Why Training Matters
Ever since I’ve been a CAD manager, I’ve advocated training. And, most of the time, management agrees that there should be training. Sometimes though, I hear things like “We can always train later when we’re not so busy” or “Now that we’re not busy, we can’t afford a training budget.” I’ve come to reject these excuses and make the case that training is the bedrock activity that allows for overall organizational improvement to occur.
So, how should we address the topic of training in today’s strange CAD from Home environment? The quick answer is that we must sell the concept of training in the right way and then deliver fast results tied to noticeable improvements. Let’s see how.
Pay Now or Pay Later
The saying: “You can pay now or you can pay later,” is 100% valid with respect to training. Training is simply the prevention of errors that would otherwise require support, money, and time to fix after the fact. It really does boil down to the fundamental question — Would you rather prevent errors today or fix them after they’ve occurred?
Of course, training has been complicated by the CAD from Home trend but the good news is there are ways you can approach training that makes the process easier than you might think. It turns out, if you show people the right way to perform a given task, then they are more likely to achieve correct results and make fewer mistakes. Plus, consistent training yields consistently better results over time. But, how do we sell the need to train to senior management? Like this:
Strategy 1: Tell everyone from your boss to your users that training will be ruthlessly focused on the prevention of errors and workflow improvement. Keep repeating this mantra until people buy in.
Where is the Training Sweet Spot?
OK, so now that we know we need to recommit to training in the age of COVID-19. What should we focus on to get the most obvious benefits? This valid question requires some detailed thought. There are many topics for training but in the age of the remote worker these merit specific consideration:
Standards compliance. We can agree that proper use of standards increases efficiency. We can also agree that lack of standards compliance causes errors and costs money, right? These agreed upon concepts make a great case for conducting training that focuses on standards.
Project coordination. When everyone is working from home — including the client — project coordination becomes far different than when everyone is at the office. The reality is that these situations are constantly evolving and will never be truly standard until post COVID-19. So, frequent communication in the form of training becomes the only way to deal with the rapidly changing environment.
Training as an FAQ system. If several people all experience the same problem with a software tool or project coordination issue, why not use a periodic training session to focus on these issues? I call this FAQ Training and find that scheduling it on a weekly basis for 30 minutes yields great results. If no questions come up for the week, you can always cancel the meeting but this way you have a fixed training session each week that everyone commits to. At first, be prepared to drive the agenda, but over time you’ll see users start to suggest topics.
Record everything. One thing I believe in firmly is: Never give the same training twice! By recording your FAQ Training sessions you’ll have a library of recordings you can edit into short clips for a training library.
Strategy 2: Be sure that any time you have training that you’re either evangelizing standards, making projects run better, or solving user problems. Be sure to record it all to reap even greater efficiency later. Follow up and tell your boss you’re doing all this work!
Learn the basic dos and don'ts of training, how to build your team using training as a strong basis, and encourage users to keep using the tools you've taught them. Read more»
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