Top Tips for Running Group Learning Sessions

October 10, 2011

Can your managers lead skills development in your company? Top Tips for running groups sessions 

Many companies use their most experienced operators to bring on their newer staff. This of course is a great idea – people can learn on the job, knowledge capital is maintained and develop and the mentor develops new skills.

But what if your managers are not happy or experienced in this new role? Maybe you’ve got a performance issue that needs righting quickly? What happens when you’ve got lots of new staff and the manager doesn’t have time to get around to everyone? 

Managers are really enjoying the new Workshop Development Skills course which we started running a week or so ago. This is a course to help managers run group sessions for staff to help them learn and develop their performance. This is a list of the most important learning points from our first group

–       Start the session by asking 3 positive and true things from each participant

–       Highlight where current performance is high

–       Involve staff in workshop by asking what they hope to get from the session and what they’d like included

–       Incorporate a conversation about a successful future, when these skills are used to the best of their ability

–       Encourage discussion on how stakeholders will benefit

–       Keep presentation element to around 25% of time

–       Consider the learning style of the group and the facilitator

–       Think about people’s emotional state before the content – make sure that they are comfortable

–       Finish by reflecting on what they’ve noticed about themselves and their colleagues during the session and how they’ll apply the learning

–       Have fun!