Tuesday Insight - Your Virtual Support Team

TEAM – Together, Everyone Achieves More. I love this acronym as it very simply describes, in a nutshell, the value of a team. The trouble is, that trainers often don’t have the luxury of working as part of a team in the traditional sense – we might, for example, be the only trainer in an organisation, or a self-employed training consultant, for example. 

The trainer’s role can therefore feel surprisingly solitary sometimes. Although we spend a lot of time with other people, helping organisations identify their training needs and delivering training or coaching, we can also spend a lot of time behind the scenes on our own, thinking about how to make training memorable and engaging, how to ensure learning needs are met and how to evaluate training. And we might spend hours trying to find inspirational ways to get important messages across, developing brilliant new training exercises and writing the supporting notes. (Though, of course, if you're a Trainers' Library customer, you can expect to save 80% of the time you'd otherwise spend on design.)

In reality, we can all reach out to other skilled learning and development professionals and network. The skill is in learning to do this effectively, sharing generously and by doing so, establishing a mutually beneficial 'virtual support team'.

The virtual support team that I've developed over many years is an invaluable resource - a group of professional friends that I can turn to when I want a second opinion, some honest feedback or when I need to tap someone's particular expertise. 

This week's Insight looks at a few things you can do to develop your own virtual support team.

Get involved on forums like Trainers’ Talk (free to all Trainers’ Library members). I’m really proud of Trainers’ Talk and the way some of our members engage with it. Personally, I prefer closed groups like this because they do have a real sense of community which encourages responses that are genuinely helpful rather than focused on marketing the respondees product or service. 

The important thing to remember is not to just ‘get involved’ when you need something, but to actively look for opportunities to help others. People will remember this and it’ll stand you in good stead when you’re looking for feedback or help yourself. Pay it forward.

Use SocialMedia like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to engage with others. And again, pay it forward. This means don’t just tweet your own news and marketing but look for opportunities to really engage with others and build on what others are posting. (By the way, if you’d like to follow us on Twitter, it’s @glasstaplimited).

Attend networking events. The CIPD run local events but there are others too. For many years, I’ve made time to attend Trainers’ Exchange, organised by Nicky Davey of SaltBox. (Despite the name, there is no connection to us.) I’ve often used the events as an opportunity to share ideas with other trainers and at the same time test some of our new Trainers’ Library exercises and get valuable, and honest, feedback on them. Some of those who regularly Trainers’ Exchange are now customers as well as trusted members of my virtual support team.

Taking part in surveys related to learning and development can be useful too. Those conducting the 

research will almost always share the results with those who participate in the project and this in turn might help you develop your understanding of a topic. And here’s an opportunity for you to pay it forward and help us right now, by participating in our survey and sharing your thoughts about icebreakers and other short exercises. 

Blogging is a way of sharing your ideas, skills and experiences with a wide audience. Always try to give your readers something genuinely useful that they can use – something that makes them think, include your contact details and encourage them to enter into dialogue with you. Who knows where it might lead? 

Finally, and brace yourself for a blatent plug – attend events. Attending workshops provides not only a great opportunity to learn new skills that you can use, it also gives you the opportunity to see another trainer in action and to meet other people in a similar role to you. 

And, here it is: There are still a few places left on my Trainers’ Masterclass, running on 19th May, where I’ll show you skills and give you ideas you can apply on a day to day basis to make your training engaging, powerful and fun for participants. I’d love to see you there, and if you don’t learn something genuinely useful, I’ll happily refund your ticket price.