“Oh no! Mr. Bill” were the words you would hear on Saturday Night Live just before the play-doh figure – Mr. Bill, was squashed. Like these words, learner resistance often precedes a training class being squashed.
Whether you are a designer, or an instructor, there are some things you can do when you anticipate or encounter resistance to a class.
Designers
For the ever-challenging and mandatory annual training, consider…
- Conducting an assessment: Could an assessment – online or face-to-face – determine competency and remove the need for some learners to attend the class?
- Changing the delivery strategy: Is there an off-the-shelf or home-built e-learning module that would satisfy the requirement?
- Changing the class design: Could the class be changed to something more engaging such as a pre-test coupled with a “lessons learned” discussion of areas that the group or the organization struggle with?
For a class about process change within an organization, think about…
- An Icebreaker. An out-of-the-box-thinking icebreaker can help set the tone. Challenge your learners to “Be a gardener star-plant 10 trees in 5 rows of 4 trees each” (see end of blog for answer), where the answer is not intuitive. This icebreaker could serve as an analogy for a necessary but unpopular change in organizational life. Tie the icebreaker to the need for out-of-the-box thinking when confronted with organizational change.
- Exercises geared to handle learner resistance: You can’t sweep resistance under the rug, so try designing an exercise early in the training where problems are acknowledged and then focus on how to make the best of the new processes? Something like, “list the reasons we should not adopt this procedure,” followed by, “identify those factors we have direct control over.” Offer to act as an anonymous ombudsman to bring the learners concerns to management and then concentrate on how to make the best of the situation during the class (i.e. learn the new process).
Instructors
The techniques for designers can also be used by implemented by instructor on the fly when encountering serious push-back from a learner group. Sometimes all it takes is carefully moderated “air time” to defuse resistance.
What do you do to handle learner resistance? Feel free to post your ideas.
Paul
Oh, the answer to the brain teaser? Sketch a 5-pointed star. Where the lines intersect, plant a tree – you’ll end up with 10 trees; in 5 rows with 4 trees in each row. It looks something like the image below.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Comments RSS
My experience as a trainer; there is a lack of buy-in from the participants due to a lack of understanding of the purpose of the training. I typically get feedback that this training will be another “flavor of the month” and it won’t make any significant changes within the organization. I agree with their assessment and make the point that THEY are the solution to making the organization better. Training alone will not acheive our goal. No buy in – no significant changes. I challenge them to take an assessment of how things are currently going. They typically say that things are OK but could be better. This is my opening to gain their trust.
Once you have gained their trust it will be easier to facilitate the training session. The key is to get their buy-in, let them know that you are there to help them and not make their job harder than it already is. When I ask for a show of hands of who wants their job to be easier I typically get a 95% show of hands.
Now the training can begin….
We are a big organization with a total of 11.000 employees. Managers screen the training need for their own people, and we in the training dept. built and execute the training. BUT none of the top managers has ever taken or participate in the courses so they don´t know the content. Hereby we end up having employees with tools and knowledge that the manager can´t understand, don´t know how to use and can offer no support to. – This makes it almost impossible for us as an organization to “walk the talk” and sometimes I just end up thinking – “Well the pay is good so s….. it!”
Regards,
Kasper Drews,
Denmark,
Europe