CORPORATE TRAINING PROGRAMS - The #1 Mistake Companies Make

By Kent Boxberger Most all Training Programs offered by companies today, make one huge major mistake, which affects the results desired and compromises the overall success, in doing the training in the first place. This is true whether you have an in-house training program already in place or have hired a 3rd party company with a ''CANNED" program to come in and facilitate the training. Also, it doesn't matter what subject you are training, whether it's Management Skills, Customer Service, Technology, Sales Training, Self Motivation, Customer Relations, Human Resources or anything else. This #1 Mistake is true of them all.

The #1 Mistake Company's make within their training programs is, "INFORMATION OVERLOAD". Too much information, given to recipients within too short a time period. Think about the last training program you attended or even perhaps taught, presented or prepared. I promise you, there is ALWAYS too much information to be covered. John F. Kennedy said, “Public Speaking is the art of diluting a 2 minute idea, with a 2 hour vocabulary.”

Our surveys indicate that people who go through training programs, retain less than 2% of what they learn, within 90 days (3 months)! The #1 reason, is that there is too much useless information given, that will never be used, remembered or retained. As a result, the training sessions are way too long in length and most participants get bored and uninterested very quickly. For some reason, training companies feel they have to inundate participants with tons of information, graphs, studies, quotes, stories, philosophies, videos, dvd's, booklets, posters and all kinds of things, in order to justify their fees.

In addition to information overload, the #2 mistake, is "Speaker In-effectiveness". This becomes particularly important when companies use their own people to present and teach information. In most cases, the people on the receiving end, get the shaft, because the people presenting are NOT professional presenters, speakers or teachers. Most of the time, they're doing it "because they have to", not because they "want to" and as a result it's the "blind leading the blind". Oh they make it through it, but why bother doing it at all? In some cases, it's more advantageous to use your own people to present the material, but not in most cases. Like the old saying, "If you're gonna take the time to do it, why not do it RIGHT the first time." Using your own, in-house people may save a few bucks, but it decreases the effectiveness of the training by as much as 90% and costs you more money down the road.

Hiring 3rd party training companies usually gets you better quality speakers and your company employees who attend, usually enjoy it more and retain much more information. However, you usually pay a hefty price in fees and more importantly, lose control of the content presented, due to it being "canned" - getting back to the issues surrounding the #1 Mistake, I talked about earlier.

So what's the solution? Well, let me put in a plug for my personal approach, after 20+ years of working in the training & consulting market. I've coined this training program approach and offer it through my company as, CUSTOM TRAINING PROGRAMS (CTP).

First of all, we believe that YOU know your business better than anyone. We're different than most training companies. We assist you in "custom building", implementing, facilitating and presenting a corporate training program. We take what you already have in place, even if it's minimal and build the programs from scratch. In most cases, we work in partnership with your current personnel to teach, train and manage the program, as you see fit. This enables you to be exact with the information, format and all the details you want implemented. You save time and money in the long run, by owning your own training program, which can be updated and expanded for future use.

Our #1 priority in building Custom Training Programs (CTP), is "Simplicity & Repetition". Simplicity and Repetition are the keys to a successful training program, over time. We take very key principles, statements, reminders and exercises and do them over & over & over & over & over again. Practicing simple things every day for weeks and making them a habit, brings results. It's not complicated, but it's focused around discipline and repetition - not complicated, impressive graphs, studies and psychologies etc. We believe in cutting down the training time to a minimum, so you actually LEARN something and retain it. Also, we believe that face-to-face training, is the most effective way of learning. Online, dvd's and time alone, while appearing convenient and cost effective, DO NOT even come close to "in-person" training methods. Personal Interaction, "looking someone in the eye", observation and intuition, cannot be replaced by anything else. That being said, there are short types of training that can be facilitated by way of the internet, but not many. Not as many as are touted today by the training and corporate markets.

Now that you know the #1 Mistake Corporate Training Companies make, why ever make the mistake again? Perhaps it's time to change the paradigm and "Simplify". It's not "Quantity, but Quality", that counts. Do we truly believe it? It's the way of a successful future.

Kent Boxberger
President & CEO
MarketCorp International, Inc.
Atlanta, GA
http://www.marketcorp.net/