Reaching Your Potential – Making Training Work

Most training specialists recognise that standalone training is only part of the solution. But while many may be geared up to running excellent training courses, following through poses a much bigger challenge. As a result, we hear a lot of good words, but see little impact. ‘Gain commitment from the top'. ‘Align training with other initiatives'. ‘Follow-up with coaching'. All these statements are bang on track, yet, in our experience, none (on their own) seem to make much difference. Why is this?

Fundamentally, improving performance is not just about building skills, but about changing specific behaviours, day in day out (this has been our mantra for nearly twenty years). Training is only the beginning.

Recognise any of these…?

• Personnel perceive changing their behaviour as a risk.
• Training is often insufficiently tailored to be truly relevant and overcome that risk.
• New skills are rarely applied straight away. As a result, they've faded by the time they are applied so success is unlikely, which in turn makes another attempt very unlikely.
• New approaches are rarely built into everyday tools and processes, whether they be recruitment, business reviews, or performance appraisals.
• There is often a lack of genuine ongoing coaching, reinforcement and support.
• Business leaders rarely continue to ask the right questions or measure whether behaviours are changing.

So, what to do…?

As with most change management problems, there is no panacea that will improve the effectiveness of training; the solution has many elements, and the follow-up process is one that deserves to be treated seriously and executed with rigour (another Amplia favourite!). Just think, what would be the impact on your business if every customer-facing employee was 10% more effective?

Despite the value in finding a solution (to what can often be a complex problem), let's try and keep things simple. Based on Amplia's extensive experience of improving sales effectiveness, here is our list of:

Top 10 Things to Make Training Work

10. Consider developing a training strategy and implementation plan to be change management. It really can be transformational.

9.  Start from the top to design the roll-out process, and gain commitment to the leaders' roles.

8.  Design new processes, tools and training that are integrated into other everyday tools and processes (e.g., business reviews, account planning meetings, performance reviews).

7.  Don't overwhelm people. Focus the training on key skill gaps.

6.  Keep the training relevant by tailoring it to different groups, whilst creating a common language across the organisation.

5.  Quantify the impact of applying the new processes and behaviours; publicise and celebrate successes.

4.  Bring managers into the fold early and give them the role of coach. Then coach them on how well they are coaching.

3.  Get people to apply new skills and use new tools during the training and immediately after. Follow-up to see that they do.

2.  Create pull through by having sales personnel report achievements and share best practice to senior teams after a period of about 3 to 6 months.

And, most importantly,

1.  Measure results. Make this as formal as a business impact study, or as informal as asking the right questions on a regular basis (using the right language, of course). If you don't follow-up by measuring results, there won't be any.

As with any change process, you should expect to see a gradual take-up of new processes, behaviours and skills. There will always be early adopters and there will always be people who will never adapt. The challenge is to reach the mainstream as quickly and effectively as possible.

The good news is that getting it right can have a significant impact. Amplia's clients have reaped the benefits long after initial training implementation (when coaching is embedded as a way of life and our Top 10 tips are followed).