Fire to Inspire

I have just been reading an email newsletter from a site I subscribe to: The Science of Getting Rich NETwork. As I write that down (like a coming OUT story) I imagine that I invite ridicule or dismissive comments from anyone who is reading this. I have exposed my under-belly (and believe me, there is more of that than I'm proud of).

The Science of Getting Rich website, however, fits my experience of how our destinies are controlled by the words our minds (the inner voices) speak to us and especially the words we speak out loud. Note how the inner voice spoke to me when I began writing that first paragraph. It told me that anyone who read those first words would dismiss or ridicule what I said. That's one of the reasons I'm not Bill Gates or Robert Kiyosaki, I'm constantly vetting what I say and do and write. I don't want people to think I'm a crank or silly or gullible.

So how does that relate to training?

Well, in this week's Science of Getting Rich newsletter, Rebecca Fine quotes American author and humorist Mark Twain who said, "I can show anyone how to get what they want. The only trouble is I can't find anyone who can tell me what they want." And then Rebecca goes on to say: "If you don't know -- can't articulate clearly and specifically what it is you really want to be, do, and have; what lights your fire; what it is you'd love to spend your time doing if you could be doing absolutely ANYTHING -- then it's because you don't really know ... who you are."

If at my age I find myself facing those moments of self-doubt and lack of focus, how come I expect younger people to risk focusing on 'what lights (their) fire'? How many young people fall into a career because they trip over it, rather than focusing on what lights their fire? How can they, with little life experience, know what might light their fire?

When young trainees come into a course, often they come because Mum or Dad says it would be a good career to get into. Or they might be on it in order to get a training allowance - the Government says it would be good for them to do. And we expect them to be fully engaged in the course!

Wallace Wattles, who inspired the website The Science of Getting Rich through his book of the same name, said that it doesn't take a lot of energy or will power to keep your mind fixed on something that really grabs you, but that it's VERY difficult to stay focused positively on what you DON'T really want. A career that you fall into is rarely one that fires your soul.

Wouldn't it be great to have a pre-enrollment course called: Seize the Day Your Way, or: Map Your Life in Joy, or: Light Your Mind's Fire? Unfortunately most training establishments rely on student numbers and/or government subsidies. I think they'd have a problem convincing the funders or their accountants that a course supporting young people to find their inner fire would pay its way.

Courses that focus on 'marketable' skills, that in turn slot the participants/trainees into a job, do enhance the bank balance, but the benefit of happy people in careers that inspire them is immeasurable. Imagine if trainers were faced with a group of participants who were already fired up about their new careers? Imagine the dialogues and monumental leaps that would happen in such a group? Can you see how they'd virtually teach themselves as they interacted with the trainer, the new knowledge and their search for answers to questions? It gives me goose-bumps to think about it.

Trainers try to enthuse trainees but are, in turn, chipped away by trainee reluctance and lack of enthusiasm. Hearing constant negativity fuels the negative inner voice. Part of trainee/student negativity stems from their life-stage where training for a skill or career is sensed as the establishment inevitably forcing them to conform. Another critical part is their total lack of knowing themselves as distinct from the group, of knowing who THEY are and what lights their fire.

It's a daunting task - being a trainer. You have to KNOW in your very soul that this is where your fire burns. Otherwise you're just going to be extinguished.

The speed of knowledge

Have you come across this? It perfectly sums up why training and education has to be ongoing throughout life ...
Did You Know?
The video also illustrates why we can never hope to keep ahead of what there is to know. Instead of trying to cram knowledge, we would be better to teach skills on how to recover knowledge, or where to go to find out more Just In Time for when we need it.

Another skill becoming increasingly necessary in our ever changing world,is critical thinking: 'How do I know what I find can be trusted?' That's a skill trainers will find difficult to pass on, because in an increasingly complex world we meet people in virtual environments and research purchases through simulations and snippets of information. Your trainees will go into those environments and later make decisions that impact on their workplaces. Critical thinking is vital in business but if you're working in a virtual environment - what is real?

Powering up training in a recession

Cost and access issues
A New Zealand industry training organisation working with mechanical engineering, manufacturing, baking and food processing industries, Competenz, urged the New Zealand government to reduce the costs of industry training in a recent press release.

CEO John Blakey said that while trade training in New Zealand has been under-funded for decades, the recession has highlighted this problem. "We're taking the message to the Government that cost is the major barrier to employers taking on apprentices and upskilling staff - and this needs to be fixed now.”

Blakey went on to say that Competenz is working with Business New Zealand and the Industry Training Federation on long-term solutions to take to the Government.

The problems
Cost is only one part of the problem, in my view. Other brakes on training include:

1. Fragmentation of the training delivery industry leading to challenges finding the right training/courses


2. Lack of clear career pathways, despite a hefty national framework of possible units to study


3. Challenges with acceptable assessment forcing training providers to produce prescribed documentary evidence of every PC and every minuscule part of the range


4. Lack of innovative (cheap and ‘safe’) solutions to accessing online training resources


5. Companies’ headaches around rostering employees off on courses for more than a day

Solutions could come from:

1. NZQA maintaining up-to-date lists of currently available face-to-face/e-learning/distance learning courses instead of just a list of registered providers


2. NZQA and/or ITOs having easily accessible recommended career pathways for industry careers


3. A review of the prescriptive model of assessment to allow integrated projects to act as evidence


4. Better access to online training, and not just in IT or computing. The Government is moving toward broadband solutions, so companies now have to get over their distrust of employee online intent and give them Internet access (even if only in a controlled IT environment)


5. Partnerships between deliverers and developers of off-site, on-site, and online training material – no one option is best but the best will come from combining them

Subtle brakes
Then there are more subtle brakes on performance improvement:

• The company culture sees training as a ‘perk for employees’ and not as a valuable tool to advance company performance


• Training ends with the employee’s attendance/qualification and no systems exist within the organisation to spread the gain


• Skills training is seen as a one-way process, like feeding hungry fledglings, instead of as a partnership of development


• Understanding business economics is a closely guarded secret that employees must not know about

Integrated improvements
There are many ways of improving performance and giving employees skills improvement training is only one way. Performance can also be enhanced by changing the culture so that every employee understands their vital part in the process of company evolution. That culture change rests mainly on management and, to a lesser extent, the partnership between management and unions.

By educating employees on the way of the market, managers gain 100s of sets of eyes to look for market opportunities and threats. After all, employees are:

• Consumers or customers and can feedback information on market demand


• Observers of the process and can identify bottlenecks and better ways


• Potential markets for competitor products because they know what they like


• Researchers/surfers of the Net so they keep up with trends

Trainers need to rebrand themselves as facilitators of learning and enlarge their own self-beliefs. They don’t have to know it all, they can use hundreds of existing learning resources, and even rely on their trainees to find the answers. Research should be seen as a legitimate and sanctioned use of their time. Let learners learn by experiencing the power of one … or one hundred.

Many of the above options can be accomplished without large amounts of money being thrown at them. They do, however, need a shift in thinking from micro-managing training in a silo to integrating training into a company-wide activity.

Lessons from Canada Geese, Part 2

If you come from a large organisation don’t under-value the knowledge of an on-site trainer. An on-site trainer sees employees when they’re being stretched and even put under stress. These observations build up into a clear picture of the capabilities of the person. These trainers ought to be involved in any consultation about promotion and restructuring. Why? Because they’ll know who will cope with added responsibilities if roles must be amalgamated.

When you’re training a group of people, especially if you use experiential learning methods, you learn how people react under pressure, whether they’re prepared to step into a leadership role, how they think (laterally or linear), and whether they’re a group player or a prima donna. An HR manager removed from practical training may miss out on learning these attributes of employees.

The on-site trainer can also be instrumental in bringing about culture changes, provided their role is clearly supported and valued by the organisation. The best worksite health and safety policy will not reduce accidents or injuries unless it's entrenched in worksite practice. ‘Big stick’ techniques are often less effective than culture change. Threats lead to clever concealment; culture change leads to a change in belief about self and the relationship with the organisation. Culture change takes time and management commitment. It needs to be led by the trainer with a positive, reward focus.

Imagine if those small groups of Canada geese decided to leave at different times of the year and didn’t bother to practice their vee-formation flying before they left? Not many of them would be around to return the following spring. It’s their commitment to the larger group, their willingness to share leadership, and their constant calls of encouragement that keep them a cohesive group flying through the nights and the rough ocean weather until they reach the next sanctuary on their journey.

When times are tough, as they are for organisations around the globe, culture change is a vital ingredient to ensure you’re a survivor. If you’re a trainer you can make a huge impact on the survival chances of your group.

• Avoid the negativity – train only the employees who see learning as valuable for them


• Focus training on the wider picture – convince employees of their role in creating a lean, efficient and well-functioning team


• Challenge the grey-matter – use unusual training tools to keep people on their toes and thinking – you’re training the whole person


• Spread the message that solutions are right within us – we just have to have the confidence to think outside the box


• Reward employees who show initiative – even if it is only to point them out to management as potential for promotion (but let them know you have done so)


• See other trainers as resources to share new techniques and tools – share your own ideas and borrow others

Survival in today’s climate will be about the organisations that learn to work for the greater good, the ones that look for new leaders from within their ranks and support each other strive for excellence. Divisive cultures will only lead to poor performance and inevitable disaster.

- Heather Sylvawood, Educational Designer, Edutech KM Ltd