I’ll be honest, it took some time to get back into the routine of onsite training. How many months had it been, anyway? (Don’t answer that.) Below are an odd lot of 10 practices that helped me get back to it:
💾 Send out a link to the exercise files ahead of time. Best case, everyone comes to the session having them downloaded. Worst case, they at least feel like they should have 😉. Locating and sharing download files is always such a chore at the beginning and without clear instructions can really set things off on poor footing.
🗺️ Know the lay of the land before you show up to the site. Ask for a picture of it. Find out whether it’s got a whiteboard, the dimensions of the screen, the room, etc. Don’t be afraid to sound manic. It’s your job.
🔗 URL shorteners rock (Bitly, TinyURL, etc)! Throw anything you want the learners to browse to (exercise file, resources, reviews, etc) into a link shortener. These are so much easier to type, paste and so forth than a full-length link. It also adds a nice touch if the URL is personalized to the organization.
🚫☕ Ditch coffee: I think most of us know not to have it while we’re teaching, but I’ll take it a step further: consider not having coffee for the duration of the trip. Staying hydrated is maybe the single best thing you can do for yourself when traveling and too much caffeine does not support that cause.
💭 Label and name *everything*: Your audience doesn’t know what files go to what slides or topics. They might not even know *your* name. So apply slide footers and page numbers liberally. Hack, label and name *yourself* with a nametag.
🎁 Schedule times in the workshops for prizes and giveaways. Everyone lives free stuff. These can make great incentives to keep people motivated. Make it clear and fair what prizes are given, when.
🚫⚔ Do NOT call them drills! I’m a big fan of hands-on workshops, but you want to be careful of what you call being “hands-on.” I’ve found that “drills” evoke militant fear among many learners; way too harsh! Something like “exercise” or “activity” is much more approachable.
🚫⏺️ Do NOT record the session on your own computer. A lot of places will want to have the workshop recorded, and that’s fine if you agreed to it. But make it clear that you cannot record from your own computer. With the projector hookup, files running and everything else this can really bog down your computer and the whole class with it.
📝 Ask for reviews. Take a few minutes to solicit them as part of the session toward the end. You don’t want to compel learners to do so, but make it clear how helpful they really are perhaps with a small gift (I’m talking a pen, not a steak dinner.).
⌚ Keep clear break times. By that I mean, provide enough of them and make it clear when they are, and how long. There’s nothing worse than when no one can remember when break is actually over, and you oddly waiting to decide when to start back up.
Thank you for reading. I hope you can benefit from these tips for your own training sessions! What others have helped you get back into the groove? Comment away.
If you’d like to partner on developing your org’s analytics talent through workshops and other programs, drop me a line.
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