The Training Looks Good on Paper. But Will Your Team Actually Use It? Choosing a Corporate Trainer in Chennai

A workshop can be lively, well-paced and receive warm reviews without making a single change to the way things are done. The feedback forms mainly tell us how the day was experienced; they say very little about whether anyone will later know how to deal with a difficult customer, how to delegate a task or how to run a review meeting. Enjoyment and actual application are two different outcomes, and only the latter provides a justification for the expenditure.

The process of moving from the classroom to the workplace is known as transfer of training. In their widely cited 1988 review in Personnel Psychology, Timothy Baldwin and Kevin Ford defined transfer as the application of learned material on the job followed by its continued retention over time. According to their model, there are three main categories of factors that affect transfer: the characteristics of the trainee, the design of the training and the work environment.

Ability, together with personality and motivation, has a role to play; if a person cannot see the relevance of a topic to their own role they will be less likely to apply it.

The extent to which the material is remembered is determined by the relevance of the content, the way the ideas are arranged, and the application of sound learning principles.

The group includes support from supervisors and colleagues as well as the opportunity to put the new skill into practice; however, buyers usually fail to take note of it since it takes place outside the training room. Anyone who is getting a programme put together should know the following: the trainer has the most direct impact on the design of the training, whereas the characteristics of the trainees and the work environment are far more dependent on the organisation and its members. The way in which you prepare your people and the way in which your workplace treats them afterwards are just as important as the sessions themselves.

A lot of the requests revolve around areas like communication, time management or team building. These topics are easy to purchase but difficult to assess. A better starting point would be a problem statement, for instance failures in handovers between shifts, managers avoiding difficult feedback discussions, or new supervisors having trouble conducting daily huddles.

What a successful participant would do differently, in terms that can be observed, should be written down. Since 'better communication' is too vague, it is preferable to say that 'the team leaders confirm each decision in writing within one day of every review meeting', something that a manager can verify. A good trainer will help you to make this statement more precise rather than just accepting it.

The managers have to decide if the new habits will continue. In the event that they are not included in the discussion, they might inadvertently discourage the behaviour which the sessions aimed at introducing. You should find out from each potential trainer if they provide managers with a brief introduction and whether the participants will agree on goals with their supervisors both before and after the programme.

A trainer who gives out a fixed programme after just one phone call is merely selling a product; whereas one who enquires as to your team, your objectives and your present obstacles is attempting to design a solution. You can expect questions concerning who the participants are, what they are already doing well, what has been tried previously and how you will know that it has worked. A brief discovery phase, for example a few short conversations with some of the participants and their managers, frequently brings to light problems that a written brief never refers to, such as unclear approval limits or tools which people tend to avoid using.

Practical rehearsal provides participants with the chance to put a skill into action rather than just hearing about it. You should find out what proportion of a session is spent on role plays, case discussions and exercises based on your own scenarios and what proportion is spent on slides. If a session is mainly based on a lecture, it is less likely to result in lasting changes in behaviour unless participants also have the opportunity to practise and apply the skills.

The workplaces in Chennai are very different; for instance, a manufacturing supplier located on the outskirts, an IT services team and a family-owned trading business all have different hierarchies, shift patterns and methods of communication. If you want examples from similar kinds of situations, you should also ask whether the trainer is at ease working in the languages that your team actually uses, such as English and Tamil where appropriate.

It is during the follow-up that transfer of learning is either achieved or fails to take place. You should look for practice assignments, arrange check-ins a few weeks later, have conversations with the employees' managers and carry out a review against the original goals set out at the beginning. If the provider does not offer some form of practice, follow-up or evaluation when the programme is intended to change behaviour, then ask them how transfer will be supported. Even a simple plan is useful: for each participant there should be a one-page action sheet which is then reviewed with their manager, thus giving the learning a place within their everyday routines.

When employees don't have a particular ability-for example, when it comes to providing feedback, coaching a team or dealing with escalations-targeted training is effective. For managers who are taking on greater responsibilities, structured leadership development programmes for the Chennai teams should include workshops together with opportunities for practice between them, so that the new behaviours are tried out on actual work and not just talked about.

There are instances when people know what they should do yet are unable to carry it out since the objectives conflict, the roles overlap or the procedures are not clear. Training will not overcome such problems; it is instead useful to obtain advice from a strategy advisor who specialises in growing businesses in Chennai in order to first clarify the priorities and establish the structure, thereby ensuring that any subsequent learning takes place in a workable context.

The study looks at the participants' views of the training, in terms of how relevant it was and how engaged they felt. Learning is determined by whether the participants have acquired the knowledge, skills or attitudes that were intended, this being shown through short assessments or practical demonstrations. A merely positive reaction does not mean that anything has actually been learned or applied.

The question of behaviour is whether or not people use the skills when on the job, a point that can be discovered through a manager's observations and subsequent conversations. As for results, the question is whether a business objective has changed, for example through a reduction in the number of rework cases or more smooth handovers. Since it is more difficult to attribute results solely to training, it is necessary to combine them with the behaviour that was defined at the beginning.

Inquire of the trainer as to which indicators he or she recommends and also about how the evidence would be obtained. A person who has not previously been asked such a question might find it difficult to respond, and this fact is itself quite informative.