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Panning for Gold: Making Training Relevant
Road Warriors become good at many things: They know which security line at the airport moves the fastest.
They know which hotel chains have the best beds.
They know which airports to avoid when faced with tight connections.
However, Road Warrior trainers must be very good at one specific thing: making training relevant. Without relevance, there’s little to no value. And what’s relevant to one audience is completely different than what’s relevant to another.
On one recent Tuesday, I was working with a CEO and executive team of a Fortune 100 company in the energy industry. Two days later, I was training factory workers who make dog food. Two very different groups. Yet, while the groups were different, the strategies to make training relevant were similar.
So what can you do to ensure the relevance of your training? Here are three simple strategies I use:
Strategy #1: Meet them where they’re at
This starts by doing your homework.
What is your client’s desired outcome? What is the agenda of the people that will be in the room with you? You’ve got to step into their shoes and walk around for awhile. If you’ve never worked with a group similar to this, ask your client contact if you can set up a meeting (live or on the phone) with a small sample of individuals with whom you’ll be working.
Strategy #2: Ask lots of open ended questions
When you do your discovery, you need to find out what makes your audience tick. Go broad with your questions. Even if this is the 100th time you’ve worked with a group like this, listen like it’s the first time. Pay attention to the responses. If you feel like you’re not getting down to the nitty-gritty reality, ask to speak to someone else—maybe someone you’ll be working with. Then apply Strategy #1.
Strategy #3: Read the room and respond accordingly
On the day of the session, pay attention to the responses you get. All of your prep and game plan was important, but the map’s not the territory. You’ve got to flex in the moment. Check in with participants on breaks---how’s it working for them? There’s no point in waiting until the end to find out: by then it is too late.
What makes valuable, relevant training is context, not content. Yes, your content needs to be solid. But without proper context, it means nothing. Get the context right and you’ll have struck gold. Then, you may receive the biggest compliment ever. After the training’s all done, a participant will walk up to you and say, “What department do you work for? I’ve never seen you here.”
They’ll think you’re one of them.
When that happens, you’ve hit relevance pay dirt.
