Success as a Trainer: The Competencies Needed

As training and development professionals, we often spend a lot of time in the classroom. Because of this, we have a variety of experiences with seeing facilitators in action—some positive, some not-so-positive. Our participants may tell us what they like on evaluation forms, but that doesn’t really define the competencies that make a facilitator shine—or how well that facilitator will help participants apply and transfer learning.

Trainer Competencies for Success Fall Into Three Areas

In our experience in working with facilitators from around the world, we have identified competencies that are key to success for facilitators who deliver in face-to-face learning environments. They include competence in three areas:

Trainer Competencies Matched with Best Practice Skills Create Better Learning Transfer

The most effective trainers possess competencies associated with success, but they also consistently use facilitation best practices that build participant behavior change. Here are a few examples of facilitation best practices:

• Setting up activities and practices with clarity about what participants are expected to do, how long they have to do it, what they should focus on and what will happen when the practice is finished. Time spent in practices and application is precious and often expensive, especially in cohort-based, face-to-face learning. If participants are confused by loosely given guidelines, or overwhelmed with irrelevant instructions, they may discount the importance of the practice. Additionally, facilitators’ credibility can be diminished by not setting up a practice well, which bleeds into other parts of the learning, creating a distraction and even resistance.
• Providing context and helping participants recognize when specific skills and behaviors are most useful on the job. Before participants can apply a skill effectively, they need to be able to identify the situations where that skill is the right tool to use. Behavior change starts with awareness—of the behavior’s importance—and the situations in which to use it. Facilitators help behavior change by cueing participants to when to use a skill, not just how to use it.
• Having the confidence and skillfulness to conduct live demonstrations of behaviors, ideally using participants’ content. Not only do participants find live demonstrations engaging to watch, they build strong buy-in for use of the behavior by proving to participants that a ‘real live person’ can actually do what is being taught.
• Never leaving a module, skill or practice without first inviting participants to identify what they learned and when they will apply it. In order to transfer learning out of the classroom and onto the job, participants need to take accountability for using skills. Even the briefest of participant commitment begins to drive behavior change. While action planning is useful, so are the small transition points: asking, “Before we leave this topic, what will you do differently the next time you are faced with…?” or “What is one thing you want to remember when you do this in “real life?” are simple questions that ask participants to consider the application of learning.

Sometimes even the most experienced facilitator will neglect these and other best practice behaviors. Effective instructional design can support facilitators in putting these behaviors into practice.

Learn more about instructional design that drives learning transfer

Missing Trainer Competencies Can Equates to Lower Effectiveness 

Not all competencies listed are of the same priority level, yet, our experience tells us that if any of these are missing, it will show up in facilitator performance over time in the form of lower participant satisfaction scores, reduced transfer of learning, less participant behavior change, increased behind-the-scenes faculty management issues and decreased trainer longevity.

Being mindful of these competencies when selecting and managing trainers can ensure a more effective trainer team. And, for those who fulfill the role of trainer or facilitator, these competencies can help guide self-assessment and development to higher levels of performance.

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