The last training session with a client was completed this morning and I am glad it is over. It was the fifth session of the same content and it makes me feel weird to deliver it as I have to essentially not only run through the same stuff, I also end up telling similar lame jokes. While not an issue most of the time, there was several client-side support agents there, with one woman being present for all five of the sessions.
It is kind of like going on a lame date with someone, and then having to repeat the lame date "Groundhog Day" style, without the improvements. Although, it did improve along the way, as I was able to learn more about the customer solution and answer questions that I couldn't in the first sessions. This made the rhythm much better the further along we went. I also make sure that I get into the sessions 15 minutes early and urge the client support team to get there too "just in case we need to discuss something or there are technical hiccups" - but in actual fact, during this period we don't plan, we chat.
Building rapport with key clients is an important part of my approach as it creates a relationship that we both can benefit from and allows us to lean on each other. It also means that during the sessions, I have advocates willing to pick up the slack, for example in remote sessions, they will proactively monitor and answer the chat feed, where participants will ask their questions. There are between 30 and 50 participants, so having everyone use their mic is not a viable option and breaks the flow heavily.
While delivering remotely, one of the tricks is not to over-deliver, not to try and cram too much into a session and if possible, leave a fair amount out. Due to the medium, too much information pouring into the delivery will leave people feeling lost as they not only have to watch and follow, they have to learn.Some people think that it is "value-adding" to include more, but in general -it is just messy.
I think that some try and make it kind of like a "sit-back-and-watch" deal, kind of like watching a show, but the intended outcome is actually quite different. A show or movie is designed to entertain with a great deal of information fed through audio and visuals - but the retention of the information is not necessary. When people walk out of the cinema, what they actually remember is far less than what was included.
If you have ever needed to build something relatively technical from a DIY YouTube video, you will probably find that you will have to stop and start, rewind and review what you have seen, you will need to focus your attention on steps. When it comes to complicated aspects, you will pause and perhaps do what the step between, before moving on. This is not possible in a webinar with 50 people, so the delivery has to be engineered to give space for points to soak in and be repetitive on key points that the audience is getting a similar experience as if they have the playback controls themselves.
The funny thing that I have noticed is that while this bores many people, they do actually learn and if I have gone at a faster pace that is more "movie-like", not only don't they learn much, they also do not rate the movie very well. You know, like people who couldn't follow a plot like from Inception -hated it. People hate what they don't understand, which as a technical trainer in a software company on a SaaS business model, wouldn't be great for business.
My goal in the feedback is for people to say that the content was "too easy" as I will then know that I delivered well, as i know what I deliver each time and what needs to be covered. If it is too easy, it means that they learned it well enough and the ability recall will be higher. When people find the content too challenging, I know I screwed up - but this doesn't happen very often in my work deliveries and when it does, it is because I didn't know the content I was going to deliver well enough - I couldn't explain it simply enough.
I like the webinar delivery and I am generally pretty good at it because I do not try to show what I know about the product, I focus on what they need to learn. However, what I do include is tips and tricks - little user aids that make their life easier and make them feel like they are getting information others are not. In this case, they were.
Across the five sessions, I included ten points that I wanted them to know, with each group getting a different two. There were two reasons for this. Firstly, the sessions were recorded and the plan was to make "key point clips", so all ten are likely to be included. The second was that the groups were rather random, they could pick and choose which sessions they came to. This means that the teams that usually work together were likely distributed across the five deliveries and when they are in the office or supporting each other, the chances that they will be able to teach each other the tips and feel good about knowing a little more, is high.
If you want to learn something well, attempt to teach it to others as soon as possible. When all people hold a little bit of different additional information, each can add value at various times without feeling silly when they themselves don't know. Also, because people have different bits of information, finding the information to troubleshoot challenges is much easier, as even if one doesn't know when asked how to do something, the recall of similar and the vocabulary can help lead to finding the answer.
There is an art to effective training deliveries (especially webinars) and for the most part - people don't actually think that much about how they deliver, or perhaps more importantly, why they are delivering a certain way. But, I guess that is the same for most skillsets, as people act on habit and pretty much everyone think that they are above average at what they are getting paid to do. This is where the personal feedback comes into play - pay attention, consider it and make changes if necessary - but don't identify with it and don't change for the minority, if the majority enjoy what you do.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
