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Solidify Their Learning

AS DISCUSSED in the introduction, the supervisor is crucial when it comes to behavior change and transfer of training back on the job. This only makes sense. You are their coach. Following a learning experience, ask your team members what they learned, what they would like to change, and how you can assist them in the process. By doing so, they will trust that you support their efforts and care about their development.

Support needs to be behavioral. For example, if you are sending people to training, don’t let it begin and end there. Before the training, ask them what they hope to gain from the experience and how it applies to their role. When they return, ask them to quickly report on this. Take one of their goals and make it part of their performance review process. And finally, support them by giving them a stage to report their learning to others on the team. There may be hesitancy with some individuals to report to others what they have learned—maybe even some level of anxiety. This is good, because challenges of this sort can turn into real growth experiences.

It’s important to remember that leaders must think of the growth potential not only of the active participant in a conference (the person attending) but also the passive recipients (individuals who did not attend but could still benefit from this learning). A small start-up company made it a policy that all learning will be shared with others. What if the training was a dud (which certainly happens)? The individuals attending were expected to share why the learning bombed, what their expectations were, and how they might achieve the learning in other ways (e.g., online resources, books, journal articles, and so forth). We hope you see that the leader in this specific example is being concrete in the types of behavioral support needed to enhance learning.