‘I liked the training, but it felt a bit rushed...’
‘I liked the training, but I found it a pity that we had to skip some parts due to time.’
You are probably familiar with this feedback. I know I am: I received both frequently when I started out. The skill you have to develop in this case is invisibly being in control of time. When you master this skill, you are able to orchestrate exactly how long each programme segment will take without participants noticing you're pulling the strings.
With this month’s blogposts, I’ll walk you through how you do it. Next up: Dealing with curveballs!
Dealing with curveballs
When it comes to managing your time, curveballs are part of the game. Things will pop up that you can’t control — and they’ll happily throw your perfect timeline out the window.
A couple of examples from personal experience:
A train strike that made everybody 2 hours late
A double booking for a location that had to be fixed first before we could start, 1 hour late
Participants in turmoil because the company announced a round of lay-offs just before the training
Unwilling participants because they had had a very bad experience with their last session
Participants having difficulty understanding the material
All of these instances require your immediate time and attention and force you to get creative with timings right from the get-go. The following tips will help you to do that gracefully:
Remember that you are not obligated to run the programme exactly as it's been designed. The design is just a guideline. It is your job to deliver on the goal of a session and, as they say, there are many roads that lead to Rome…
Don't communicate timings in your agenda. When I share the agenda, I share the sequence of the topics that we'll cover, the time for lunch, and the end-time. This way the participants know what to expect but will not be aware if segments take longer or shorter than expected.
Don't mention it when you skip things. Remember, you are the only one in the room who knows what was supposed to happen. Mentioning you're skipping things will make them feel they're missing out, while they wouldn't even have noticed it had you left it unmentioned.
This is an excerpt from my upcoming book on how to deliver awesome trainings. It comes from the chapter Essential Trainer Skills - Time Management. This theory is also covered in my Train-the-Trainer programme: Inspire to Develop.