What Does Good Training Look Like?

Ask a dozen people and you're likely to get a dozen different answers. In part, that's because good training does come in a variety of shapes and sizes. It's also because plenty of misconceptions exist that get in the way.

No matter the size of your business, if you want your employees to perform at their best you'll need to ensure that they are well trained for their jobs. The fundamental guidelines in this article will help you pick the best and most effective training opportunities for your employees.

Good training meets two criteria. First, it is based on known principles of adult learning. This would seem to be a no-brainer but I can assure you that there is far too much "training" happening that ignores some of the most important elements of learning. In addition, training must be a good fit for the business to be truly valuable. This means that it is financially and logistically well suited for a given business. If your business employs 20,000 people across the country it might make sense for you to send a promising individual to an MBA program. However, if you only have four managers in your entire operation, such an effort would be far out of scale.

Characteristics of Good Training

WIIFM? (What's In It For Me?) More than anything else, it's important that training recognize that adults learn best when they want to learn. On the job, this is most likely to be the case when your employees can see upfront what's in it for them, how they will benefit from the learning. Unless there is some other factor (such as having to complete the training at their own expense and/or time) in the way, once your employees see that the training is relevant to their job and will bring rewards from their work, they will be motivated to participate. In other words, before committing to being trained, everyone wants to know What's In It For Me?

• Realistic Training should be as much like the real work experience as possible. We've all heard the line that you can't learn to swim on dry land. As much as possible, training should include practice that is like the real job. This means using real equipment or practicing new sales techniques with real people. While you want training to be a low-risk activity - that is, there is little risk of damage from making a mistake while learning - it's important to have enough realism in the learning that people can easily transfer what they have learned to the job.
  
• Effective It must be set up to allow for maximum learning and retention. This means that each lesson includes three stages: content delivery, processing (where the learner absorbs and practices what is being learned), and demonstration (where the learner proves mastery of the lesson). All three stages are essential and none can be left out or the learning will be partial and temporary.
  
• Value The cost must be suitable for the situation. This is a matter of judgment, of course. While it's important to keep your training expenses in proportion to the size of your business, it's also worth remembering that the cost of a training session is not a reliable measure of its worth. Examining how well a training program meets the first three characteristics in this list will help you determine if any training program is worth the investment.
  
• Logistics The delivery method must be suitable for the situation. Again, this is usually a matter of judgment. What I tell my clients is that there's more than one way to learn almost anything. It's hardly suitable to set up a classroom session for one or two employees when a self-study training option might be available. At the same time, it might be more efficient than classroom training to have several employees complete a self-study program at the same time and meet occasionally to compare notes and help each other out.
  
• Continuous All training must include ongoing support and reinforcement. To make sure that training sticks, continually reinforce it on the job. How do you do this? The best way is to make sure that you are also familiar with the lessons in the training so you can see if your employees are using the new skills they have learned on the job. If you can't do this, a manager or team lead can have this responsibility. What matters is that someone pays attention and monitors the use of the new skills so that appropriate feedback and reinforcement can be provided long after the training is over. This is how new skills become valuable habits.

Whether you're setting up to train a new hire in the essentials of a job or looking for the best way for your senior employees to stay current in their fields, these guidelines will help you make the right training choices.

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