The Best Training May Be No Training

Have you ever been asked to fix all problems with a PowerPoint and a box of doughnuts?Training and development professionals know this drill all too well. A problem crops up, and management’s first approach to solving it often is to request a training session. But this may not be the right approach — you may actually be doing too much training or even the wrong training. Or perhaps you shouldn’t be doing training at all.It’s time to get back to the “why” and the “how” of training. Here are three questions to ask yourself before you schedule another training session, inspired by a session I recently led at the Association for Talent Development’s Gulf Coast Talent Development Conference in New Orleans.

Why Do We Really Do Training?

Ideally, training should be done proactively to show new employees the ropes, help current staff learn additional skills and develop leaders to step into higher roles. However, we’re often using training to try to fix problems: Something is wrong and leadership’s reflexive solution is to have the trainer design a module and have a class. Is that always the best way? What if the problems we’re trying to fix cannot be handled through training alone? If lack of training isn’t the problem, then more training can’t fix it.Here are some typical issues I see people trying to fix through training, and not being successful:

• Employees don’t know how well they should perform.
• Employees aren’t getting on board with a change or improvement.
• Employees are struggling to meet job demands because they are too busy.
• Employees have no consequences for poor performance.
• Employees lack financial, technical, staffing, or other resources to perform.

Many of these issues are a result of not setting expectations, poor job design, lack of feedback from the manager or poor communication. Each of these issues is a real concern but not something that can always be addressed with more training.

What’s the Root Cause?

If someone comes to you with an issue like the above examples, your job as a trainer, before you design or schedule a module, is to ask the “why” questions and determine the root cause. The root cause is what needs work.For example, someone says, “I believe in having dinner as a family but I can never get there in time because I’m at work too late.” Ask why...and ask it more than once.

• Why? “Because I get to the office too late so I end up working late.”
• Why? “Because I’m leaving the house late in the morning.”
• Why? “Because the kids aren’t ready in the morning.”
• Why? “Because they are watching TV instead of getting ready”

A possible solution here is to have the kids lay out their clothes and prepare their book bags the night before and no TV. This lack of preparation and TV watching in the morning is the root cause and only fixing it will solve the problem. Everything else is a symptom of this root cause.Managers may not want to hear there’s a root cause that requires any examination beyond just holding a class. You’ll have to use your experience and influence to get them to think beyond their initial ideas. If an employee lacks resources, is too busy or simply doesn’t know the performance objectives for a position, this may reflect a lack of feedback, poor job design or poor system design. Training may not be the solution.

Is Your Training VUCA-Ready?

Once you’ve assessed the training request and determined the root cause of the issue, you can determine whether training will help. It may be that training is not appropriate, or that you have to design or redesign a system, process, tool or initiative to target the deeper issues. If you do hold a training session, make sure it will close gaps between the readiness of your people and environmental or organizational challenges they face. Training should address the “VUCA” world.“VUCA” stands for volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. It describes the world we all work in today. Mergers and acquisitions, a global economy, changing energy prices, rapidly changing technology and natural disasters are all examples of today’s VUCA environment. Training and development professionals (and HR, since these are often merged) can address these factors by recognizing the need for organizations to build leaders across all levels, functions and site locations. They can broaden their engagement strategies beyond retention and focus on building a culture of passionate involvement. They can also move HR away from focusing so much on compliance and administrative tasks and instead view themselves as internal consultants, there to improve employee performance.As a learning and development professional, you shouldn’t pigeonhole yourself into what you can deliver to your company. You’re a trusted adviser who knows many roles within your organization. You may deliver greater value by recommending solutions other than training when the situation warrants it.Success Labs is a leadership-development and management consulting firm in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. For more than 25 years, our expert team of consultants has worked with hundreds of companies to explore their business potential and improve their company and cultural performance. Contact us to get proactive about your people strategy.