My experience as a trainer

by Sophie
(Inverness)

I train as part of my role within my company and have run many training sessions over the last 10 years or so.

I think a good trainer needs to be well prepared and know what message they're wanting to convey. Then deliver the same message in different ways.
It's an easy mistake to try and deliver too much information at once.
I try and keep the message simple and re-enforce the message in several different way. For example
*start with bullet points in a power point presentation. No more than 5 bullet points in each slide.
*The carry out a written excercize about the topic, which should then lead to a
*discussion
*ask direct questions ensuring people have understood what you're saying
*finish the message by recapping the bullet points on the slide.

You have to remember the following when carrying out a training session
*tell them what you're going to tell them
*tell them it
*tell them what you've just told them.

We remember 30% of what we here, 50% of what we see and 70% of what we do!!

Icebreakers at the begining of a training session are a great way to get every-one warmed up. I did one this week which went down well.
Every-one had to write down 3 things about them selves, 2 of which were true and 1 which was a lie. The we all had to guess which was a lie!
It's fun and gets every-one relaxed.

So what makes a good trainer? Well I think a good trainer needs to understand how people learn and make that into a fun session.