Issue link: http://psai.uberflip.com/i/980009
W EEKLY EDITION MAY 9, 2018 Effectively Training Your Team …continued By Karleen Kos, PSAI Executive Director • Ensure what you are teaching is immediately applicable. This may seem like a no - brainer, but you'd be surprised at how often it seems to make sense to train on something the employee won't use right away. Notice that Dale's Cone shows how much – and how little - information is retained after two weeks. What is retained degrades even further over longer periods of time. So do what you can to plan your training "just in time." Rather than take new employees through a checklist of things, some of which they won't use for a while, create a calendar that has you dem onstrating how to do things when employees actually need to apply them. Mix brine a few days before the weather turns in the fall. Build in some extra time to train on how to secure a trailer for transport the day before you need to do that. • Build process es that draw out learners' existing knowledge base. People appreciate being recognized for what they already know. Have employees show you how they have done things in the past, and then show them how to improve on it while correcting anything that wasn't right. • Keep it interesting and choose activity over lecture. Obviously not all topics lend themselves to experiential learning. You wouldn't want everyone to go out and contract Hepatitis or faint from heat stroke so that you can train on how to manage t hese health and safety issues. When you have to use a meeting or classroom setting, integrate multiple interactive methods including group learning and discussion, video, case studies, brainstorming, quizzes, independent role plays, and so on. People are m uch more likely to remember what they learned this way than from a lecture. Regardless of which techniques above you use, there are a few things that will further increase the likelihood your team members will retain and use what you teach them to do. • C reate opportunities for learners to experiment. For example, when you are training on how to secure with double straps, let them try multiple ways to do it and give feedback on which ones are acceptable or better versus the ones that are not okay. • Allow su fficient time to debrief activities. We all know time is money, but don't be in such a hurry to get them on the road that you fail to talk through any questions and review what worked and didn't. Debriefing should be the final glue in making what they have learned stick in their minds. • Provide specific feedback to trainees. This is not the same thing as being "picky." It is letting people know specifically what they did right and what still needs work. Good feedback reinforces both positive actions and corr ects those that aren't acceptable. Which of these training techniques are you currently using in your company? Are you performing them as well as possible? How will you do things differently now? Tell us at info@psai.org . We love to learn how our Members succeed. P AGE 3