Show and Tell
Effective staff training requires demonstration-based instruction
Galen Rapp
Cooperative Development Specialist
USDA Rural Development, Kansas Office
"If I had eight hours to chop down a tree, I'd spend six hours sharpening my ax." - Abraham Lincoln
Training employees to do the tasks assigned
to them is the responsibility of a cooperative's manager or leader. You are only as good
as the people you train.
If employees are unfit for the job, it is
likely they were not trained. You may have inherited an untrained staff, but it is your
responsibility to see they don't remain that way. Training is neither a quick fix nor a
cure-all to your problems.
To illustrate, let's assume when we were born,
we received a key ring. For every situation we go through, we get another key to put on
it. As the ring fills up from training experiences, we learn which keys to use for certain
situations. Most people are fumbling around in the dark trying to find a key they might
not even have - or haven't used it in so long they can't find it.
Training is like that. We grow based on what we
learn, but most don't know they are learning something, so they feel they are not growing.
Training should be a process, not an event.
Much of today's training is formal. We learn in
classroom settings, watch video series, use spreadsheets and computers, and attend
workshops and conferences. Training is not cheap, so it's management's job to see that
training funds are productively spent.
Because of all the factors involved in a
training program, many managers avoid it. It takes time and money. Essentially, by not
training employees to do the job right, we train them to work carelessly, waste time and
cover their mistakes. If you don't train, you train regardless. So, it's not a question of
whether you will train, but a question of why and how.
Why Train?
· How do I know when an employee needs training?
This illustration, while extreme, answers the question. If someone told an employee his or her life depended on whether or not he or she could do the task, could he or she do it? If so, then the employee only needs motivation. If, on the other hand, he or she would die before completing the task, the time is ripe for training.
· Does this person's work overlap with someone else's?
One of the most difficult challenges in training occurs when blending two job descriptions. Often, one person will assign a nearly completed job to another staff member, who works on it and returns it. Employees often interface daily and their jobs follow suit. It is possible in the "gray areas" to consider peer training.
· Are you training employees for something that is nearly obsolete?
Today's technology moves
fast. The new computer system you just purchased ceased being state-of-the-art the day you
carried it out the door. You must evaluate whether you are training employees to do
something the industry may be phasing out or a service the cooperative may need to
re-design. Never train before asking whether the skill or service to be trained for can be
altered, improved or eliminated.
Even after the formal training is completed,
never send employees out to perform the skill or service prematurely. A good manager will
train until the point of saturation to assure employees succeed in customer satisfaction.
The sole purpose of formal or informal training
is to make the employee successful. It isn't to increase the cooperative's bottom line or
make the manager look good. There is very little value in training for the wrong reason.
If done poorly, time is wasted. If the training was poorly conducted and the participants
didn't learn, do you re-train? If you're re-training, your apparent effectiveness may
suffer.
Another faulty alternative is to let employees
stumble along on their own. Most of the time we don't repeat training, and cite the lack
of time and money as an excuse. The truth is, it will cost you both time and money to
repair the damages done by incorrect training. Most managers would rather blame the
employee for not getting it right than to admit the training was poorly conducted.
When Is It Best not to Train?
Are there reasons not to
train? Certainly, never train someone to promote them up or out. This might seem to be a
simple answer to a personnel problem, but that kind of training is for the wrong reason.
Training is meant to help employees successfully do their job, not for a promotion.
Another - and wrong - reason not to train is to
prove a point to upper management or advisors. During periods of financial pressure, what
may be demanded are cost reductions and work performance through increased skill
performance. Reduction of whole departments is often part of the recommended solution. It
is wrong to train workers in order to keep an obsolescent department intact.
There are three basic
reasons why you train only for success:
1) The employee can't do the job properly
without it;
2) The employee can do the job but not well;
and
3) The employee does the job incorrectly.
Telling Vs. Training
"Telling" is best
reserved for lectures, occasional speeches and eulogies. Training, on the other hand,
requires a mental trip back to kindergarten and use of the oldest teaching method known to
managers: show and tell.
Training must be carried out with as much
wonder and excitement as you experienced in kindergarten in sharing a new toy. Remember
how everyone took the opportunity to touch, hear, smell. and probably even taste. It was
truly a learning experience. Training without the proper attitude by both the trainer and
the trainee lowers retention and effectiveness.
The trainer must explain clearly and in detail.
This is often difficult for the trainer, but, the better you understand the territory, the
greater the sales results.
As a trainer, you must anticipate every
question, every glitch and every objection that might arise. Your ultimate goal is to
teach staff members something they will use more than once. They may learn to use and
understand the mechanics of a spreadsheet, but you want them to know the significance of
each column in the spreadsheet, its relationship to their job and how to adjust operations
to get desired results. Training doesn't teach keen and quick insight, wisdom, or skill.
Those things come only after the mastery of skill.
Management Sets the Direction
During my working career, I have had the
opportunity to observe, and work for and with, several top managers. One successful
manager of a large regional cooperative would take the "before working hours coffee
session" to train and network with employees at all levels. Each morning that the
manager was in town, he would make a point of meeting with a different group of employees.
Cooperative goals and objectives were met and good things occurred as a result of these
sessions that ordinarily would not happen.
Another manager would meet only with his top
managers daily. He passed up the opportunity to build unity and find out what was
happening in other facets of the business. The balance of the employees would try to guess
if his staff really needed that much coaching or if it was just a chance to socialize. In
either case, the unit between top management and the rest of the staff suffered. Good
things that should have occurred usually didn't
.
Training and mentoring go hand-in-hand for new staff members of Country Hedging, Inc., the futures and options subsidiary of Cenex Harvest States Cooperatives. Brian Rydlund (standing) reviews electronic information display on commodity futures with new staffer Kyle Sieren. (Photo courtesy of Cenex Harvest States)
Quality Management
This approach stresses the
importance of the human element in the business. Rather than reducing employee involvement
to rote routines - which dulls ambition to perform - this approach encourages employee
participation and self-motivation. It provides growth opportunities and encourages
employees to take advantage of them. The emphasis is on motivating others, rather than on
high technical skills for the top management group.
Another implication of this approach is that
good management causes desired things to happen that would not otherwise occur. Activities
are purposely planned. Management provides the resources necessary for those at the next
lower level to achieve their objectives and goals.
Management causes, guides and directs change.
Innovation is a major part of keeping a business and services viable to members and
customers. Well-trained employees deliver viable services to members and customers.
Some business place little emphasis on training
while others help employees learn new skills by standing over them, talking through
difficulties and encouraging success. They move the employee through the skill process in
graduated steps.
Training is critical to the strength and
success of the organization. It must be done with fervency and urgency. If management
doesn't take training seriously, neither will anyone else. Management sets the standard.
The Three-Step Process
Trainers have long recognized the need for these three steps for successful training:
1) Tell the employee what
you want done, and then show him or her how to do it;
2) The employee tells you what is to be done,
and the two of you perform the task together; and
3) The employee tells us what is to be done,
then does it correctly by him or herself.
Managers should remember
that training is an important part of the process. Never train while facing the employees.
Rather, stand alongside and walk them through the process. This tried and proven success
is just as effective in training today's modern technology skills as teaching hand skills
hundreds of years ago. 
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