Ask, Not Tell

I was delivering a new class (not the presentation one) in Shenzhen this week. Because of the hectic training schedule these few weeks, I virtually had only the few hours on the flights to prepare – not ideal. Whilst it was enough for me to get acquainted to the content, I was not familiar enough with the flow and slides. They are equally important since mastering it (e.g. which slide will come next) will largely increase your creditability. However, interesting, I realized something useful because of this. And this is largely inspired by the SPIN class.

I re-shuffled the class so that there are activities ran by the participants e.g. small discussion around every hour. During these activities, I can readily spend 1 to 2 minutes to preview the material which will come in the following session This makes the trainer’s job easier.

On the other hand, such arrangement also makes learning easier for the participants. On a regular basis, they can have a break from the ‘lecture’ and activities make them to THINK. Adult learners learn better by taking an active rather than passive role. I shall bear in mind such design in my other classes as well!!!

‘The person doing the most talking is doing the most learning’ – a great quote I learnt from Sharon Bowman during the ASTD conference.

This summarizes best the way how people learn effectively today as compared to the past.   In the past, participants could learn well as they sit still and just listen.   Nowadays, participants got to be involved in order to learn.

So, who talk more in your last training course?   You or the participants?

I always argue we should not give to the participants the handout before the class, because they will focus on the handout instead of listening if they have the handout. However, the downside is that:

• Their attention is drawn to another task – taking note;
• There is so much they can write down in a class and may thus miss to capture some learning
• Since they take note on paper wherever convenient to them, some could easily lose their note and thus learning

A solution which I learnt in the conference from a number of speakers is what I call the interactive handout. Basically, the handout contains some but not all the class content. More importantly, participants have to do something in order to record the key contents. It could contain fill-in-the-blank or space for drawing.

Of course, you need to spend extra time to prepare this (instead of just printing the power-point copy). Well, what good thing does not require preparation

In my organization, we sometimes video-taped some class delivery and send to remote branches for their viewing. Not many colleagues there are interested in watching them. I somehow guessed that it would be the case but I do not have a clear answer…. until I attended Doug Stevenson’s session on story telling.

Here is what Doug said – Imagine, whilst you are reading a book in a beach, you suddenly find someone surfing in the sea on a huge wave. What will you do? You will continue reading or watching the surfer? Probably the latter. Why? Partly because surfing is a beautiful act, partly because you do not know what will happen in the next second – will he fall? People love uncertainty or unexpectedness in this sense. They know they can always go back to their books, but for the surfing, if they do not pay attention they may miss something great.

A video-taped presentation is just often too ‘safe’ to be attractive (….unless its other elements e.g. content / delivery skills are great like ‘The Inconvenient Truth’). The same applies to those plainly-designed live presentations where audience can readily expect what to happen next e.g. going through points shown on the screen or worse in the handout.

So, make your presentation ‘unsafe’. Build the thought to the participants that something unexpected may happen so that they will pay attention!! Of course, one way is to tell stories as what Doug advocates.

In a session of ‘Top 10 questions which trainers ask’, I asked Bob Pike who is a well known figure in the corporate training field a question – ‘How do trainers get good feedback on his / her effectiveness in the classroom?’ I asked this in the context that the happy sheet is often just a ritual at the end of the class – participants frequently do not care to put down their true thoughts for all sort of reasons. They are rushing to leave. Or they try to be nice…..especially in Asia.

Bob’s immediate response struck me ‘Trainers should be evaluated by the underlying value which the training intervention brought to the company, but not just their effectiveness in the class.’ I know that there is argument like this i.e. we should go for level 4 instead of level 1 or 2 evaluation, but I just do not expect he would answer my question with this…. Perhaps it is because I have been focusing myself in the classroom effectiveness since I joined the training field. It made think whether I have had the wrong focus at all.

I do not have a clear answer yet, but it surely makes me think. Whilst I do not have a final conclusion myself

The sponsors or the employers pay for the intervention. It makes sense to evaluate the whole spending by looking at how much value e.g. increase in revenue, cut down in staff turnover brought by the intervention;

It is however often difficult or costly (in terms of time and money) to measure level 4. For example, it takes time for the change to show, and control groups have to be arranged;

If the course is paid by the participants e.g. a presentation training, it makes sense to just look at level 2 or 3 evaluation.

Perhaps I can have a better answer myself by looking into more Kirkpatrick’s thoughts on evaluation.

Anyway, re classroom effectiveness, Bob did give a good suggestion afterward and he modeled it as well. He is great. He promised to send us some bonus material if we send him an email after the session containing one paragraph about one key learning from that session. This is a good idea since it

• Extends learning beyond the classroom – enhance retention
• Checks for yourself your effectiveness
• Shows that you care

Good stuff!!

I am now in the Chicago airport waiting for my connecting flight back to Shanghai.  Contrary to my original plan, I did not write my blog during the conference since I was so absorbed into the conference.   It started early (6:30am on Wednesday!!) and sessions run back-to-back.  In addition, there were so many people which I can talk to – heard that there were over 9,000 participants.  Together with my jet-lag, I just did not do anything else.

Let me now take this blog to reflect on some insights and learning from the conference.

I will have the chance to go to the ASTD 2007 International Conference & Exposition next week in Atlanta. I very much look forward to experiencing it and sharing with what I see and hear!!

I was chatting with a senior professional today.  He was real kind and he tried to coach me on my future career direction.   I was really glad that someone would spend his precious time to talk about ‘me’.

I was delivering the SPIN class in the few days before that.  Whilst SPIN is very much about influencing, my instinct in the meeting was to see how effective this senior professional was in influencing me.   His kind intention, experience and seniority is superb in making me ‘into’ the conservation, as the starter.   However, somehow, I noticed that there were a few moments which I was not engaged.    I mean – words were coming to my ear, but they did not touch on my heart much.   It was like – I was running on auto-pilot!!   

Why?  Thinking retrospectively, one possible reason is that he talked quite a lot.   A rough estimate is that his talking time vs mine was 70/30.   I could imagine that if he had asked me question, I would be more compelled to think, or simply compelled to be engaged!!   As I discussed in the class, the other benefits of asking instead of telling (in the context of coaching rather than selling) are that questioning:

·     shows concern and interest

·     helps you to control the discussion

·     uncovers and develops thoughts

My learning is – when you try to provide guidance, use more questions and avoid talking.   I believe that it is especially true when the recipient is an adult…. Cos an adult can actually be more easily be distracted in his / her own thought!!    The same applies in class delivery (see my last post) – you should ask to stimulate thoughts rather than just tell!!

Still, I respect the senior a lot in being so kind to share his thought with me…..!!