L EADING Y OUR T EAM TO S UCCESS : M ANUAL W RITING, T RAINING & F OLLOW -U P Rakiesha Chase Year Two AmeriCorps Project January 2010.

LEADING YOUR TEAM TO SUCCESS:MANUAL WRITING, TRAINING & FOLLOW-UP

Rakiesha Chase

Year Two AmeriCorps Project

January 2010

WHY IS TRAINING IMPORTANT? High turn-over rate at sites Low number of staff members = no

official trainer Good to have documentation of your

processes and procedures for archiving

Good way to break the ice and open lines of communication while simultaneously integrating new team members and volunteers into your current team/organization structure

Increased morale for yourself and your team

QUOTES ABOUT TRAINING:

"Train, don't strain.” -Arthur Lydiard

“The biggest job we have is to teach a newly hired employee how to fail intelligently. We have to train him to experiment over and over and to keep on trying and failing until he learns what will work.”

-Charles F. Kettering

"If the coach cannot do it, he cannot 'teach' it - only talk about it.”

-Percy Cerutty

WRITING A TRAINING MANUAL

MANUAL WRITING CHECKLIST

1. A list of things to be added to the manual

2. Copies of all templates

3. Any old training materials

4. Word processing software

WRITING A TRAINING MANUAL

Make sure you have a highly comprehensible table of contents

Document everything! Nothing is “common knowledge”.

Include templates for everything. Use formatting to help guide people

to important text (bold, italics, headers).

Include diagrams and illustrations where applicable.

WRITING A TRAINING MANUAL Keep it simple. Ask for input from your team

members/staff/volunteers to make sure that you’re not leaving anything out.

Don’t be insulted when you have to make edits once your team starts using your manual.

Provide physical and digital copies of your manual.

Focus the manual and table of contents on tasks rather than ideas.

HOLDING A TRAINING SESSION

TRAINING SESSIONCHECKLIST

1. A training schedule

2. A list of people who need to attend

3. A place to train

4. Handouts and other training materials

5. Agenda for session(s)

HOLDING A TRAINING SESSIONCreate an atmosphere that allows energy to flow.

Make sure you have hand-outs ready.Define goals at the beginning of the session.

If you have several topics to cover, break it up into a series of trainings.

If you are doing a series of trainings, try to schedule them on the same day each week at the same time.

HOLDING A TRAINING SESSIONTurn the training into a conversation.Reference pages and chapters in the training manual as much as possible.

Allow people to ask questions.Brush up on what you’re going to be talking about before your session.

Keep sessions to about 1-2 hrs. If is has to go longer than that, allow for breaks.

Bring snacks!

FOLLOW-UP/PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE(A BIT ON TEAM PROJECT MANAGEMENT)

FOLLOW-UPCHECKLIST

1. A work plan/task list for each employee

2. Communication plan for team (formal or informal)

FOLLOW-UP Make sure that your team members know how to

reach you (contact info, best mode of contacting you).

Check in with your team member(s) to see if they have any questions. Sometimes, people don’t know what they don’t know until you ask them if they know it.

When assigning people new tasks, make sure that they are comfortable completing them. If they are not, conduct an impromptu training with them to get them up to speed.

Create editing/updating protocol for the manual so that it becomes a living document.

Make your team members responsible for their own learning.

PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE

Train a team of knowledge seekers

Document everything using non-technical language where possible

Track edits and create digital copies of all documents

Think outside of the box in terms of training tactics

Things to Consider Things to Do

You won’t be at your site forever

Your training should accommodate for learning curves

Manual and schedule are living documents

Not all sites see the importance of training

SOURCES

Ang, Cherie. "Important Reasons to Train your Personnel." Street Directory. Web. 28 Dec 2009. <http://www.streetdirectory.com/travel_guide/184123/human_resources/important_reasons_to_train_your_personnel.html>. McClelland, Susan. "A Training Needs Assessment for the United Way of Dunn County Wisconsin." 2002. Web. 28 Dec 2009. <http://www.uwstout.edu/lib/thesis/2002/2002mcclellands.pdf>.