Most people don’t look forward to attending training classes. Why? Because they are often facilitated by boring trainers. What many trainers fail to realize is that facilitating an interesting training session that is also memorable and lively takes lots of planning, practice, and preparation.
Whether you are training a large group or one person, you know your training session is lackluster when participants:
- Uncontrollably yawn throughout your entire presentation. No matter how much they try, they have a hard time staying awake and energized during your presentation.
- Keep looking at their watch. To them it seems like time is standing still, and no matter how much they try to keep track of time, your presentation feels to them like an eternity.
- Start sidebar conversations during your presentation. Your topic is so uninteresting that they don’t hesitate to start a mini-conversation with the person sitting next to them, maybe even adding a joke or two about you.
- Read through the entire training manual before you are finished. You belabor one point to the extent that they go ahead and just read the rest of the manual. While you are still focused on page 3, they have read all the way to page 15 just to make the time go by quicker.
- Go to the bathroom and never come back. Once they get out of the training room, they feel a sigh of relief and feel sick at the thought of having to go back in and continue listening to you talk.
- Doodle on your training materials. They feel that drawing is a way of escaping from your annoying, monotone voice and endless series of confusing information.
- Have a blank stare, especially when you ask them a question. They have been daydreaming of being in on some topical island throughout most of your presentation, and have no idea that you have called on them to answer a question.
My best advice for overcoming boring training presentations is to know your topic inside and out; create visual aids and handouts that are colorful, informative, and lively; animate your tone of voice so it is interesting and not monotone; don’t just stand in one section of the room, but walk around; add humor; and most of all get the audience involved by asking open-ended questions.
You left of one important way to avoid boring training -- hire Theo!
ReplyDeleteManagers often overlook that the most expensive part of any training session are the BIS (butts in seats). Not only should the manager count the hourly cost of the attendees, but the cost of the work not getting done while they in in class. A boring training session is not a good investment, even if the presentor charges nothing, because people learn little.
Usually the cost of the BIS is much higher than the additional fee a qualified facilitator or trainer will charge.
Having seen you present on several occasions, Theo, I know that these instances of negative feedback have never happened to you. Once at the Ritz-Carlton Dearborn I saw you energize an after-lunch audience for two hours. . .and we wanted to hear more! There's no such thing as dull topics, just dull speakers. Thanks for serving as a grand role model for all speakers/seminar leaders.
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