this can have a serious impact on motivation. This is best discussed in a one-to-one setting. Individuals will all have different emotional and psychological challenges and you need to know what these are in order to help them. A simple question like, “How are you looking after yourself?” can open up a discussion and go a long way to making team members feel supported individually. Read more on this topic in our post Dealing with Loneliness and Isolation when Working from Home.
Personal
Don’t forget to also look after your own needs and work through your own personal and logistical challenges. If you don’t address these, you won’t be as effective at helping other people with their issues. Get advice on how to do this in our post Three Steps to Adapt to Home Working.
How do I keep the team working together?
In the 1970s, MIT Professor Thomas Allen discovered that team cohesion is strongest when employees are physically closer. His ideas have been taken forward by some of the most successful companies who engineer ‘collisions’ between employees to strengthen bonding and group affiliation; simple things like coffee-machine conversations, team social events, sharing stories, etc. So, how can you do this with a team that works in physical isolation from each other? Here are some ideas we have seen that work:
Which skills do I need for leading a team that is working from home?
You don’t need new skills to become an effective leader of a home-working team, but you will need to use some of them more. Here is a short list of where to focus your leadership skills:
Be available
You may have an open door policy in the office but that won’t work in a remote team. So, be explicit about when and how team members can contact you. If you haven’t heard from someone in a while, check in with them and ask how they are. At the same time be careful that you also ring-fence the time you need for yourself and your own tasks.
Solve problems
This is probably the biggest thing your team will need from you, at least at the start. You may need to be flexible and change processes if necessary, for example lifting constraints on how and where data is stored and shared. Focusing on outputs rather than processes will help push the team towards purposeful activity and away from missing their old physical environment.
Make rules and hold people accountable to them
It’s important to establish some ground rules with the team, for example on which communication tools to use for different tasks, how and when to contact each other. You then need to monitor that the team is sticking to those rules and jump in when they are not.
Continue to manage performance
Research shows that employees value their performance being managed and they rate managers highly when it’s done well. This is still true in a home-working environment, but it will take more communication and more regular, smaller steps to address the distance and isolation. A practical start is to set some short term performance goals on adjusting to home-working at the beginning.
We hope you enjoyed reading this post and please share what works for you in the comments. If you would like to know more about our experience of helping teams with remote working, feel free to contact us. We also offer training on managing your focus, energy and impact when working from home and leading people when they are working from home.
Three steps to adapt to working from home
/in Methods & Tools, Soft Skills /by Scott LeveyStep 1 – Acknowledge
The first step to dealing with any big change is to acknowledge what is happening. If we don’t do this, we may get stuck in a little bit of denial, which will prevent us from dealing with the present situation effectively. Here are examples of what you can acknowledge in the current situation:
There will be other things you need to acknowledge – everybody’s situation is different. Spending a little time considering what is different or missing from your new home working situation is a good way to prepare to make some changes, which is our next step.
Step 2 – Make Changes
Now that you have acknowledged the situation, you’re ready to make the changes you need in order to adapt to it. A good way to approach this is to make a list of difficulties/things you miss and then come up with counter-measures to each one. We did this exercise recently in our own team, and we discovered that although our team is made up of experienced remote/home workers, they still have challenges that they need to work on. Here are some of the things from their lists:
Difficulties I Face/Things I Miss:
Counter-Measures:
Step 3 – Look After Yourself
Sudden changes to our lives can be traumatic. In Step 1 we advised spending time acknowledging the change. Step 3 is all about managing your mental and physical health through a period of sudden change. Here are some practical ways you can do this:
Get some exercise
Even if you don’t wear a fitness gadget on your wrist, you will soon realise that working from home means moving much less compared to being in the office. So, plan some exercise into your daily routine, even just a 30 minute walk at lunchtime can help. Research shows that lack of exercise and fresh air has a real impact on our mental capabilities.
Ask for help
From colleagues and especially your manager. This could be asking for solutions to technical problems, or for a bit of slack if the home/work balance is getting overwhelming. We are all in the same boat and asking for and giving help and support is what we need to do now. You can read our tips and advice for managers in the post How to Lead a Team that is Working from Home.
Be kind to yourself
You are not going to make this change successfully in one day or even one month. It’s ok to be frustrated, angry, impatient and it’s healthy to consider the emotions you are feeling and where they come from. It’s also important to understand the emotions of those around us – whether family or colleagues – and be kind and understanding of those people too. You can find tips and advice on dealing with the emotional side of home-working in the post Dealing with Loneliness and Isolation When Working from Home.
We hope you enjoyed reading this post and please share what works for you in the comments. If you would like to know more about our experience of helping teams with remote working, feel free to contact us. We also offer training on managing your focus, energy and impact when working from home.
A practical guide to storytelling in business
/in Leadership, Soft Skills /by Scott LeveyPeople have always told stories and they are a vital part of our communication. Today, storytelling has become accepted (and sometimes expected) in a professional context. We’ve seen a rapid demand for our practical storytelling in business training solutions. Whereas 8 years ago there was sometimes a need to convince people that a storytelling approach was valid, we rarely get any pushback today. This change in attitudes can be partly attributed to the power of the TED talk format, partly to our push back against death by PowerPoint and people speaking to us in bullets … and mainly because storytelling never went away. When done well, storytelling connects with people in a way no other communication approach can. This post outlines the essentials so you can get started.
What is a story? And why should I use them?
Every story has …
This last point is the key. A story is not a series of events or a case study. It should connect with people and create an emotional reaction.
This connecting makes stories easy to remember. When done well stories bring meaning to information and have the power to move people. Depending on the story and the skill of the storyteller our brains …
If you are interested in the science behind these statements, these two HB articles explore the science behind storytelling and what makes storytelling so effective for learning.
This means you can choose to use a story in a wide range of situations. We often use stories when presenting, influencing, teaching, leading or just in day-to-day discussions. Consider using stories when you want to aid memory, celebrate, challenge assumptions, connect, convince, encourage, energize, entertain, explain, impress, inspire, motivate, persuade, reinforce values or beliefs, scare or shock, sell, support, teach or warn.
How do I build a story?
Learning to build a great story is a skill, and it can require practice. If you want to build a story you need to start with your audience. Your first question has to be “What do I want them to feel?”. Sometimes the emotion you arrive at may surprise you. Secondly ask yourself “What do I want them to understand? think? do?”. Then think back over the situations you’ve been part of, or have observed. It is far easier and far better to tell stories that mean something to you and are your stories. You can share other people’s stories but make sure you have the information and the understanding to bring it to life. Again, a story works because it connects on a human /emotional level.
This post goes behind the scenes with 2 of our staff, discussing the challenges some professionals have when building a story and how they approach this in a training environment.
If you are struggling to build a story, then try using the IDEAS approach:
Finally, don’t assume you can just get up and tell it. You need to practice your story, if you want to make it matter.
How do I actually tell my story?
If the story means something to you, you will already have the content and the structure. Make things personal and tell tough stories. If your story is tough and personally matters to you, you will naturally find the pace, the tone and the body language you need to make your story captivating. When you are developing and practising your story, follow these 3 great pieces of advice:
When you are delivering the story …
And if you want to get really good …
What should I not do when telling a story?
Telling a story is NOT the same as making a presentation. A lot of the techniques you’ve learned on presentation seminars are story-killers and using them will rob your story of its emotional content. For example:
Storytelling is a learnable skill! It starts with identifying your goal and understanding your audience. You need to know the emotion you are looking for. From there you start hunting for the right story, which you then craft through practice. Don’t rush it, do not “present” it, and have the courage to just tell a story person to person. You’ll be surprised at the impact you can make.
And if you’d like support, whether it be coaching or training then do get in touch. We’d love to help you be even better at storytelling.
Rescheduling meetings in English
/in Business English /by Guest AuthorAs an InCorporate Trainer, I provide business English training and support to an engineering multinational within their offices. Most of my participants attend meetings with clients, partners and colleagues, and sometimes it’s necessary to reschedule a meeting via email. My participants are concerned about the tone of the email, letting others down, and losing trust and credibility. Based on my work with them, here are a few examples, tips and phrases that you can use when you need to reschedule a meeting in English.
Reschedule with as much notice as possible
This gives others the chance to use their time as efficiently as possible and reduces the impact and inconvenience. Waiting until the last minute to reschedule the meeting, means no one else will have a chance to schedule another activity during this time. If it happens frequently it damages your emotional bank account. As you can see from the example mail below, the reason for the change has been given. Transparency is valued and builds trust. If you have a reasonable reason for rescheduling the meeting and you share this, others will find the change easier to accept. If you are informing them a few days in advance a polite email to is usually fine. This email has 3 steps:
Dear Ralf,
I’m very sorry, but I need to reschedule our status update meeting set for Thursday. I need to stand in for my colleague who is unexpectedly unable to lead a client workshop. I am aware that our meeting needs to happen before we can move on the next quality gate, so I’d like to suggest that we meet on Monday 6th instead. I believe everyone is able to attend, right? If not, please let me know and I’ll look for another alternative. Sorry again for the inconvenience and I hope that we are able to find a suitable solution.
Thanks in advance,
Reschedule at the last minute
How you handle rescheduling your meeting at the last minute depends very much on whom you’re meeting, why you are meeting and how big a problem it is to reschedule the day before. Sickness and family disasters aside, rescheduling on the day of the meeting really does deserve a personal phone call. Using the phone is personal, shows you care and also speeds up the process of finding a new date that fits both sides. On those very rare occasions when you need to cancel a meeting an hour before then get ready to eat humble pie. Again, do it by phone, apologize, explain why and show you want to find a new date – even if you can’t do this right then and there. Then consider showing you appreciate their patience by following up later with a thank you email. For example …
Dear Ralf,
I just wanted to write and say thank you once again for your flexibility. I really do appreciate it. Talking though our options regarding the NCC presentation is very important to me and I’d like to reschedule quickly and find a time that suits you. I can move things around and find time to meet on Monday (10:00 – 14:15) or Thursday (9:00 – 13.00). If neither of these work for you then please make some suggestions and I’ll do my very best to find a solution. Once again, I’m very sorry for the inconvenience and thanks for your understanding.
Phrases
Explaining the reason
Showing appreciation
Phrases for apologizing
Suggesting an alternative meeting time
Fore more information
If you would like to learn more about how our InCorporate Trainers provide on-the-job support and coaching for clients then take a look at
Train the Trainer: Dealing with ‘difficult’ participants – part 1
/in Methods & Tools, Soft Skills /by Scott LeveyAt Target Training we’ve been delivering “train-the-trainer” solutions for over 20 years to a broad range of clients across industries. Without fail, one of the most common personal training goals we see is “I want to learn to deal with difficult participants”. No matter whether you are delivering on-boarding, technical, safety or skills training, training starts and ends with your participants. As a trainer you want to deliver training which is engaging and useful … and as all experienced trainers know, a single difficult participant can impact this. This blog post shares our advice and experience, so you are better prepared to deal with difficult participants in the training room.





What do we mean by a “difficult participant” and how common are they really?
Training is about adding value to your participants and organization, by developing their knowledge, skills and behaviours. You want your participants to have a rewarding learning experience – and you have designed your training to achieve this. You’ve identified and considered the learning goals, you’ve considered the flow so it is smooth and ties together, and you’ve designed varied activities to keep the training engaging and rewarding. A “difficult participant, is a participant who hinders or prevents the above – intentionally or not. Difficult participants diminish the impact of the training for the other participants and reduce your organizations return on investment.
All participants have the potential of being difficult, and this depends upon a variety of factors – ranging from the context of the training to the training design, and from personalities to an individual’s situational circumstances. We all have bad days. However, truly destructive participants are thankfully rare. I’ve been involved in delivering training for over 23 years, and looking back I can only think of a handful of “difficult” individuals. Unfortunately, I remember them clearer than the rest. So, what can you do? Before the training starts, you can minimize the risk of participants becoming difficult before the training even starts, through some simple steps.
Know who the participants are
If you are delivering internally, then get a list of the participants in advance and make the time to speak with their line managers. By doing this you can learn more about the “perceived” context for the training, and the participants knowledge, experience, needs and attitudes. If somebody is cynical, silent or a talker, then the line manager may flag this. Alternatively, just ask straight out “Are there any participants I should keep an eye on?”. You can also encourage the manager to speak with her participants and reinforce that they value training and have expectations. Line manager involvement is key to successful training (Clemmer 2008) and ensures your organization makes the most of its training investment.
If you have a chance to meet the participants before the session, you should take it. Give them an impression of who you are. Build rapport before they enter the training room. Introduce yourself, find out what they expect from the training and set their expectations (“yes, unfortunately, there will be some role-plays”), or just make small talk for a few minutes. For you, the trainer, it makes a huge difference to walk into a room with ten strangers (not knowing what they want), or to walk into a room with five strangers and five people you already know (whose expectations you’ve already set).
Design the training so it respects and engages everyone
Use what you’ve learned from speaking with the line managers to ensure your training content is appropriate, relevant and challenging. By doing this you can minimize the likelihood of a wide range of difficult or disruptive behaviours – from boredom to frustration to challenging. You also want to ensure that your training respects the range of personalities and learning styles. Give your participants the opportunity to reflect, consider and contribute both as individuals and in groups. Plan “loud” and “quiet” times so both extroverts and introverts get what they need– not everyone enjoys brainstorming and discussions. Do consider the flow of energy within the training day and consciously design your training around this e.g. after lunch will you energize the group, or give them some reflection time to look back on the morning?
Anticipate tough questions, difficult learning points and likely areas of resistance
If this is a new training solution, then take the time to play “what if”. Write down all the questions that you hope they will ask, know they will ask, don’t want them to ask, and dread they ask. Then think about your answers. Practice your responses out loud and ensure your answers are brief, to the point and authentic. As the trainer you have a lot of knowledge and experience – and synthesizing all this into a clear and brief response can be tough.
If you’ve delivered the training before than you’ve already spotted the areas which raise questions or provoke discussions. Again, step back and consider what you want to say, how you want to say, and how much time you want to invest in which topics.
If there’s an elephant in your training room, then know how you want to tackle it
Keep your training human and keep it real. The circumstances surrounding the training can and will influence behaviours. If the organization is going through change, restructuring, laying off staff, or merging then you can expect this to impact attitudes and behaviours. You probably cannot influence these circumstances, but you can acknowledge them and prepare for possible resistance, push back or disassociation.
I remember delivering a 2-day leadership program to an automotive company where everyone knew that at the end of day 1 a major announcement would be made on the future of some plants. The training content was fixed and “motivating and driving performance “was a major part of the first day. We spoke about the circumstances openly, acknowledged that the topic was awkwardly timed to say the least, and agreed to reframe the training as practical management skills for the future, wherever they may be. Keeping the pace fast, the energy high and the themes as “archetypical” helped the training make a personal impact.
Reframe how you see difficult participants
Embrace the challenge of difficult participants. At its heart, training is about people, and we learn more about working with people from difficult situations than from “everything going to plan”. You want participants to be engaged and challenging you is actually a good thing. You want your participants to let you know if something isn’t going right for them during the training and not afterwards. And you want your participants to be themselves. I’ve only ever met one participant who I couldn’t work with at any level whatsoever, and even this was a learning moment – I learned that was ok, to accept the situation, and to focus on the other participants who clearly wanted to be there.
Always open the training in a way that sets out mutual expectations
Creating and agreeing on ground rules and shared expectations is essential. This then gives you and others the framework to hold each other accountable and have difficult conversations with difficult participants about difficult situations. Experienced trainers do this naturally and each trainer has their own style, but the core you need to agree on is
Effective approaches to managing the pull of phone calls that I’ve seen/heard/ done have included:
And if none of the above are acceptable, then at least get agreement that people respectfully leave the training room when on the phone.
Agreeing on ground rules allows you as the trainer to refer back to the agreed expectations and have awkward conversations safely. And of course, all of the above approaches are much more powerful when the training participants build them themselves! This allows the participants to hold each other accountable and take responsibility for ensuring the dynamics are healthy. You can expect that colleagues can self-regulate behaviours to some extent!
Start the training by keeping it real and keeping things human
The final tip is that positioning yourself above your participants will create unnecessary resistance and provoke difficult behaviours as participants try to prove something wrong, reject messages because they reject your credibility, or fight to show they know more. You are the trainer and you are human. Use this to build authenticity, credibility and trust from the outset and reduce the risk of difficult behaviours derailing the training. Share your experience, build your credibility and also show that you know how it can be challenging at first to get to grips with the specifics (“ I remember when ..”).
If you are delivering soft skills, customer service or leadership training, then avoid presenting yourself as the example to be followed. Tap into meaningful stories, share experiences and connect with the participants on a human level. My own approach is to open our Practical toolbox for managers program with “ I strongly believe in the value of everything we’ll be covering in the next 2 days, and many of your colleagues have fed back that they found it practical. Saying that, as a manager, I do not do everything we’ll be covering myself. I’m human and I have my strengths and my weaknesses”. I then see the participant’ physically relax and open up.
17 practical ways senior managers and executives can support training and development inside their organization
/1 Comment/in Leadership, Soft Skills /by Scott LeveyRecently one of our clients asked me to co-facilitate a workshop at an annual global event. The client is one of the largest building materials companies in the world, and their annual event is attended by plant managers, country directors and executives. Amongst the presentations and plenary sessions they wanted to run 2 challenging workshops which would then lead to concrete action plans. One of these workshops focused on the ambitious goal of quickly becoming carbon free, and the other on training.
Our client wanted to further strengthen their learning culture and ensure top-level management were playing an active part in this journey. Rather than asking the senior leaders “What do you need?” the question they wanted to ask was “So. what can you do?” – and the participants loved it. They were more than happy to share their experiences and opinions, and all were quite vocal when expressing that learning and development was their responsibility. As one Indonesian plant manager said “You at headquarters support us and help us, we like the e-learning and the virtual delivery offers … but we are the important ones because we need to make it happen”.
Based upon their input, and expanded through interviews with other clients, here are 17 ways that senior managers and executives can actively support training and development within their organizations.
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Which topics are most suited for the live virtual training format
/in Methods & Tools, Soft Skills /by Guest AuthorThis week’s Secret L&D manager is German and has been working for one of the big management consulting firms for 13 years. She is part of a virtual L&D team responsible for internal training solutions for a global group of analysts, specialists, and managers across multiple time zones. In our previous interviews she has shared how and why her organization got started with live virtual training solutions, and what they have learned along the way. In this post she shares more of her experience and looks forward to the future of virtual delivery.
Which topics have you learned work well virtually and which haven’t taken off?
As I mentioned earlier, we first used the live virtual delivery format for what we could call hard skills. This included technical skills and software training. Training on Excel, PowerPoint etc. We then used virtual delivery formats for training where there were a lot of tips, dos and don’ts. For example, how to build effective slides and engage your audience. If the training is about showing something directly and then facilitating a conversation about this, then virtual training actually works very well.
We have also had really good experiences with softer topics too. Many of our leadership programs are now delivered virtually. For example one of our management development programs has a kick-off webinar, two one-one-one coaching sessions and a wrap-up webinar —all facilitated virtual—as standard elements, plus during this journey the participants meet for a two-day residential workshop. The feedback from our managers is that this is one of our most popular and successful programs. We also have a lot of softer topics where working virtually is part of the training goals. For example, “Presenting in a virtual environment” or “Leading virtual teams”.
One big challenge or obstacle in a virtual space is how to build up trust. You have so many things which are lacking in a virtual space which are usually vital to building up trust with someone, right? This could be the immediate reaction to the other’s physical presence – smiles, body language, eye contact, even smell – anything. We’re all humans and we react to one another’s presence. But what happens when there isn’t a physical presence? Tackling this kind of virtual training topic in a virtual training environment makes absolute sense.
Are there some topics that you’d never wanted to go virtual with?
That’s actually a good question. Some training concepts are not at first glance suitable, but over the years I have learned that it is really a question of design. The technology does have limitations, but this is continually improving. I would say the obvious ones that don’t transfer as easily to a virtual deliver format easily are those programs where there are a lot of role-plays required. It’s difficult when the softer expressions, body language etc. are important training elements. But even these can be approached in different ways.
It depends on the situation, the participants’ situations and our training goals. When I want to adapt communication, soft skills, leadership training, etc. for a virtual context I think it’s possible to do that training or program also in a virtual setting. In fact, I will say that it makes a lot of sense to do it virtually as this is the manager’s reality! Yes, it can be difficult with topics like assertiveness, difficult conversations, giving feedback etc. On a tiny little screen, their body language is not really visible. I don’t know what their legs are doing, but I can see what their shoulders are doing, and maybe their arms, hands and face – and this is reality. If it’s leadership in a virtual environment or difficult conversations in a virtual environment, the virtual training setting works perfectly.
If you’re trying to practice something you only ever do face-to-face with people, then it’s not as strong but it still can work. I can only think of a couple of our programs which maybe aren’t so suitable for virtual delivery, but it’s really only a few.
Do you see a change in the way you’ll be using live virtual training in the future?
Yes and no. I think there’ll be a shift in L&D generally, and also inside our firm. On the one hand, we don’t want to fully give up on the residential trainings because it’s still a very different experience and people really do like them. You are spending maybe three days with each other, rather than three hours online. It is completely different – you get to know people, you have a different level of peer exchange, you establish defined accountability partners etc. If you are meeting in person you also talk more broadly about things which are happening in the business and topics which are very sensitive things. Often this is outside of the training, too. In these longer residential trainings, you often build friendships with colleagues that are important for the rest of their working life. It’s a different experience.
On the other hand, the internationalization of our people and company means we are finding that the people who require a certain skill and want to develop it are not actually based in the same location. Bringing people together for classical face-to-face training is certainly a cost question – but also a time and environmental one, too! I think virtual training will expand because of these factors. There is of course an additional benefit – it is also good that people from different countries, with different work styles and different backgrounds have more chances and opportunities to exchange ideas and approaches.
So, from the human side we certainly still want that people meet each other in person – but really it’s a question of the topic and taking everything into account. I expect virtual training will increase because of the benefits it offers when done well. It makes a lot of sense when you have a topic which can be actually broken down into modules, and where it doesn’t matter if you have a week in between modules (or maybe a week in between really helps!).
Today, virtual delivery is being integrated into all of our approaches. All stand-alone residential training events will also have maybe a virtual kick-off call, some exercises in between, virtual coaching calls afterwards, and virtual wrap-up meetings afterwards etc. This leads to a blended learning journey so people can integrate training into their work life and transfer what they have learned. It is easier to incorporate virtual delivery into our everyday work life. I believe it will become more and more usual.
Lessons learned: making live virtual training work for our business
/in Methods & Tools, Soft Skills /by Guest AuthorThis week’s Secret L&D manager is German and has been working for one of the management consulting firms for 13 years. She is part of a virtual L&D team responsible for internal training solutions for a global group of analysts, specialists, and managers across multiple time zones. In our previous interview she shared how and why her organization got started with live virtual training solutions. In this post she shares more of her experience on how to deliver virtual training solutions well.
Based on your experience over the last five years, what advice would you give a fellow L&D manager who hasn’t organized virtual delivery before and is planning on trying it?
If this is your very first move into live virtual training, I would suggest you start with a hard skill. Something which is more about skills than behaviours, for example software tools, processes etc. I would then search for a pilot group. For me a good pilot group is a group who will give you clear and balanced feedback. You should invest some time in preparing the pilot group. See it like setting the scene in terms of change management. People will probably be very sceptical and may even complain. You want to help them build an open mindset and help them understand why this move to virtual delivery is a good idea for them and the organization.
If this is the very first time you’re trying live virtual training then make the time to go and talk with people one-on-one and win them over. People don’t understand actually how “live”, interactive and fun, live virtual training can be. They might be thinking about e-learning or webinars where they just listen for half an hour. You want them to appreciate that this is live and that they will be expected to contribute in the same way as if they were in the same room as the facilitator. Tell them it’s not going to be a passive and boring experience, just pick up the phone and say “Hey John, you’re suggested for this training, we have this really cool format on WebEx, and it will be working like this and we’ll get you a really good headset and this will be really fun. You’ll meet people from Brazil and from Russia and ….”. Then see what you can do to help them be comfortable with the technology. Think about setting up a WebEx call with them beforehand and show them what WebEx looks like, how it works, how you’re going to use—and a few tips on making it a good experience, like finding a quiet place for the training session without people listening in, without background noise etc.
You want to light a fire in them. You want them to talk about the pilot session to other people and say at the very least, “Hey, actually that was not too bad!”
What advice can you share on designing and delivering live virtual training?
First of all, I would also invest in finding a fantastic and experienced virtual facilitator. You want the participants to connect with them and the training and leave with a positive experience. You can either look for an external vendor or learn-as-you go internally.
If you are going external you want to find an external partner who knows what they are doing and can guide you. If I use our example of working with you at Target Training, when we first spoke, and you asked me “Do you want a producer or not?” I knew that you knew what you were talking about.
Why do you feel a technical producer is so important in virtual training?
There are many people who don’t know what a producer is and what a producer’s role is. For me the technical producer is actually a key part of virtual facilitation and this is often forgotten.
The producer takes care of the technical part and if you use a producer, you can leverage all the functionality available in the virtual training tools, like breakout rooms, polls, whiteboards, combining whiteboards and summarizing them, letting people share output from the breakout rooms, managing technical glitches, etc. There are so many things that can be leveraged so easily. When this is covered by a producer then the facilitator can actually focus on facilitating – the human part of it!
Using a trainer and a producer works very well and everyone knows exactly know who is responsible for what when they have glitches. A producer means fewer distractions. It’s really a key thing for me to have a seamless experience and I wish that producers would be standard. I am a big fan of that.
What do you think makes an effective virtual trainer?
Being an effective trainer virtually requires different approaches. Let me share our first experiences. Prior to deciding to make this jump to virtual delivery, we had of course built up over the years a large pool of trainers and training companies who we worked with company-wide. This pool had a lot of experience with us and there were also a lot of alumni amongst them. We decided to invest in them and their development and help them learn to deliver live training virtually. They knew our company, they knew our people and they knew what our firm is all about. This key learning part was completely covered.
We decided to invest in them and their development in three ways – training them, learning by doing, and giving them constant feedback about really excelling in the virtual space. When we started with live virtual delivery, we said, “Just give it a try and let’s talk after 1 or 2 sessions about how they were delivered”. Our experience was that not every trainer can or wants to make the jump, and that is ok.
When I think about the better experiences I have had with facilitators, like your colleagues, what they all had in common was their ability to do a remarkable job in really building up trust quickly. They knew how to engage others and help people open up. I have also seen them play a lot with the pace which is so important. Generally, in the virtual training environment, people (myself included) tend to be talking much faster than they would in a classic residential training. Slowing the speed down really helps a lot, but if you are the facilitator it can at first feel kind of awkward and unnatural. The virtual facilitator can’t always see the other person and then there’s a delay and you feel as if you are talking into a black hole. But talking too fast is far worse as the participants feel they can’t contribute and are being pushed through the training as quickly as possible. For me an effective virtual trainer can adapt their pace and play around with it. And the supreme discipline for me personally is when a facilitator can use humor in a virtual setting and makes participants laugh.
How much virtual training is delivered by your own trainers and how much by external partners?
I would today it is 60 – 70% by externals and the remainder by internal trainers. We have developed our own internal train-the-trainer programs for virtual delivery. This is delivered by those pioneers who were basically there at the beginning. We offer a “train the virtual trainer” program to our internal trainers. Our experts benefit from the experience, tips, tricks and advice the facilitators themselves learnt over time. They learn about designing and delivering virtual training.
Do you see a difference regarding training design in virtual training?
Yes, it’s absolutely different! Make sure you think carefully about the training set-up and format. For virtual training, the training design and the training materials need to be approached differently. In terms of training design, ask yourself what actually makes a face-to-face training successful and how can I apply this to the virtual training design? You certainly still want a lot of exercises, so the training is engaging. And, as the learners’ attention span is much shorter virtually, you might need to play more with timing and move fluidly between trainer inputting to discussions and then to exercises.
And a final question – how large would you recommend the groups should be for live virtual training?
It very much depends on the topic. For topics which require interchange of more sensitive things, for example soft skills or anything about teams or leadership, we say five to six people per group with seven being our absolute maximum. For what we call” technical trainings” I think we can accept a few more because the exchanges, discussions and conversations aren’t as important. For these kinds of topics our maximum is 15.
In the 3rd and final part of the interview the Secret L&D manager shares her views on which topics are best suited for virtual delivery and how she sees the future of virtual training.
How and why we got started with live virtual training in our global firm
/in Methods & Tools, Soft Skills /by Guest AuthorThis week’s Secret L&D manager is German and has been working for one of the big management consulting firms for 13 years. She is part of a virtual L&D team responsible for internal training solutions for a global group of analysts, specialists, and managers across multiple time zones. In this post, she talks about the need for virtual delivery, the challenges, and the lessons they’ve learned along the way.



When did your organization start delivering training virtually?
When I joined our L&D team four years ago, our department had already been offering live virtual training for about a year. Not everyone in the company was actively using it yet so we were kind of pioneers. The background behind our decision to introduce virtual delivery was that we had, and have, a big group of people who are spread across the world in different countries on different continents. There are people in hub locations, and these hubs are also spread across the world, and there are people who may belong to the same department but are located in some very remote locations.
The training challenge here was that if we used the classical way of offering what we call “residential” face-to-face training to all these people, we would have exceeded our budgets by far. And still we wanted to offer everyone a fair chance of having the same training options as their colleagues. We were actively looking at which trainings could be held in a virtual space and this is clearly linked to which trainings are actually most suited, or most easily converted, to virtual delivery.
We started with so-called hard skills like slide writing, using PowerPoint, Excel etc. but we then also quickly moved into other soft areas too. We were keen to make this move as the virtual approach allowed us to make a continuous learning journey out of a “one-off training” and enabled implementing learning into every-day life – this is clearly the biggest advantage.
So how quickly did you move into delivering live virtual training solutions for soft skills training, leadership development, etc.?
I think fairly quickly actually. Until about six years ago there weren’t any soft skills or leadership training programs for my global group at all because the group was just being established. The first training initiatives were the classical format – residential trainings of one to three days. However, within a year, a live virtual delivery format had been established and then it moved forwards fairly quickly. Nowadays we have a 50/50 split – half is virtual, and half is residential.
What have you learned along the way about organizing live virtual training?
We should split this question into the organizational part and the delivery and facilitating part — but we have learned a lot in both areas! Starting with the organizational side, as with residential training, too, we learned we need to block time with people, and in virtual training these time slots need to be convenient for multiple time zones. Then we needed to find a suitable and reliable tool of course. WebEx was rolled out globally in our company around this time, and we were very happy – it works well with only a few exceptions when people have a poor internet connection. Everyone has the same technology; everyone has the same starting point. This is actually a really big help.
We also learned that there is a difference between delivering the classic virtual training session and what we call a blended virtual format. Let me explain; we had training where everybody was in a different place behind their desks. What we also successfully tried is, for example, having ten people in Boston who wanted to do the slide writing training, and we also had four people in Munich, and three people in Madrid. In some locations we have dedicated video rooms—this means people are sitting on one table and in one corner of the room there is a TV screen and camera. The group in Boston sees the other groups in Munich and Madrid and the other way, too. The facilitator is live in Boston, so one of the locations does have the advantage of having a live facilitator in the same room – but the participants in the other locations have colleagues with them, too – and everyone can see everyone. So when it comes to exercises this “being in a room with colleagues” does have a really big advantage. Colleagues are motivating and challenging each other, and of course we shouldn’t ignore the benefit of group pressure when it comes to participation and focus. People are not checking emails or multi-tasking because there are other people sitting in the room in the same training. And we could offer training to locations where there were too few people to have a face-to-face training.
We did something similar for a “writing proposals” project with a sales team in the Far East. The trainer was in one room and everybody else was in another room. It can work really well.
Absolutely! If the room is set up properly, this comes close to recreating a live residential training. Of course, logistics-wise there can be some difficulties because you first of all have to have a certain number of learners in each office and then people of course change plans last minute etc. But this is similar to the challenges of classical residential training. We also had to book all those video rooms, so they were free at the same time etc. Then an important client meeting comes, and the team is thrown out; so logistics-wise that’s a little bit hard, but we found solutions. In general, the approach worked very well, and the learners said they had a really positive group learning experience.
When you made your first moves into live virtual delivery was there any resistance from people? For example, did you have people wanting to stick with the classic face-to-face training approach?
Of course – and to be quite honest there still is! Often people still frankly ask “Hey I’ve been invited to this virtual training. Is there a live residential training instead?” This is natural because many people prefer to go somewhere else to be really focused, meet people, limit interruptions etc. It’s a much more intense experience, let’s be honest. There was a lot of resistance at the beginning and we still get it sometimes. However, I would say it quickly became accepted – mainly because people have had very positive experiences with virtual training, and they have then shared their experience with others.
This is where we come to the absolute need for good virtual facilitation skills. When we started moving into live virtual delivery, we already had a strong pool of trusted facilitators. Many of them were external vendors who were brilliant in the residential live facilitation, but facilitating virtually is so different. I’m thinking back to a workshop I attended myself on “Virtual Facilitation” run by the American Talent Development Association. This trainer was a radio moderator and he gave tips and tricks on using your voice to make virtual training more engaging. One thing he said—that I have never forgotten—was that facilitating in a virtual environment feels completely awkward. It’s really like being a radio moderator. It feels like you are talking to yourself and you aren’t getting any feedback. He said you need to embrace this, and to accept the silence. You will feel super awkward at first. But people need you to act as a guide. When you ask a question, you have to wait until an answer comes, and you still have to smile into the camera—even if there is no one immediately responding. This is a big change and challenge for many facilitators. And just as with face-to-face training, space and time to think is important. It is just that the time feels longer and different in a virtual training world.
In the early days we invested in our internal facilitators. They got training on how to really adapt to this virtual training context because it requires very different tools and very different styles of facilitation. We also had to train long-term and trusted external vendors on what we needed.
Not every trainer can or wants to make that change – it’s a question of personal preferences. And of course, some trainers are much better delivering training face-to-face than virtually. It’s really a totally different skill.
In our next blog post this Secret L&D manager share more of her experience and advice on making virtual training a success
Balancing your emotional bank accounts – practical activities for managers and leaders
/in Leadership, Soft Skills /by Scott LeveyIn our previous blog we explained what an emotional bank account is and why managers need to care about building them . To quickly recap, an emotional bank account is a metaphor coined by Stephen Covey in his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. It describes the amount of trust that’s been built up in a relationship, and when trust is high, communication is easy and effective. Every time a manager says something supportive, shows respect, helps somebody with a difficult situation, etc., they make a deposit in that person’s emotional bank account. Every time they criticize, blame, lie, intimidate, etc., they make a withdrawal. Over time, the effects of these deposits will help transform that relationship. This post goes deeper into how to build your emotional bank accounts.
How do you build a healthy emotional bank account with your team?
Every manager and team are different, and culture can play a part, but at the end of the day it comes back to our relationships and how we behave. Covey identified six ways to make deposits (or reduce withdrawals):
1) Understand the individual
You need to know what the individual wants and what constitutes a deposit and withdrawal for them. Whereas one employee might be exhilarated by presenting their project results to the board another may prefer to be in the background and their contribution acknowledged privately. Ask yourself what drives them? How do they want recognition? What makes their eyes light up?
2) Keeping commitments
We have all broken a promise and let somebody down, and when we do this, we are making a withdrawal. Keeping commitments is about doing what we say we’ll do, keeping our promises, delivering what we said we’d deliver, being on time, being where we should be, fulfilling our promises. If you consistently keep your commitments, you build healthy emotional bank accounts with people.
3) Clarifying expectations
Each of us have different backgrounds, experiences and expectations. We see the world differently. Clarifying understanding and expectations is essential if you’d like to minimize misunderstanding and wrong assumptions. By proactively investing time in clarifying expectations and building a mutual understanding of what you need, don’t need, want, don’t want etc you can minimize the “ I thought that..”, “I’d assumed ..”, “To me it was obvious that …”. And keep in mind that if you are leading people and teams virtually, then the risk of false assumptions and misunderstanding does increase, and formalizing things with communication charters does help.
4) Attending to the little things
Relationships aren’t only built by big moments but by the little things too. These are the smiles in the corridor, holding the door open, short thank you emails, remembering their daughter has just started school, not heading straight to your office but spending a moment walking through the open office to be seen. Kind words, smiles, courtesies, warmth. Human interest, and taking time when you don’t have to.
5) Showing personal integrity
Relationships are built on trust and integrity. What does integrity mean? The word “integrity” comes from the Latin integritatem, meaning “soundness” or “wholeness.” Integrity is not situational – it is a state of mind. In Covey’s words…
What does this look like in practice? Here are 7 musts to start with…
6) Apologizing when we make a withdrawal
we are all human, and we all make mistakes and get things wrong. Know when you’ve made a mistake, admit it and apologize with sincerity. Admitting you’ve made a mistake doesn’t necessarily mean it is acceptable but it’s a start, and can be healing to a relationship. Avoid the temptation of wanting to discuss why you made it before you discuss and show understanding of the impact it had on others. And understand that if you are continually making the same type of withdrawal, trust will erode. It’s the smaller things that kill relationships in the long run. Finally, don’t try and lighten withdrawals with banter, humour or a “shit sandwich”– this is rarely appreciated.
To add to the list above , tolerance and forgiveness are also powerful deposits, as is appreciative inquiry and holding back judgment and sweeping statements.
A 10-minute practical activity for managers
More about our leadership and management training solutions
If you are interested in learning more about how we integrate emotional intelligence into our leadership and management training solutions, please contact us.
Why managers should care about their emotional bank accounts
/in Leadership, Soft Skills /by Scott LeveyIn our Practical Toolbox for managers training program, we often hear that the time spent on giving feedback is one of the highlights, and implementing DESC frequently makes it onto the manager’s transfer plan. One of the key points they take away is that the success of your feedback/feedforward rests upon your broader relationship with your partner. Put simply, if you have invested in them as a human being then feedback conversations are far more likely to go well. To look at it from the other side, if you haven’t invested in somebody, if you haven’t built trust, and if you haven’t built a meaningful professional relationship with them … well don’t be surprised when thing go pear-shaped. If you are managing others, you need your emotional bank account with your staff to be healthy.


What is an “emotional bank account”?
The term “emotional bank account” appears in Stephen Covey’s The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. In Covey’s own words:
“An emotional bank account is a metaphor that describes the amount of trust that’s been built up in a relationship. It’s the feeling of safeness you have with another human being. When the trust account is high, communication is easy, instant, and effective.”.
Covey made the term popular, but the concept behind the “emotional bank account” is not new. When we take more than we give from a relationship over the long-term, then we shouldn’t be surprised if the relationship suffers. This holds true in all our relationships, from those with our partners, kids, friends, colleagues, clients, and suppliers.
The metaphor took off within the business training world because it is immediately understandable. You make deposits, save up money, and when you need that money later, you withdraw it. An emotional bank account is an account of trust instead of money. We all know how a bank account works … plus bank account sounds more business-like which helps a certain time of person accept the idea.
Every time a manager says something supportive, shows respect, invests in somebody as an individual, helps somebody with a difficult situation, makes time for them etc they make a deposit in that person’s emotional bank account. Over time, the effects of these deposits will help to transform that relationship. And conversely, every time they criticize, blame, defend, ignore, lie, intimidate, threaten, etc they make a withdrawal.
We are all human and there are times when we are making more withdrawals than deposits. Just like a bank, we can go in the red and then come out of it. The trick is to be in in the healthy green zone over the longer term.
Why should managers care about emotional bank accounts?
It is rare to hear managers dismissing the concept. Almost all managers we work with in our management and leadership solutions want positive, productive, rewarding, trust-based relationships with their staff and teams. Concepts such as authenticity, credibility and trust are valued by the vast majority of organizations, and books such as “Servant leadership in Action” and Goffee & Jones’“Why should anyone be led by you?” and have captured this.
A personal sense of self-worth and respect is important, but meaningful and strong relationships in the workplace also lead directly to tangible results. As a manager, your success is largely is dependent on your staff. Leaders who build strong and meaningful relationships within and beyond their organization give their business a competitive advantage. Emotional bank accounts are not just about the “soft stuff”. They are about delivering results through performance.
Healthy emotional bank accounts play a role in practically all of a manager’s day-to-day tasks. When a manager tasks, delegates, motivates, influences, leads meetings, communicates, reviews, resolves conflicts, gives feedback, navigates difficult discussions etc., the relationships impact the success. All of these are moments where a manager can deposit or withdraw, and each of them has a range of potential for success or failure.
To summarize: If a manager cares about their emotional bank accounts they are more likely to succeed in the short, medium and long-term. If a manager doesn’t take care of relationships and withdraws more than they deposit, then they can’t expect to see a highly motivated team delivering outstanding results.
Check your emotional bank accounts – a practical activity for managers
More about emotional bank accounts
In our next blog post we’ll go deeper into the behaviours related to “how you build emotional bank accounts” and share another practical exercise.
The secret L&D manager: What makes training effective?
/in Business English, Soft Skills /by Guest AuthorThis month’s secret training manager is Italian and has worked in a variety of fields including public research organizations and service companies. Here she talks with Scott Levey about the basic elements that make training and trainers effective.
What makes training effective?
To me an effective training is a training that uses most of the senses. Meaning: seeing, hearing, touching. The learners need to experience things and be actively engaged. Of course, the training needs to cover the thinking side, but adult learners need to learn by doing things. A good training event also has to be designed to have different activities and moments. For example, it needs moments to listen and get input and ideas, moments to pause and ponder on the theory that was just presented to you, moments to experiment, and moments to recap. I want the trainer to also plan in multiple moments where they cover again the main and salient points of the training. For me this is essential. I would also say that effective training sessions need to have a certain pace and this pace changes depending on the moment. After lunch the trainer will increase the pace to get people moving again. Alternatively, the pace may slow down if the trainer sees that the participants aren’t following what the trainer is trying to do or trying to say. So that’s what I think makes an effective training.
What makes the trainer effective? I mean you yourself have worked with many trainers and you have also trained yourself, haven’t you?
Well the most obvious answer would be that the trainer is the subject matter expert. She is an expert in her field and has real experience … but that isn’t enough. I’m going to give you a trivial example but I think everyone can relate to it. It’s about my daughter. She’s in high school right now and her math teacher is brilliant. He has a very brilliant mind … but he is not a pedagogue, so he is a teacher by definition but he is not a teacher through experience, and he is not patient with them. He knows his stuff, and is really smart, but he doesn’t know how to convey the salient points to my daughter or his class. When I think back to the many companies I have worked in, I have also seen similar experiences with internal training sessions ran in various topics. It could be IT related, quality management, HR or technical skills. Being a subject matter expert is the start but not the end.
Being an expert is not enough; you also need to be an expert in pedagogy, you need to be patient and you need to be attentive to the participants and allow them to ask questions. You need also to be able to shut down any conversation that strays from the topic because it can become difficult and you can waste time and not reach your training goals. This is not good because as we know training has an agenda and you need to stay on track.
Somehow a trainer also needs to be very confident and have some leadership behaviors, because she’s the leader of the group for the time of the training. Finally, I think an effective trainer has to have those storytelling skills where you put theory and experience into a nice little story that illustrates the point. And is easy to understand and remember
So, what I’m saying is an effective trainer is somebody who
Train-the-trainer courses can really help for both new and confident trainers … but it is my opinion that nothing really beats experience. So that’s what I think makes a trainer a good trainer.
Who is the secret L&D manager?
The “secret L&D manager” is actually a group of L&D managers. They are real people who would prefer not to mention their name or company – but do want to write anonymously so they can openly and directly share their ideas and experience with their peers.
You can meet more of our secret L&D managers here …