[Martin:] Okay
[speaker002:] [cough]
[Martin:] questioning technique. Er... okay it's a little bit about questions we should ask so in summary then what sort of questions should we ask the group? Okay... What type of questions?... Just testing you.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Remember? Over questions?... Which one shall we avoid then?
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] If we should use... what sort of to vary the style of questioning? If you ask a question to the group who's intending who can tend to ask for it?... You just throw out a question.... Well let's see er what did you do last night?
[speaker002:] No one answers
[Martin:] Either no one answers or, or what?
[speaker002:] The person you're looking at.
[Martin:] The person you're looking at. So don't forget you can use by, it doesn't work with you lot, but it
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] You know I save a lot of time preparing that one okay.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Now what d'ya think the answer to that is? And this husky voice from the other side
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] which is another thing you have to look out for in training if you're asking. There's one or two things that are naturally more forthcoming aren't there? Yeah? The more readily answered questions, nothing wrong with it, it's great... but again er you fall into patterns don't you I'm sure you on training courses... we know that er one or two people are content to have the answer, so what will the rest of us do? There's nothing wrong, you know, but again it seems the nomination of people. Okay so ah the next question the remarks anyone looking across at him we put a bit of pressure on them and they take interest. So nomination of the person.... Post is the way of nomination and also... direct nomination.... [cough] A little tip for you I mean one of the things I do when I'm writing a training manual or something like that, I will actually write my open questions in really bold letters on the script. You know I, I, I mean I haven't written this one and it makes it quite difficult for me to see some of the questions, but I actually write I think that's the most important thing in training is asking questions er and I'll perhaps bring down some examples to show you. Exactly the easy things to forget about especially when time's against you... if you get to answer questions don't ask the questions, what's gonna happen? Don't understand. Don't be frightened of asking testing questions. Don't be frightened of what else? Performance of silence, give them a chance. What's the other side of questions, we talked very briefly about questions... to the group, what's the other thing we should be looking at? Yeah. The swine's asked you questions now.... What should you do with questions from the group? You genius, you should be here.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Why do that?
[speaker002:] It's another way of
[Martin:] Right. Yeah? Or d or else, what else? because again as adults we realize that if every we ask a question to the trainer you're asking questions to him and they keep answering them, what does it mean we can do as trainees? Switch off? sitting there with a row of people. What would happen then if that happened? you know fifteen minute monologue. We all knew the answer,. So good idea for questions from the group reflective at the group. So ask me a question.... how to train
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER] How could you use a
[Martin:] Mm
[speaker002:] I dunno.
[Martin:] How often do you think we should use training session? needs. Yeah. What would you use it on?
[speaker002:] It depends on the situation
[Martin:] Probably you're right yeah, I suspect. What would you do? It's all about technical stuff I mean a lot of you do technical training. Erm... you know people know the answers questions or they've got an idea material of your own experience you know a lot more than they do, but it's good technique to throw it back to the group. Alright when you get a question. Very useful technique for handling er people are trying to catch you out. You get you do that to people yourself training the easiest way to do it is group and if they don't know the answer you don't look such a pratt do you?
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Behind you... it is something that people don't know you don't know. I think you're honest it's the people respect you more if you say I'm sorry, I don't know the answer, I'll find out for you... and then you say tell you what John, can you write that up on that issues form pad or you know another bit of flipchart paper, we'll come back to that. Yeah? What you gotta do though? At some stage or other.
[speaker002:] another group.
[Martin:] The group, yeah, alright? Okay. Now I suspect that when you do your role in place... there won't be many questions for the group... alright? You'll be sitting there saying to me. [LAUGHTER] Er certainly not today anyway, but tomorrow you might find that erm
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] We'll ask you questions... purely because you know that you know yeah you know it's good to see how you get on with it etcetera yeah.
[speaker002:] Do you... tell people when you questions like
[Martin:] Well what do you think we should do
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] What? I know that.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Another use you see of defective deflecting the question. I'm sorry that was very unfair. Do you forgive me? Yes. Good question. Well what do the others think, I mean yeah it's a sort of when should you let trainees answer your questions?
[speaker002:] It depends on the question right to the end relevant as you go along. [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] I know it's early in the morning still.... Like Wonderwoman now in her get up.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Don't worry that bridge has fallen down. Okay, erm it depends on the session. Think about training though, if somebody's got a question to ask... what will about sort of something very early on... and they don't get the opportunity to answer you what might happen Yeah. Does that make sense? So really it would be I suspect the answer to your question you don't want to keep saying any questions but perhaps what's the answer. questions.... What. That's right. So where might you say... Okay look er what I'd like to do is... ask questions. If you've got a question, shout, shout out... to start you on and that start up encourages cos it so often happens yeah bop bop bop bop bop and somebody is still basically... looking for their rucksack while all the rest are up the, half way up the mountain.
[speaker002:] danger of sort of like if you've gotta time like yeah sort of thing somebody else questions ten minutes.
[Martin:] Brilliant.
[speaker002:] Completely lost it haven't you.
[Martin:] Yeah, brilliant, that's a, that's a good technique to take on bribe one of your colleagues to answer the questions
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] at least ten minutes er Totally unrelated, yeah. Now there's another thing questions what I'm saying is that's something to take away with you, or perhaps you won't get the chance er try now er. Certainly you should encourage people to answer questions.... Most people think that they're being stupid if they have to ask a question... they think that everyone else isn't probably thinking the same thing. Chances are they are... I think you owe it to your trainer to let them know.... So building new introductions... ask questions... by definition build in. I would suggest that you build in a few nice easy open questions at the beginning of the session. You know like you might be doing some technical training, they say what's... er... anyone know what motor insurance is?
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Yeah. If you're running a training session on motor insurance, what might be a nice easy question to begin to encourage people to participate?
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Right. okay let's expand that, yeah think about the beginning of the training session where you want to involve them. Are we all drivers here? Or how many of you are drivers?... Two of you.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] [shouting] Hello []!
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] [shouting] Earth calling moon base one to eight []. How many of you are drivers?... Hurrah! What's our next question?
[speaker002:] Have you got motor insurance? [LAUGHTER] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] car. What er what could we ask then? Apart from have you got no, no, no, no, no cos that might under pressure.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Hey? Yeah, well that training session now what sort of cover have you got?...
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] What sort of, what sort of cover have you got? What does that tell you as a trainer?
[speaker002:] [cough] what sort of cover available.
[Martin:] Yeah, so give you some knowledge about the level of your group wouldn't it and what does it give chance to do? Yeah, it gives you something nice and easy to tell you about, cos we've all got we all roughly know what sort of cover we've got. We can build up from there some of the er... some of the er exclusions or something yeah something like that you can develop it from that
[speaker002:] [cough]
[Martin:] yeah? See what I'm saying is ask a nice open question an easy one at the beginning that you know most people are bound to understand you get a lot of participation and then start building it up.... We will develop questioning techniques as we go through your training sessions. I think it's more when we actually see people doing it, but it's all, it's a nice idea to give you a little bit of basic just to think about, and again we won't be expecting this to be demonstrated to the on this afternoon's role page, you done all your preparations for that haven't you. Perhaps tomorrow. So you'd like to take one and pass it on to me Margaret.
[speaker002:] [cough]... [cough]...
[Martin:] So we've looked at asking question visuals... We've got involving trainees which, with which we talking about involving trainees... think about this side of it erm... I suppose this is one of the best ways to show... Training should be chunky... The idea is that... you put in your input yeah you talked around a subject and give you some guidelines, then... we get a chance to practise the participation.... So if you go back to the sort of where we gave it five or six headings yeah... or three to six headings... you should be aiming say well I'll input a bit of... information on that side of it and at the end of that little section I'll build in some practice in participation... and the participation can be any of those ones you've put in there on that list you gave us early on er practical allocations
[speaker002:] [cough]
[Martin:] brainstorming, testing, role playing and you get exercises, whatever. It's simply to test... cos if this side of the graph, if that one there is knowledge this one here is time. If you went from there to there without any practice or participation, since we've already said you might have left half your audience here [cough] and in actual fact so your practice and participation needs to be built in.... You do a little bit of input well I say a little bit, you do some input, practice and participation then build on that, okay? Let's move on to our next section. Bit more practice and participation, input, practice and participation.... We use visuals... give you something to focus on you can see everything's come out no wonder you. Look.
[speaker002:] I can't really...
[Martin:] This is my favourite slide of the whole course.... Some concentration.... What do you reckon the concentration span of most adults is?
[speaker002:] nine
[Martin:] Nine? Much less... [shouting] aha []!... It varies from person to person obviously [LAUGHTER] now know that Laura is talk to her ask a question after nine minutes erm absorbed to knowledge. This is for a straight lecture, you know sometimes people stand up to give you a lecture.... just talk at you... training and they reckon that after ten minutes... look at that tern! So after about thirty five minutes what are you actually taking in? Absolutely zilch. So why do we do lectures? Doesn't make any sense at all does it?... In training though you can still have the same problem erm... you know perhaps towards the end of the session you've probably seen it as and I, I'm guilty of it myself cos we're trying to rap on through it as quickly as possible so we get in ya way by six o'clock or that so we break all the rules late in the day...
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] You sort of
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] And you as well. Right erm... all the rules people are tired etcetera so their rates of and knowledge is probably downhill anyway and then we talk about thirty five minutes just to speed up make sure we train them, we've given them all the input. What happens? You test it out the next morning... isn't it interesting you remembered as proof of the pudding. What did you remember? the training side, it's pretty well the objectives. What about the last we did yesterday actually designers and training, it's quite a, it's quite a struggle that... had a long day, been sitting here for a couple of hours I dunno it seems longer and there you are and you're actually struggling
[speaker002:] [cough]
[Martin:] You got the notes that's part of training as well, you can refer back to that, you struggle. So they reckon that after about ten minutes if people haven't been involved we haven't thrown out a question or something like that people start thinking about other things... and there's been actually a bit of er analytical research on this that shows that people think about three things... after about ten minutes they just switch off. Any ideas what this might mean? Yeah, the environment, yeah.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Could be, very
[speaker002:] they're hungry.
[Martin:] Food, yeah. . That's quite a frightening thought really when I'm up front here.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] I'll leave you with that thought. I should have turned the tape recorder off for that shouldn't I!
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]...
[Martin:] Tell you your mind does wander doesn't it, yeah? I mean mine does, but mine
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] mine does and I'm training, so you know what chance have you got. Alright, so there's a couple of ideas for you, including er getting the participation going, but don't give too much of the verbal. What are the other techniques you do, if you've do a bit of I mean as a sales trainer, I tend to walk around quite a lot... and talks about what? Yeah, but what does it do? What do you do?
[speaker002:] You have to focus
[Martin:] You follow me round don't you, people you know you see them he's gonna ask me a question. Also, that's what that's the training staff we know from experience that our moving targets are. Think about. So another thing we said on our list or your list what you put up here was visuals. Visuals are very important in terms of information recall... I modelled for this a couple of years ago.... What does that tell us? Yeah. They reckon that of the information our senses receive, seventy five percent of it is received visually.... Reading, yeah... you look round at people and then somebody comes rushing in through the door and you've never seen then before, what do you do?... You just weigh up and take so much information in through your eyes don't you, perhaps this person's in a panic or they look angry, yeah, this sort of stuff, do it very, very naturally. Seventy five percent is taken in through the eyes of which we're gonna recall about fifty percent, so fifty percent of that seventy five percent yeah? Through the years though more [LAUGHTER] erm through the years we actually only receive thirty percent of our... input... I suppose one of the examples are and then we only remember twenty percent of that thirteen percent again the danger of you know every remembers this
[speaker002:] [cough]
[Martin:] Well you've seen this before you remember it straight away.... Erm th the, the thing I think about is do you remember the Green Cross Code?... Tufty Club?
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Yeah, things like that. What was, what is the Bre Green Cross Code? No you've gotta be a bit more precise though. Stop, look and listen yeah. Good, good.... So you remember what you're supposed to do. What was, what was the actual little rhyme? Something like that yeah. Can you remember I mean what they sa what the actual steps as it were when the, you know, when the kids stop look and listen when you do your look left again. concentrate yeah and also kids tend to listen. Most accidents happen as kids run out in the road without looking, alright. Because most kids nowadays are brought up with constant noise of traffic and so covering ears doesn't mean anything does it? because they're gonna get the information and absorb much more information none of it, none of any use but... so... don't get much information from. This is a very informative handout. You know that sort of thing you can
[speaker002:] [cough]
[Martin:] Right.... a little bit else about making it interesting... don't worry about yawning in my courses, at least it shows you're still alive. Can you share with Margaret please. Little again we'll develop these as practices more, they're more dynamic to develop when we actually watch and see your role plays. Presentation techniques, a few things here that might help you in terms of making it interesting as it were and the actual delivery of your training your posture, keep your posture erect, but relaxed... I don't really know what that means but er [LAUGHTER] er... stand up. What's the da what would show if you're standing up, what would demonstrate that you're not relaxed? Like this. No I know what you're doing that means you're relaxed when you're actually training. What else then? I
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Right.... Movement. Simply nervous trainers tend to stand in one spot,feeted feet rooted like a tree to the ground. Move around, engaging the groups are more involved. Again it's true though isn't it? People will stand there and they will clutch something, you see their knuckles are white you know and these sort of things erm or they'll have their notes you know here, and let's be honest about it yeah I can remember when I started training I think you know you used to cling to your notes a three feet flipchart, you know what can't you see?
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Can't let go of this.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Anyway, and all this sort of stuff, so it's all about getting yourself prepared and knowing what you're gonna say etcetera etcetera. Does th anyone worry about using notes, it doesn't make you feel as though the trainers know what they're doing does it? If you see the trainers looking at their notes. What might make a difference though in terms of posture?... Okay so erm... I think it's also very important that we look at gestures.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Important gestures cannot be able too often and this restricts communication. We use gestures for emphasise normal conversation about what with our hands. gesture in front of a group exactly as if you were having an animated conversation with a friend nothing more, nothing less. Do you understand that? What would that demonstrate, posture, terrible isn't it? If you're talking about a subject that means gestures what should you be doing? Yes, course you should shouldn't you. So what's, what sort of gestures should we use when we're up front? Don't be rude!
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]...
[Martin:] gestures, big ones, enough to you know you don't want to take off but open gestures, get your hands moving, doesn't matter does it. Er again it's a sort of... you know like that form that format don't worry about it if you do it, it's just that sometimes people will say it's the change of gesture. Get some movement out there we had a young, a young lady who er she name and she's up front in the cabinet you know every opportunity she had she was looking for round the room, but not sort of in the round the outside all the time and it's just that she wanted to be with a group of people all the time. It was great, it was you know so, so when training rooms are set up we used to sit here behind this barrier as it were, there's you, there's me..... So usually use gestures then it's got some things here, it's got some little matchstick men on the next page. the first one.
[speaker002:] [cough]
[Martin:] Keeping your hands in your pockets... What's the danger of your hands in your pockets?
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] I've never heard it described that way before but there you go er
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] You [LAUGHTER] jingle your change, dead right. Er again after you do that very same thing erm you know jingle your change and one of them he said that I reckon you got three pound eighty.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] He reckons he's got six pounds you know and it's just so distracting. Keep your hands out of your pocket handcuffed behind your back... Yeah and what, what, what do we think she means that you know what do you stuffy, yeah?
[speaker002:] Pompous.
[Martin:] Pompous, yeah does that?... Might do because it's not close gestures differ.... What are the others keeping your arm or keeping your arms crossed, or in a fig leaf position. If you would like to demonstrate a fig leaf position. Andy, well stand up
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] demonstrate a fig leaf position.
[Andy:] I don't know... a fig leaf
[Martin:] Cos I've no idea what it looks like
[Andy:] I'm sure it's like this... or is it like that?
[Martin:] No, no no that doesn't look a fig leaf, does that look like a fig leaf position to you?
[speaker002:] Yeah
[Martin:] Yeah it must be, yeah.... Quite interesting really.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] It's just that exaggeration because you know basically. Right or wringing your hands nervously. Eye contact, eye contact.... What's it mean by eye contact? What's good eye contact?
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] It's good though isn't it?
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Eye contact. definitely trying to avoid my eyes now there's a few eyes round here that look more like route maps of the M twenty five!
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Erm,... eye contact if people avoid eye contact what's it mean?
[speaker002:] They lack confidence.
[Martin:] They lack confidence, simple as that and one of the things is that as a group you come in and you probably look at people when you and you look at the trainers and the idea is that early on people can do, can keep some eye contact gonna stare you out but just keeping your eyes and don't flit away and also when you're under pressure at this stage his eyes challenge you or something like that, then your eyes go down. So again it's just thinking about the eyes the eye the beginning. It's says rule of thumb that eye contact is one to three seconds per person...
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Ah that's you look.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Marty Feldman does anyone remember Marty Feldman when one eye went this way and one eye went the other? that you know watching this happen.... Using your voice... your voice... I'm not gonna be too worried about this erm monotone... monotone yeah. I'm not too worried about it because erm... a, a lot of people natural accents, regional accents and that so others come over as quite monotone don't they sort of thing. It's a big problem, it's just that fluctuations you do, if you are aware you've got some. Some trainers go down [whispering] []. What else have we got talking too fast. Now suspect that this is something that most people fall into on their first few training sessions which is all to be about this er er er have you got any questions and most people I was gonna say good morning, but you got a paragraph down now and it's all about slowing down and you can speed up as you go through but it's certainly the opening slowing down. Slow down, slow yourself down in training sessions.... Yeah.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] We had we had a training session for ourselves like you know
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Right erm right what was I saying yeah erm slow down, what's the other way have a drink of water yeah. Breathing, it does help... you know sort of you know morning everyone [sigh]. Big gulps of it much easier.... answer the question nice and easy question slow it down.... Problems with volume on the last page erm I don't that affect most of you erm you won't be, you won't be talking to cavernous places will you? If, if you do any of your training it will tend to be rooms about this size.. So before I talk through some of those, cos I think that some of those er if we just gave you the handout you've gotta read it training group seems to be far more aware of things like your body language. Is that yours?
[speaker002:] Er yeah.
[Martin:] getting fed up Okay just to finish up now, because we're gonna be moving on in a minute. There's a couple of handouts here which I'm not gonna go into, but there again somebody might think about when you're running group training and there's some, there's some I dunno er points with a few heading samples, so I'm gonna take one and pass them on... take one pass them on... which I really no, no and there's one over there So you've got involving trainees we've done... humour we've touched upon, brainstorming we've done before. Testing role plays I've sent you a handout on that... exercises and there's a handout on that.... Practical applications... a thought about practical applications we need to build in practical applications don't we? Actually give people chance to try what we've been talking about. Any thoughts about that? What should we be doing with practical applications?...
[speaker002:] Past experience.
[Martin:] Yeah, past experience to find out the level they're at at the moment. Anything else? Oh no, it's incredible. Again on this very course a while back it was only three people in the group in the week that I was watching and the guy who was running the session had, had worked the equation wrongly on the rating or whatever and the other two, never seen him before in their lives were saying that's wrong and he started getting really annoyed. it was really funny group after it was so funny er
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] with his permission he thought it was funny he saw the funny side of it as well, but they had this big argument for five minutes cos he thought what he'd done was right and he said [whispering] Jesus, I've been using this [] for three years for the training in the branch er it makes you wonder doesn't it erm... but if you're gonna do practical applications you've gotta give people relevant examples... perhaps you start off basics with an example that is correct and then you start building on that don't you... then you start giving them the deviations and all this sort of stuff. Don't deal with deviations first cos they'll never learn... but build in lots of applications... either by questions or by actual exercise.... Last thing just briefing cos this is designing the training session is your notes. What sort of notes... what sort of things are you gonna do... within your running of training sessions for a group training session or it could be one-to-one doesn't really matter. What are the sort of things you need to think about when you're putting in notes together... script or.... Right, that's a good idea... bullet points in large print.... Cos you know all the content don't you? A lot of the training you do you probably only need to write bullet points. What might you write under your bullet point?... It's just the yeah you've got your main point and there might be one two three four things a bit more information, yeah. So that you don't deviate or forget things.... What other things might you do in your notes?
[speaker002:] Think of some questions to ask.
[Martin:] Yeah, that's good, good. So you actually write down questions... so much going on you can't be expected to remember everything and if you've got just you know sort of questions written down the page... like what is your name, it's simple as that... it gets you to do, what? Involves the trainee.... What else might you do? Bullet points, questions. Okay, so... er what have we got there erm... use supports... use of support yeah... material... another thing you might think about is time. Time... Basically that's it, how you do it is up to you, the danger of a, a script of a basic script is what? Right, yeah you're stuck to it aren't you and if you move away from it, where are you, if you gotta go back to it, you might have done this for t for today, don't worry but you know, but it's not, we're not gonna mark you down or anything like that, the danger of is what? It's very and you're gonna just sat down reading it. And some of the other things what about you know erm. Chances are you're not gonna use it or or not use it. You write all this screed down and then you never look at it. I'll give you examples perhaps of... none, none of these I must admit I, I don't, I don't think, they're not my style I much more... my page my training tend to have just two or three points on it... rubber stamps on the side flipchart all this sort of stuff big question. Er it's just a thought to say well if I, if, if this training is so important I will use it over and over again, it makes sense to... save the preparation time four or five months down the line by having a script... and now only you can up with your examples.... I'll just check what samples there is... this would be more of er this one that's coming over now is entirely the session keep it flowing, there's your content and your method of the syndicate O H P, flipchart. So you're restricting yourself. That might be having and again we're not looking for you to do these or follow these patterns for tomorrow, you do whatever you feel comfortable, yeah.... There's a blank page it's okay I might be able to use that er as a structure for more for when you've gotta run training courses at a lot of the time... and sample three is just another side that's erm that one of sample two is landscape goes across the page this is. What? This example. ... I've been filling time wherever I am. Haven't I team?
[speaker002:] Yeah.
[Martin:] What have we been talking about football last night... er just an example of erm some of the scripts that we use down here. You see look here's a script all typed out. You know a lot probably to do this. You see there's not much on the page you know just some bullet points....
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER] That wasn't it What [LAUGHTER]...
[Martin:] They're being rude, they're being really rude.
[speaker002:] Are they?
[Martin:] no chance
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] out of all that stuff there what's the most important things? ... I know if I say that Notes are really important... Alright.... In summary while we're waiting for our to come back, if she is coming back we don't know do we. Designing training we started yesterday [cough] we are... finishing the session now so in your opinion what are the most important things we should do first when designing training? Right measuring, understanding.
[speaker002:] Yeah....
[Martin:] You've thought of another element there which I'm gonna write down, feedback.... When do we want feedback? Stages. So we want stages don't we?... How should we design our training in terms of stages? Come and draw it, come and draw up... and show us.
[speaker002:] Draw it?
[Martin:] Yeah.... Come and show us how you do it... I'll give you a red pen... Do you remember that earlier we said participation...
[speaker002:] The
[Martin:] That'll do for me.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]...
[Martin:] You, oh no, yeah, it's alright yeah alright
[speaker002:] ...
[Martin:] [clapping by ps3kn]
[speaker002:] [clapping by ps3kn] Thank you. [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] Not so bad is it? So input and then what? Participation, participation.... repeat the process... stages. Anything else we should think about... designing training?
[speaker002:] ...
[Martin:] . summary at the end of the session. ... Alright, let's... we've looked at design of training as the first step you know identifying training needs and then design. On the areas that we might like to think about design and also delivering training is the different ways people learn and to do that go through learning styles.
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[Martin:] laugh. much done.
[speaker002:] Do we need that questionnaire cos erm
[speaker004:] Yes
[speaker002:] cos certain members tend
[speaker004:] Oh would you like to go and get your questionnaire those that haven't got them.
[speaker002:] That's me. Well I've got [LAUGHTER]
[speaker004:] Has anyone had an actual break or? Have you scored scored more
[speaker002:] Yeah. Yeah, great.
[speaker004:] Yeah. Have you, have you done it?
[speaker002:] Yeah I've done it, but I didn't bring it.
[speaker004:] Oh right.... You've all got yours questionnaires yet....
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER] ...
[speaker004:] You didn't last time did you? do something this week lunch today... Have you got it?
[speaker002:] I just, I just honest to God I hadn't realized at all the guy was sort of and says er oh it's probably I said no I'm sure I was really cheesed. It was awful he said go and get it it'll be in there and I just went er and I could see it all. [LAUGHTER] A nightmare... and we had to actually ring the emergency number and in an emergency ring this number Yeah she rang it and this bell started going [LAUGHTER] Oh no. ... [LAUGHTER]
[speaker004:] Have you all scored your questionnaires? Yep.... and you've Oh yeah, we've got the analysis we've got the questionnaires... Okay what we're gonna look at now is we gonna look at the work of Honey and Munnford and what Honey and Munnford spent a lot of time researching was people's learning sides... and they spent a lot of research and what they found out is that... there are four different learning sides and we all learn in different ways.... So far Martin's taken you through how to put together a logical and effective training session. What we also need to think about is we learn in one way, but our delegates may actually learn in a slightly different way.... in a minute so what we're gonna have a look at is we're gonna have a look your identified preferred learning side and the questionnaire will actually help you do that.... I'll tell you what Honey and Munnford actually found and what their findings were, we'll also think about some more practical applications that if people learn in different ways, what impact does this have on the trainers.... It does have some impact... I'm sure that you've been the training session and you thought it's really good, really got a lot out of it and you're quite surprised to see someone sitting next to you didn't like that much at all, you thought... hmm wonder why that is because I found the content really interesting and it could have been the content matter didn't really sort of do anything for the people, it could have been the way it was put together, put over and the way it was actually structured. I'm sure you've also experienced sessions you thought something somebody's delivered in one session and found it really interesting you've got a lot from it, and yet somebody else comes into the same subject matter and you think that you know... wasn't very interesting didn't, you know, didn't, I didn't really wanting to learn. The key reasons before that is that they've actually put the across in the way that's not totally compatible with learning side. What I'd like to do to start with is I'd like to actually put the scores up, put your scores up on the charts and then we'll look at what, what exactly they mean, what does A stand for but what does it all mean. So if you put the scores up first then we'll do some, have some discussion about what they mean. So Margaret if we start with you.
[Margaret:] Eight fourteen six six.
[speaker004:] Eight fourteen six six. Thank you. Mark?
[Mark:] Fifteen sixteen nine sixteen.
[speaker004:] Okay, John?
[John:] Twelve [clears throat] sixteen thirteen seventeen
[speaker004:] Andy?
[Andy:] Five sixteen thirteen thirteen.
[speaker004:] Marie?
[Marie:] Nine fifteen twelve thirteen.
[speaker004:] Nora?
[Nora:] Five fourteen nine twelve.
[speaker002:] Sixteen two three
[speaker004:] Two three and nine?
[speaker002:] Yeah Two nineteen ten and thirteen
[speaker004:] We've got quite a variety here haven't we?... Right what I'll do now is I'll introduce what means and then we'll go back and... think abut the impact that they have on training. So, and I've got a handout on this. If we go to the first style of A this is an activist and some of you have got high scores here we've got sixteen fifteen and twelve these are, these are hard activist. What Honey and Munnford found is that people learn in basically four ways, the first of which is... is the activist. Now what they're saying is that, what they said is activist action learn best... when they get the opportunity to experience new sort of... problems, situations, opportunities when they're doing something quite new... when they're sort of involved in very much you know here and now activities when they're sort of like business games, exercises, role plays, team tasks that they can sort of get you know really get involved with themselves then there's lots of action and they're quite short and sharp, so can move on to something else.... Activists also like being thrown in the deep end... they quite like the challenge of being thrown in and sink or swim and learn from the experience, rather than actually talking about too much and then a little bit of action later.... Activists like things which involve other people as well so they like team work, they like team activities, they like discussion groups... they enjoy the sort of bouncing ideas off other people. Activists also like... they love the opportunity in training to have a go... but they do like getting involved, they like a action. They also like this sort of excitement and you know when things chop and change and there's sort of erm almost like a crisis situation and lots of excitement, lots of activity, activists actually thrive on that, they like that sort of challenge... that stimulates their learning.... They also like things which are quite so if the activity involving chairing a meeting, doing a role play, doing a presentation... although they may be nervous they actually enjoy that, they find they gain a lot from that... and they also like activities where to an extent there's a freedom from constraints, policy... structures, they don't like to feel bound... because if you think about it a lot of are actually exploring... deep end situations trying new things out, they don't like to feel that constrained. So that's the activist. A couple of you have got high marks John and you've got high activist, you're higher than the others, how do you feel about that?
[speaker002:] Yeah it's pretty
[speaker004:] Yeah.
[speaker002:] I'm not so sure about liking the presentations though. [LAUGHTER]
[speaker004:] Oh. Well like you say you feel nervous about it at first but once you do it, you've got. So there are th that side of learning there are people who like to have a go who want action. You quite like erm learning from, from experience. When I was working at British Airways we used to do a lot of technical training and erm it was sort of on er airline regulation, stuff like that and you could always tell the activists cos they didn't really want to all they wanted to do was to get on the computers and actually trying out things out themselves, they piece of furniture the activists don't want to read the instructions, they want to start putting it together and then they'd learn from actually putting it together rather than them reading the instructions and regulation training you could always tell the activist cos they sort of always like chopping every bit, they just want to... they just want to get on the computers and start inputting numbers and they'll actually learn, they, they prefer to do that and then somebody can come round and help them out when they get into trouble rather than some of the other which perhaps like to more up front and that's the activist.... Now we move on to the reflector and... Irene in particular has got a very high a lot of the others.... Quite high. So what's the reflector all about? Well as a the reflector is... they actually learn from situations where they get the opportunity to sit back to watch to think about what's being said so they digest in information for themselves.... situation they sort of they sit back they think about and assimilate it. They also like activities as well reflectors, where they can stand back and watch and listen to others as well and sometimes within a group activity they actually like to pull back and listen to what others are saying. It doesn't mean to say they don't like participating, but they'd like to you know see what the group view is before they put in their own views so they're analyzing, thinking. A lot of people with high reflector scores like to think before they act. They assimilate, they analyze, they consider and then they make a decision or act on things. It's similarly with similar to the situation for training... while the activist would like to get straight into a role of play, the reflector wants to stand back think about it, think about how they're going to, what they're going to do etcetera before they actually participate or get involved. Activists actually enjoy activities within training while they can carry out some research where they can analyze and investigate situations. The things like a case study where you have to gather lots of information and analyze it, I mean that's just what the reflectors like, cos they want to feel that there's you know they th... working is not just it's actually working on some fact. They also enjoy reviewing experiences so when you've done a role play, the reflector will actually get a lot out of doing feedback, standing back and analyzing what did I do... well, what did I do less well and they actually learn a lot from that as well the role play. They love things which involve producing reports analysis... reflectors also like... exchanging views with others, they like to think, analyze, formulate an opinion and then have the opportunity to discuss with others. Reflectors like reaching decisions in their own time... and on training courses they actually like to feel that they consider the situation... and they don't want feel sort of too rushed... before they act. What I'd like say with these guys there's no right or wrong style, there's no good or bad, we're all different erm... and we f we're all a combination of each as well. Reflector Irene, you've got the highest there... what are your views on that?
[Martin:] And you can always tell reflectors in training, cos sometimes you'll think what's happening, nobody else wants participation, reflectors will actually stand back and think well what did they ask for, what do I talk about then and it's always like a delayed response you get a lot of reflectors and we had one course once and we had all high reflector scores and that actually told us a lot about participation cos people weren't disguising any they were thinking about it coming in had time to consider an opinion... so that's a reflector. The next one is the theorist and the highest that we've got here are John and Andy and thirteen.... Marie, you, you're popular on highest scores on reflector as well that I mean you what did you think about that?
[Marie:] ...
[speaker004:] The er reflector and the activist actually. So the theorist... so the theorists actually best from activities where something can actually give them a system, a model or a theory or a concept so we've got Andy and John and it was quite interesting Andy when you were saying well whose work is this because you not really behind so you, you actually scored thirteen on that one. If you can sort of say well... that has been proven, this is the research, this is the system, this is the model, theorists actually enjoy that because they think well this isn't just somebody's gut reaction, this is something that somebody spends a long time actually thinking about it considering.... They actually like well argued a sort of elegant prototype concept... so if you're gonna present a model theory, they like it sort of well thought through, rather than a half-baked... airy-fairy model.... Theorists are very stimulated by sort of quite interesting and new ideas of concept... because ultimately a lot of theorists like sort of to be intellectually challenged... they like things that they need to... really sort of stretch their minds.... Theorists love sort of debating concepts and arguments... they don't want to, to, won't accept them at face value, they'll actually challenge them and enjoy the rationale, enjoy discussing them.... They will question.... We have some people on training courses who could tell that they're quite theorists cos question of challenge... if you actually put forward some ideas they'll, they'll question them, not in a negative way, but they just want to know well where have these come from and why and why is this and on your training courses what theorists will do is if you're actually putting together forward and processing procedures that C U follow, they'll question why... they won't just accept it, they'll actually question it, not in the negative way but they'll want to understand it.... As we said they like being stretched intellectually so if you can put forward some concept theories they, they actually enjoy that. They like a clear structure, they're logical, they're analytical and they want things to be delivered in such a way. They like analyzing and they like sort of... practising or getting involved with complex things... sort of complex piece of work... very, they're really happy in the training session to get involved whereas some people if you put something very hard, they'll actually back away from it won't they cos they think well this is new, I don't really understand this, whereas theorists will ac they actually enjoy... they enjoy the stretch they enjoy the challenge.... Those two John and Andy you were the highest on that John what are your views on that? Yeah. Andy? Yeah. I'm actually, I'm quite high on as theorist as well and I like to write everything out in full and I clear structures and if I go to training sessions and they're all over the place, it's such a in about five minutes and I have to say hang on a minute it might not be structured in the way that you like it but you can actually learn from it.... And the last one is the pragmatist... erm... we've got Mark, John and Marie who have come out quite high on the on the... The pragmatist th the title that you suggest what the situations you actually learn best from and pragmatists like training its practical
[speaker002:] [cough]
[speaker004:] job if there's gonna be an exercise or a they like it to be a real-life practical situation, almost like a simulation of the job... rather than something that's er... for example if you were to do a case study, pragmatists would like it be in an insurance-related case study and it could be related to their job very. If you were going to say a travel industry case study and insurance industry prefer it to be quite practical.... They like... training which they can actually apply, that has practical applications so say if you're thinking of something like erm motivation styles or something like that, if you were gonna introduce Lounslow I dunno at the motivation there are loads of them one's Lounslow one's Hertzberg... if you were introducing our training to a pragmatist what would be essential is you could actually show the practical application of it, if you just put forward C V and no practical application the pragmatist would say well this is all very well in theory, but how can I apply it to my job and if they can't they think well what's the value of this. They actually involve like... participating in training that they can actually try out the techniques and they and they can try out the techniques in the training and on the job as well.... They like things... satisfy the pragmatist if you can give them something that they can put in practice straight away o on the job in their job.... If you said well you can't apply this time, you may be able to in three years time but pragmatists they like something that they can take away and then put into practice straight away and they can try out. They like training that's practical and they're dealing with real problems.... Real problems, problems that they're currently facing or issues that the company's facing, they like real problems... activate things.... Although some people are quite happy to just because it's training i it they're quite happy if it's a hypothetical situation cos they think well I can actually learn from this, I can, I know what the concept structure is, I can learn from it. The pragmatist wants it to be... they want the structure they also want it to apply you know to real-life stuff, they're not into hypothetical... made-up situations.... There are valuation forms they usually show the all very well much more to erm give away of, of er their learning styles.... Right... so those are the four styles.... What... what we mustn't do with Honey and Munnford is just take things at face value because what Honey and Munnford did is they actually carried out interviews with a thousand people... and what they decided that I mean they carried out interviews with er lots of people thousand and they had a general study where they carried out interviews with a thousand people and what they said was that... in particular with the reflector a l some, some scores are naturally higher than others... and that what we can't do is just sort of look at these and say well this is the highest score, therefore I'm much more of a, of a reflector than I have of, I am of the other three, all we actually need to do is compare our scores against the general norms. If I show you the general norms it makes a lot more sense.... For example if you've got between thirteen and twenty for an activist that's a very strong preference, however for a reflector... a very strong preference is eighteen to twenty, because by nature most of us tend, you know most of us tend to stand back and think... so what we actually need, what we wh what we can see is that when we compare our scores against the general norms... it's a much more accurate picture of our learning style. So what we can see for the activist... nought to three is a very low preference... so Irene has come out as a, a very low preference on that, four to six is a low preference so that's... seven to ten is the sort of average... so that one's the average, that one
[speaker002:] [cough]
[speaker004:] eleven to twelve is a strong preference... so John's come out as strong and thirteen to twenty is a very strong preference, so that's Mark and Lou, you've actually come out as very strong.... The reflectors, the mean here is at thirteen the average is thirteen... they're all slightly higher, so eighteen to twenty... would be a very strong... whereas the others have just come out fifteen to seventeen which is strong, you've actually come out fairly strong there, because the highest score for anything is twenty. That, that, that is high, but then again is very high the activist we don't, on the courses, we don't see many activists coming out as high as fifteen or sixteen, they are.... The theorist is quite in line really with the reflector the average there is about twelve and a half. So sixteen to twenty would be the very strong on that, no one 's actually, no one 's actually got this. Fourteen to fifteen is strong... no one 's got that. Eleven to twelve, so you're really sort of moderate preference, it's not a, it's not a strong preference a moderate preference... and then the pragmatist... again that's quite high... very strong preference is seventeen to twenty and again... John... edge of that.... What, what we need to do we've got a handout for you on this so you can spend more time looking at yourself, or what you need to do is you need to compare your scores against those rather than just take the highest one.... Right for the pragmatists in the group, we want to do something practical learn from that. Erm... so what does that tell us about training, from the training when we're training others?
[speaker002:] ...
[speaker004:] And what's the sort of plus or the dangers on that? Yeah.... So what do you need to do?
[speaker002:] ...
[speaker004:] And that's why this is very interesting for you because you now know what your preference is and what you need to think about is that I may be a very high reflector, but I can see there's, there's Lou in particular was a very strong activist and when I put them together training, I need to ensure that it's not the way I like to learn, it is a balanced approach... others can also gain, I need to ensure that others gain from this. What else is it that it tells ya? How can we achieve a balance... What's the ideal balance Yeah. Yeah.... Yeah. We need to get a combination of all four. So how could we get a combination of all four?
[speaker002:] Using a practical example.
[speaker004:] Yeah.... Yeah. Yeah.
[speaker002:] ...
[speaker004:] Yeah.... There's one other
[speaker002:] ...
[speaker004:] To get the ideal session, that's what we need, we need a... we need an exercise, we need participation and Martin was saying that earlier, that essential anyway cos people learn best by doing... well we need activity and we need to make it practical to satisfy the pragmatist to real-life issues, problems, things that on the job. We need the theory concept behind the method and we need to build in that people can think, digest, analyze, because as we've seen by nature most of us have higher reflector scores than we do the pragmatist and the reflector are higher than the theorists and the activists... all have a tendency.... Right... just one last thing that we... need to think about is that as I said with the with the learning styles, there's no right or wrong
[speaker002:] [cough]
[speaker004:] you know it doesn't mean to say that you're wrong because you like to have a go or jump in and you're not wrong if you like to have time to spend, there are no right or wrong styles and also what we can't associate the styles with, which people try to do sometimes is they try and identify the introverts and extroverts.... I mean you can't do that... there is no correlation between... you can't say that all the activists are extroverts... cos are actually quite about the way they... but they do like to have a go and it doesn't say all the reflectors cos they're sitting back and thinking and they're actually quiet reflectors. Right, so that's all we want to look at with regards learning styles... I think the key thing to remember... is that... we mustn't fall into the trap, because it's our learning style if we actually put together our training which reflects our style. So as you said the danger is that it's not balanced for our delegates... and the ideal is that we want the combination of all four.... So if you think back now at times when you've done a training session and you thought I can't understand why that didn't work, you know I worked really hard... this may actually reveal something to you... you did work really hard at it and you put it together just the way that you would like to receive it, but it's not it just the way the delegates would actually have liked to have seen it done.... and that's why when we experience different people's training... you get different sort of... views and feelings from it... because their learning style is actually... pushing through sometimes... sometimes it suits us and sometimes it doesn't.... So if you can get the balance and you can get all four... also what's interesting as well is if you've got a very low score at something, it may be they think well... perhaps I need to develop that, if I don't apparently learn a lot from getting and having a go, perhaps I'd actually learn more if I can develop that more enjoyment from that and I can see the benefit from it.
[speaker002:] Is it possible to develop?
[speaker004:] No no, there are natural, we always have a strong preference for something but we can actually develop them, just like management style we have a strong preference for, for one style but it is something that we can learn... can get more and try and rationale sort of like theoretical we can try and rationalize what's perhaps happening is that in situations when we're not gaining a lot and it could be that it's because it's had a lot of activity and we can actually gain more from it we can rationalize it and analyze it.... Because if we can enjoy, if we can become more balanced actually balance our training doesn't it?... I know when I first came into training I was really high... on er...
[speaker002:] Drugs! [LAUGHTER]
[speaker004:] Drugs, yeah! Would of made the job a lot easier [LAUGHTER] might have been high on drugs. I was actually quite low on the activists and higher on these three... but I managed to wonder sometimes where I worked ever so hard on a session I can't really can't understand you know why it's not going very well and I thought well... when I then watched other people do something that had a lot of action I thought well why did they like that more and I never I didn't know... but I've actually learnt that you have to put activities in, cos you, you know you do get people with a very strong activist preference.
[speaker002:] Do you find people
[speaker004:] Erm... you may think that. There will be some who have a strong preference th they, they like activity erm and what you can actually do if you're very interested in looking, what Honey and Munnford have done is they've actually taken