Making Team Training Relevant: Reading the Room

Think about the last time you stayed at a hotel. If a friend was to ask you “how was  the hotel?”, would you only respond based on how well you slept in the hotel room bed? Of course not. Your answer would factor in many elements, including:

• Ease of making reservations
• Ease of parking, unloading
• How the first person greeted you
• Cleanliness of the elevator

To name just a few…

So, when a participant in your team training session judges “how was it?”, they don’t start judging “it” when you say “Good morning, and welcome to XYZ training. “ They start gathering data points much earlier, starting with when they first find out about the training session (by the way, did they volunteer? Or were they volun-told to attend?).

Your training does not exist in your facilitator guide. That’s your guide to the content.
I had a great mentor earlier on in my career. Believe it or not, he taught me to brush my teeth right before I met any participants. He said, “You always feel better about yourself when your teeth are clean. When you feel better about yourself, it shows to your participants.”

When it comes to content preparation, we have to walk in knowing our material cold.
When it comes to room preparation, we have to be done before the first person hits the door.

We have to be ready to read the room and work the room.

For team  training to be effective, we have to be present and connect. In the NY Times obituary of DJ and broadcaster Dick Clark, Clark describes learning his craft in radio as a young man. Clark loved legendary broadcaster Arthur Godfrey, who knew how to connect with an audience. Before Godfrey, radio announcers would speak with a stentorian tone, saying “Good evening to you all”. Godfrey was different. He didn’t try to speak to the masses. He made the listener feel like he was talking just to them.

When you read the room, you can adjust your style. Do I need to connect the dots more? Or are people getting it so much that I need to move through things quicker? Do I check with folks on breaks as to how it’s going? What should I adjust?

More than anything, corporate training is an experience. When you frame it as such, and prepare accordingly, you’ll create much more value for your participants. And isn’t that why you got into this field in the first place?

What techniques do you use to read the room and bring your trainings to life? How do you avoid learning decay?