E-tip 77 – Getting the biggest value from training

Think back to when you’ve been on a training course and ask yourself how much of what you were told you’ve actually remembered and apply?

Generally, you’ll retain and apply about 20-25%, which doesn’t sound particularly good value for money. That means to get £200 of value you have to spend £800 – £1000!

If within a few days of the course you practice what you’ve learnt you’ll retain about 50%, which means you still need to spend £400 to get your £200 value.

However, with just two short follow up coaching sessions the retention and application rate increases to about 80-85%! Which means that you only have to spend £250 to get your £200 value.

And a way to get similar resuts is teaching or coaching someone what you’ve learnt very soon after the course. Then you’ll get pretty close to the 80% level as coaching someone to replicate what you’ve learnt really embeds your new found skills, and you’ll remember too the little nuances and subtleties that make your it really effective.

Today’s experiment
· Take a skill or technique you’ve recently picked up. You could use one of my e-tips and having practiced and applied it, teach it to someone else, or use it in a team situation
· And coach them through the process or how to apply the new skill or technique – they’ve got it when they’re getting similar results to you
· And if you’re looking for new training, ask the potential provider if they provide follow up coaching or post-course access to the trainers. It makes sense to get the most value out of your investment doesn’t it?

And have fun too!

Anthony

©Anthony Davis. All rights reserved 2007