THE SECRET DIARY OF A VIRTUAL TRAINING EXPERT

“Learning online is better than face to face. That’s right, I said it.”

In her latest blogpost Hayley Bird reflects on her journey; the good, the bad and the ugly, sharing what she sees, what she hears and more about what she does.

My passion for virtual learning

I’m passionate about virtual learning because it works for me. Having spent years travelling all over the country delivering training, I was tired. When my eldest daughter was born in 2015, I was fortunate that the business I worked for at the time, moved all training to a virtual environment.

I won’t pretend that this didn’t come with a fixed mindset around the impact that virtual training would have on the quality of my delivery, it did. But it also meant that I could be at home more for my young family, and this was, and still is, my number one priority. We are kidding ourselves to think many people in my situation would prioritize anything else.

I’ve been there, forced to move my delivery online and skeptical about the effect this would have on me and my learners who seemed to gain some great value from ‘getting together’ as a group in an environment away from the workplace.

It is this journey which has included many lightbulb moments, a lot of practice, a change in mindset and some unimaginable results – and what has inspired me to write this blogpost.

My mission – to help people see things differently

In January 2020, I took the leap into self-employment following the birth of baby number two, a redundancy and quite frankly, a genuine fear that employers wouldn’t offer me the flexible working and freedom that I wasn’t willing to compromise on.

I went for coffee with my now Business Partner, Erica, and she asked me “What is your USP? What do you want to specialise in?’” I told her “Virtual Training. It can be so good, but people just don’t get it.” From then, I made it my mission to share my passion, skills and expertise to help people see things differently, through a different lens and towards the opportunities that lie within online training. (A global pandemic thrown in may have helped things along a little.)

Fast forward to today and Quantum Rise has delivered practical online training skills to over 2000 trainers, coaches, teachers and managers: I’m completing my mission one cohort at a time. By way of an example, experienced learning practitioners arrive, and within 10 minutes they are telling me they have already learnt something transformational! 10 minutes.

I’ve run so many workshops with people from all walks of life, with different roles and responsibilities, mindsets and experience. They all have the same misconceptions in common, the same lightbulb moments and the same opportunities to totally transform their online group facilitation. Who’d have thought it?

My own experiences and how they help

Of course, being in the thick of virtual best practice, makes me very aware of how online presentations and training can be improved. When I attend virtual events or online sessions for my own personal development, I must remind myself to turn off the critic and focus on the content, which isn’t always easy. It’s the dull and boring sessions though which give online learning a bad rep and put my attempt at putting people two steps forward, three steps back.

The text heavy slides and attempt at too much ‘content’ drives boring sessions. Animated and inspiring people suddenly turn to ‘click and read’ because it’s all they know.

People use the word ‘engaging’ to describe their sessions but only have their perception to base this one. They lack focus for the learner’s experience and how frequently they need to engage with their audience – an instant cue for the ‘mute’ and ‘camera off’ buttons to kick into action.

Trainers are taking the stage, doing all the hard work, they know they are, but don’t know how to transpose good face-to-face training to great online delivery. This is because virtual training requires a different skillset. At the start of lockdown, I observed trainers picking up their face-to-face materials and standing in front of their cameras on Zoom, expecting the same results. Whilst some have adapted and changed their approach slightly, there is still a long way to go.

It makes me reflect – are we now accepting that online training is the way forward, but we are willing to lose out on the quality of delivery for the convenience of accessibility?

The thing I find the most frustrating is that online engagement can be transformed, which in turn increases application and retention, by implementing some very simple changes.

Here are five recommendations:

Ask questions. Before sharing content with attendees which leads to us talking through content, ask them a question instead to get them thinking for themselves.
Be clear on how you want people to interact. Write your interaction method on the slide. Do you want people to answer in chat? By using the poll? In a breakout room? Let them know!
Vary your interactions. Avoid using the same methods repeatedly. By including variety, you keep people on their toes.
Keep content practical. I see so many sessions which revolve around heavy theoretical content – save this for the supporting material.
Be you, be confident.

These recommendations are a starter for 10. Of course, each one takes practice and confidence. But, if people get creative, bring their personality, and implement these five simple steps, I am confident that your online learning will transform as a result.

Drop me a line if you’d like to discuss the challenges you’re facing with virtual training design and delivery.