Importance of training the trainer

I have been busy with recruitments recently. We are expanding our trainer force and ensuring that we have trainers in every major city of the country. I have spoken to quite a few trainers and my major take back from all the discussions, interviews and demonstrations that I have had is this. Every trainer needs to go through a train the trainer training.

You must be wondering why I am saying that?

What does a train the trainer training have that it can make such a difference?

Well it has various components that are extremely important. We are different individuals with different skills. Some people excel in their knowledge, some are great at presenting skill, while others are amazing at creating awareness. However for a good trainer, a mix of all the three is very important.

In the past few days I have met and spoken to people who are masters in each of these areas. Some were very knowledgeable, however were unable to transfer their knowledge to the trainees. They ‘knew what to speak’ but fumbled when it came to the ‘how to speak’ part. They had amazing presentations with amazing content, but were unable to create the connect with the participants that would have helped them in transferring the knowledge to the participants.

On the other hand, their were others who were great orators. They had fantastic energy levels and were so full of life. They knew exactly how to keep their audience engaged and on their toes! However when asked deeper questions they were at a loss. They could just parrot what they had read in books and were clearly just training! They were unable to add life experiences which would have made a huge difference.

And there was a third category. They were more of facilitators. They had amazing observation powers and could create awareness from the most subtle things. Things that we would never be able to catch in ourselves. However, when it came to delivering the theory part of the training, they were at a loss. They just looked uncomfortable and would lose the audience completely!

So what is taught in a train the trainer training that’s so special?

All the three aspects.

1.       Knowledge – A lot of focus is placed on the content. You have to have content which is interesting, relevant to the audience, yet crisp. No matter how good yourcontent is, if it doesn’t make sense to the audience and you keep rambling with it over the designated time,  you are certain to lose your audience

2.       Delivery – This is a skill that needs a lot of practice. Train the trainer trainings give you a lot of awareness about how you are currently delivering and how you should be delivering to keep your audiences hooked. They also teach you various methods for teaching the content through which you can engage your audience. Apart from this, they also cover aspects of how to handle your audience, right from helping the quieter one’s to open up to keeping the louder ones in control!

3.       Facilitation – Good train the trainer trainings have now started focussing on this aspect too. They take participants through a number of activities and help them debrief the same. Debriefing is one of the most important aspects of a training. And when done using facilitation, creates the best learning experience for participants. It helps them get aware of what they are doing and come up with what they can do to change those ‘not so great things’ that may come to the forefront

So have you attended a train the trainer training and allowed it to unleash the facilitative trainer in you?