View from the Build — Training Recruiters
Confession — I am an impatient and terrible trainer.
I’m struggling to recall a job in which I had more than a few hours of formal instruction to start. (Notable exception — my Professional Scrum Foundations certification with Centare. That was awesome, thank you.) I did have a lot of willing, helpful people around me. But deciding when/how to go to them and what to ask was largely up to me. I loved that.
It’s taken me a decade to fully realize not everyone will love that sensation of sinking or swimming. And even knowing that, my natural training style is essentially to tell you what to do and expect that you’ll recall it. Not good. Actual trainers are cringing at that right now.
I have *seen* great trainers in action and know many of them. And those people would tell you that people need to:
- process information in multiple ways (verbal/written/observation/practice)
- apply the information themselves
- repeat everything
- create a safe space for questions
(Shoutout to our client Brilliant.org who has hands-on learning figured out!)
Luckily, Becca on our team LOVES the details of training and has 10x my patience for it.
We decided to start with twice weekly training sessions designed to be 1/3 information, 1/3 practice, 1/3 Q+A.
The highlights:
- People learned way faster than we thought. We ended up shortening several trainings.
- We had the whole team attend (optional for senior members) and they reported learning a lot too. Their own experiences improved the depth of the conversation greatly.
The lowlights:
- We knew having a group with varying levels of experience would be challenging and it was. There were some sessions that were a stretch for those with less experience. And worse, we had a few bored experienced people on occasion. I’d still do this in groups, but do a clearer job of crafting individual training plans.
How I’m feeling at this stage: overwhelmed.
What’s next: lessons learned.
