Prep For The Environment:  KNow Your LImits

This last sailing trip was in heavy winds for a small sailboat, requiring reefed sails for safety.  Could we have sailed under full sail?  Possibly, but if you put too much stress on the rigging from too much sail, you can snap the rigging and the mast, leaving you dead in the water, as best.  Preparing for the environment means knowing when you need to reef your sails to shrink your sail area for safety, and when even just using a mainsail or jib is all you need.  You can’t move as fast, but it’s safer, easier to handle, and doesn’t freak out your crew.  

For training, this means understanding your capacity.  No instructor should have more than 16-20 people in their class if you want your class to be well prepared.  Everyone needs to have the materials (if you provide them), and all lab environments should be prepped days in advance.  

Could you have 30-40 people in class, or 170-500 like lecture halls in college?  Well, let me ask you a question:  in your lecture hall, how many people asked a question of the professor?  Could you?  I’m willing to bet, if your experience was anything like mine, you could not.  The professor just couldn’t manage that type of experience.  No matter how many people are begging, they will not have a good experience if you overload a class.  Period.  If this becomes a regular problem, you probably need to hire more trainers to manage capacity (or start a Partner Training program).   

Establish Your Process:  Know Next Steps

Sailing a boat isn’t like motoring a boat:  you need to have momentum from the sail to get going, which means you need to be angled correctly against the wind.  Sometimes this means you need to tack several times to get where you are going, moving back and forth.  This means you need to organize the tiller movement, the filling of the sail, and unlocking/locking your jib (if it’s not self-tacking).  A lot is going on, and if you are not familiar, it can take you some time to get things set up right for successful forward movement.  Knowing your process, your lines, and getting the timing down is key.  

Process and mechanics apply to everything, and most definitely that includes training.  Make sure you follow your established processes, ideally documented, and have everyone on the team follow them.  If you don’t have established processes, but wing it every single time, it will stress everyone out and impact the training experience for learners.  

You need to have a solid registration process and a way to track registration.  Know how to add folks to your lab environment, distribute training materials, and provide meeting links if remotely taught.  A good Training Coordinator is a lifesaver in these scenarios, keeping track of everything, documenting processes, and establishing routines that make training a joy for those delivering.  

Short-Handed Struggles:  It Works, but not Well

Is single-handed sailing possible?  Provided the lines are properly set up for single-handed sailing, absolutely!  The sailboat we had put the winches too far forward, making it difficult to keep a hand on the tiller and winch in the jib.  Usually, I have a couple of crew members who take a winch each, which makes it easier, helping the sailing experience and making it more enjoyable with smooth tacks.  Without that help, I’ve got to trust the tiller to the crew who may not have experience, and often sends us too far to one side or the other.  It takes patience and understanding to manage this on your own with bodies in the way.  

Training can be the same, particularly for a scrappy start-up.  Leadership might think that a single manager can create training, deliver it, keep it all up to date, and manage registrations and course prep, all without breaking a sweat.  For really small start-ups, that’s possible if you are delivering training once a month.  Any more than that, you need to get some staff.  

Curriculum developers specialize in building out your content so that it best relates to the needs of the learner while making the training experience enjoyable.  They need to be aware of cognitive load, prerequisites, constructivist learning, and the whole works.  Content isn’t just about slides: it’s about making sure the structure and content support excellent delivery. 

Trainers excel at the delivery arts and performance that is leading training.  They know how to relate to the learners, provide experiences that help learners connect the dots faster, and answer questions from their own experiences.  Some can be excellent curriculum developers; most are not.  They don’t know, or care, about design; they are all about the art of delivery.  

Operations management is a whole different beast.  You need good people to understand who organizes office space for classrooms, links, and Zoom rooms needed for class, registration requirements, and training material logistics.  Could they teach?  Perhaps, but I’d rather they focus on operations and keeping the training engine running smoothly.  A good Operations person and make a successful training program.  

Forcing The Passage:  Your Judgement Impacts The System

I wanted my crew members to enjoy the sail:  I wanted them to love it as much as I do.  I talked it up prior to the day, I hinted at the practicality of the experience, I talked about theory, and the joy of just being out on the water.  Then, when we got out there, I worked my tail off to make it as effortless as possible for them.  Did it work?  Well, a lot was missing from the experience because of a lack of knowledge.  The crew wasn’t properly prepared (there wasn’t time), and we went anyway.  If I had it to do all over again, I would have taken some time and trained them on the mechanics of sailing, so they understood what I was doing and why, even if I still did it myself.  

Training experiences are impacted by so many different things:  Environment, content quality, delivery quality, and learners having completed prerequisites.  If one thing is off, you don’t get that sweet spot.  To be honest, when you are short-handedly delivering training, that’s going to happen a lot.  Training sweet spots, like hitting a perfect close-haul on the ocean, require everything to be aligned.  

Sometimes it’s best to put things off, provide more time, so that the experience is better for everyone.  You may think loading down a class or adding folks from that high-profile customer into an advanced class without a basic understanding is good customer service.  It’s not.  It’s the worst thing you can do for your customers, and taints the reputation and quality of your program.