What are we missing when it comes to training? Well, outside of my opinion that a number of trainings haven’t been well thought out and are executed poorly, the issue is about embedment. So, the training happens on Monday and by Tuesday we are back to what we have always done. Whatever change the training was trying to get you to make didn’t take. Some of the blame is on the content and execution of the training, yes. But, some of the blame is because we don’t embed the insights of the training into our daily work. This part is critical. For the training to have an effect, we have to take the content, harvest the insights, and then connect those insights to our existing way of doing things. Not easy. Leaders can help, though. They can help by guiding what happens after the training. Apply a bit of pressure to help your team member summarize the content, find the insights, and then figure out where to apply the insights. The reason? It will help your team member improve and it will increase the training’s ROI.
With your teams, don’t get out of the way, do this instead
"Get out of the way!" I often hear some version of this sentiment when talking about building a culture to incentivize high performance teams. "You have to find the right people, equip them, and then get out of the way." People who talk about getting out of the way...