Death by Powerpoint
Yep, that's how they do training at my work. It's really awful - they cram all info on a subject, relevant to the audience or not, into a single powerpoint presentation (sometimes numbering up to close to 100 slides) and then go slide by slide, reading word for word what is on the slides, stopping every now and again to ask if there are any questions, which tend to be very rare. This type of class kills brain cells.
So in my loud protests against this type of thing, I have been asked as the training developer to write up a Train the Trainer class on how to train. It's funny - I could take 30 minutes, write down a few notes, and teach the dang thing easy enough, but writing it all out explicitly as a class outline someone else could teach from has been a fun challenge. It's like I instinctively follow certain principles of training without really being conscious of them, and so forcing those instinctive principles into concrete form helps me learn consciously what I already know subconsciously.
Like, for instance, the human brain does not function like a computer. We can't do information dumps, so Death by PowerPoint is a terrible way to train. (I mean, there's more than one reason DbP is terrible, but that's a biggie.) So divide info into 3 categories:
1) Info that is irrelevant to the audience
2) Info that is good to know, but not critical to their jobs
3) Info that is critical to know for their jobs
No category 1 info should be in the class.
No more than 5-10% of the class should contain category 2 info, and the presenter should make it very clear that this info is not critical to know.
90-95% of the class comes from category 3.
It sounds like common sense, right? But no one does it!
Crazy, I know. All the training I've gotten thus far has had all three categories mixed together with no way to discern which category each piece of info goes into. It's confusing and aggravating all at once. Makes for awful training.
So I originally thought, Sure, I can pull this together as a 1 hour class within a couple of weeks.
3-4 weeks later (and with some other major projects interrupting this one, so it's not been 3-4 weeks straight), I'm closing in on a 2 hour class and maybe at the halfway or 2/3rds mark. The final product will be between 3-4 hours and contain my class outline, a handout, and a powerpoint that illustrates exactly how a powerpoint should be used in a training class.
It's been a really fun project, made even better because I know it will be taken very seriously by the higher ups and not just blown off. :)
I love my job.
So in my loud protests against this type of thing, I have been asked as the training developer to write up a Train the Trainer class on how to train. It's funny - I could take 30 minutes, write down a few notes, and teach the dang thing easy enough, but writing it all out explicitly as a class outline someone else could teach from has been a fun challenge. It's like I instinctively follow certain principles of training without really being conscious of them, and so forcing those instinctive principles into concrete form helps me learn consciously what I already know subconsciously.
Like, for instance, the human brain does not function like a computer. We can't do information dumps, so Death by PowerPoint is a terrible way to train. (I mean, there's more than one reason DbP is terrible, but that's a biggie.) So divide info into 3 categories:
1) Info that is irrelevant to the audience
2) Info that is good to know, but not critical to their jobs
3) Info that is critical to know for their jobs
No category 1 info should be in the class.
No more than 5-10% of the class should contain category 2 info, and the presenter should make it very clear that this info is not critical to know.
90-95% of the class comes from category 3.
It sounds like common sense, right? But no one does it!
Crazy, I know. All the training I've gotten thus far has had all three categories mixed together with no way to discern which category each piece of info goes into. It's confusing and aggravating all at once. Makes for awful training.
So I originally thought, Sure, I can pull this together as a 1 hour class within a couple of weeks.
3-4 weeks later (and with some other major projects interrupting this one, so it's not been 3-4 weeks straight), I'm closing in on a 2 hour class and maybe at the halfway or 2/3rds mark. The final product will be between 3-4 hours and contain my class outline, a handout, and a powerpoint that illustrates exactly how a powerpoint should be used in a training class.
It's been a really fun project, made even better because I know it will be taken very seriously by the higher ups and not just blown off. :)
I love my job.