The Ten Secrets of Successful Training:

1. Put the emphasis on learning rather than teaching.
Put the emphasis on helping the students learn in a practical manner rather than merely teaching them. Because the student will take an active rather than passive role in their training, their skills will be developed more quickly and should be retained for longer.

2. They should only learn what they need to know.
Make sure the training objectives are derived from a task analysis and relate to what the students actually need to know. This may mean leaving out what has come to be the accepted content of the course, but it does not prevent the inclusion of material related to building confidence and motivating the students.
3. Determine first what they already know.
An essential fact to know is to find out the existing knowledge level of the students before beginning your training. Training them on what they already know will produce boredom and lack of interest in your training. There’s not much point in going over old ground.

4. Let them know what they need to know.
Give the students the objectives at the beginning of the training. This means that, from the beginning, they know where they are going, how they are going to arrive there, and most importantly, they need to know when they have arrived. Without this sense of direction, your students will get hopelessly lost. Be careful of giving your students the same detailed objectives that you have used for developing the course. Although detailed training objectives are necessary for trainers and developers, students would be confused if they were presented with detailed, jargon-laden objectives at the beginning of the training.

5. Make sure they can walk before they can run.
Make sure the students are competent at one level before proceeding to the next. This provides a sound basis for future learning and you can assist this by having a logical flow which goes from:
1. The simple to the complex
2. The general to the specific
3. The known to the unknown

6. Check that they have learnt what they need to know.
Get the students to demonstrate that they have met the training objectives. Testing competence does not have to be an examination.
The minimum condition is that you should be able to observe the desired behavior or skill so that standards can be checked to see whether the training has been effective. The tests should be based on original objectives.

7. Expect and ensure success.
Expectation is one of the strongest motivators. Obviously, you should not express false expectations. Tests should only be given to students who are ready for it. To do otherwise is dangerous and inefficient.

8. Don’t discard the old tried and tested methods just for the sake of new.

While its good to try out new and innovative methods of training, it may not be wise to discard the old tried and tested methods just because they are old. Use a hybrid approach until the new methods deliver the desired training objectives.

9. Everyone can get an ‘A’.
Because we assess our students against parameter that meet the training objectives, there is no reason why all our students cannot get the highest grade. Remember, we are assessing students against performance – not against each other. Rank-ordering students in training means that we are measuring against the overall level of the class – some students can be given a false impression of their ability.

10. Give continuous feedback, tips for improvement and encouraging words to motivate.
It may be necessary to give all three things – feedback, tips for improvement and motivating words at the same time to get the best out of your students. All three have to be balanced in a way to derive the maximum effect. Your students should be made to feel that you are training them for their benefit, which should be clear in their minds, so that they remain focused and try to deliver their best performance. ############################################