They say that it takes about 28 days to make something you do become a habit. Forming a habit is doing something over and over again. Then I read somewhere that “You learn what you do”. That when you worry day by day, you learn to worry better. That made me think a bit. To me, I am seeing an advantage and at the same time a disadvantage here. A disadvantage is that you allow or let yourself worry day by day and still end up worrying in the end. The advantage is you get the chance to practice worrying differently (and yes maybe worry better in a way) every day. However, I do not really condone worrying every day. I would like to think that you have to stop and deal with it instead of continuing to worry. I mean think about it. What if the subject is procrastination? Does it mean that if you procrastinate every day you learn how to procrastinate better? That does not sound right, right? So, I guess, we need to be careful on what we should be doing day by day that will ensure us that once we do something every day, it will give us an advantage which is to become better at it.

So choose wisely what you do day by day. The key is choose something that will improve you as a person. Maybe like figure out how you deal with a situation or problem. One thing you do not want to happen is to sit there, dwelling and festering, right? You want to be able to resolve a certain problem or situation on a day-to-day basis. Deal with it, find a solution and accept it. Allow yourself to go through the phases but do not get stuck. Find positive things if you want to follow this “You learn what you do” day by day. Say, if you are happy day by day you learn how to be happy better. Or if you want to be positive day by day, you learn how to be positive better. Choose to be better. Choose to deal with things in your life better.

Remember when you were a kid? The first books we had were books with more pictures or drawings than written words. Remember those pop-up books? I remember enjoying reading them over and over again. I loved looking at the pictures or drawings and learn the story or narration through seeing the picture or drawing and becoming familiar with them. I love those pop-up books and other interactive books where you get to touch something to move a character of object in the book or just feel the different textures. One day when I was looking for the first books I want to read to my baby before she is born and once she is born, I looked for those pop-up ones or the interactive ones since I want her to be able to touch and see things pop out of a book than just seeing drawings or pictures. The books that my mom read to me or gave to me when I was little where the same so I want my baby to experience it as well. With that, when we were little, this is our first taste of visual learning. When you facilitate a training program, you need to keep in mind the learning styles of your trainees. Some take in and learn when you just talk about a subject matter, while others need visual aids to understand more what you are talking about. I would go more for making your training more visual since most of the time, majority of your learners are visual learners. Plus, this gives you freedom to be more creative in presenting your concepts or theories. Another advantage to this is that your learners will appreciate it more that you have given thought and time to your learners' needs and education. You have designed your program for your learners and not for you alone. Some facilitators just settle in discussing a concept or theories without further thought if their learners will understand it the way they do. They would rather do things that are convenient for them rather than for their learners. When you take this road, you will find that your learners will not fully grasp the material during and even at the end of the training. Starting right now, look at how you are presenting your program. Bear in ind, that you may easily understand what you are talking about but ask yourself if your trainees will as you intend to present the material. If the answer you come up with is no or maybe. Then it is time to change your approach. Make it better to make sure that your learners will get that takeaway you want them to get once the training is over.

As a training professional, being flexible and being prepared for just about anything happening (good or bad) is a MUST. I believe that you are a great trainer if you can segue into a topic – gracefully and without offending anyone as you do it – when the discussion ventures into sensitive topics or situations. There are some trainers who are afraid to go into discussions for fear that they will end up treading into sensitive topics or going-ons within the group that they are training. However, these things just happens sometimes and stumbling into them is not all uncommon. It is really up to the trainer to get it all under control. If he or she cannot do this then this spells trouble. In my years of experience, I have been in the same bind for a number of times but I did not let it go out of control and was able to sway the discussion to a more friendlier and safer discussion. How did I do it? For one, trainers need to remain calm themselves and not panic. Some trainers make the mistake of expressing either these two emotions: 1) fear; or 2) anger. Let us talk about fear. Some trainers immediately panic and worry and get scared once the discussion becomes heated. Where the trainees start using accusatory words and tones with each other. Once the trainer starts to panic – it will show on his or her expression and that is the telltale sign that he or she has lost control of the training. Now, let us talk about anger. Some trainers take on an arrogant approach to the situation. They assert themselves in the wrong kind of way showing their tempers brewing both in the words they use, their body language and their expressions. They want to control the situation but they are handling it the wrong way because if they resort to anger, this will leave a very bad impression with the trainees, who as we have established are already in a disposition that you do not want aggravate. Thus, they as trainees will lose interest in listening to whatever else you have to say after that. In training, once you get a discussion started, you as a training professional need to know the following: 1) Beforehand, you need to know that once this discussion starts, you know where it may lead to (put yourself in your trainees' shoes); 2) Knowing that you have an idea where it might lead to, make sure you know how far will you let it go on and when do you take control of it; 3) Acknowledge the discussion such as saying that everyone is entitled to their own opinions that is why we have discussions. Remember to not take sides, be neutral and maybe even point out something good and bad about both views and then leave them to ponder about it; 4) Segue-segues-segue on to the next topic on your training agenda. You could segue by saying you see that any discussion is a healthy discussion, however, we seem to be straying away from the subject at hand so we need to move on. Then proceed back to your training agenda; and 5) Be calm and remain calm as the discussion unfolds. Observe how it is enfolding and recognize when it has gone on long enough. Control the fire before it becomes a flame and people start to get burned. Calmness is the key in controlling dangerous waters you will encounter in your training discussions.

There is learning in our everyday living. If you do not see this, then you need to open your eyes more. I believe that we learn every day and for that we are so fortunate especially if you recognize a learning when it happens to you. Whatever simple task we are engaged in, I feel we always learn something. Whether it is old learning (something you have already known before) or a new one – the point is you recognize that you are learning something! If you were to ask me how to define learning I would take say “Learning is like Cooking.” Do not worry, I am not going to start giving you recipes here... but think about it. When our Moms or Dads or Grandparents taught us to cook, you got first-hand experience and recipes, did you not? Recipes that has been handed down for generations. Some I guess you would call classic. Over the years, your grandmother made a certain dish this way because that is how her mother or grandmother taught her. She used the same ingredients and followed the same cooking methods. Right? Then your mom probably changed it a bit, like perhaps added an alternative ingredient or added some new ones that were not there before and even helped the dish taste even better than before. Now that you are cooking the same dish, you probably got a little inspiration and used different ingredients or added a little twist to the dish and came up with an extraordinary dish from the same simple and basic dish your grandmother or mother did before. Were you able to get my point? You started with a basics – things you have learned before and got used to doing the same stuff for years and yet one day, you find yourself, adding more to the basic and creating a better version of the basic and what is great about it is that you learned to improvise! To create! I love cooking and when I do look for recipes of dishes I grew up eating, I would get different versions of it, from the very old-fashioned, basic recipe to a more elaborate, more newer recipe and yet still come up with a dish I know so well, growing up. To me, learning is like cooking because you either stick to what you know – all these years – or you look to improve on what you already know. You have a choice. Again, do not get me wrong. I am not saying that sticking to the old things you know are bad. Learning old things is good. I think I call re-learning old stuff. I, myself, like to go back and do that at times. What I am saying is, you learn even a lot more if you improve on what you already know and the way to do that is to learn something new about things you already know or even something you have not heard of before. When you do this, you will be proud of yourself and the end result is a better and improved YOU. Think about it.

One time I attended a training with some colleagues and instead of being encouraged to learn, we felt antagonized because instead of helping us discover the learning, the facilitator was insulting our intelligence. He acted and showed that he knew more (and better) than we do. As a trainer, there is nothing wrong with being knowledgeable – and you should be to be credible – however, if you want to encourage your learners to learn, you need to involve them in the learning process and help them discover the learning – not act you are a Ms-Know-It-All or Mr-Know-It-All and be high and mighty with them. The biggest mistake a trainer can make is alienating his or her learners. If you want them to be involved and participate in the whole training program, you need to give them aid and guide them not work against them. This is what makes your training program a success. After all, the program is all about your learners and not you. That trainer we had, since there were a several batches he facilitated along with us, we heard that the other trainees complained about him too and we did not see him again the next days nor was he a trainer for the succeeding batches that came along. Remember your goals as a facilitator: 1) Be knowledgeable but do not shove it in your learners faces; 2) Involve them in the learning; 3) Aid them do not alienate them; 4) Encourage them to participate and most importantly; 5) Remind yourself: It is all about them and not you. Once you keep all these in mind, you will find that you will a group of happy campers – in this case, learners throughout the duration of your training program.

If you are doing training for your team or trainees, I often talk about making your activities relevant to the topics in your training program. I am not changing my stance on this in fact, I encourage it very much. These activities after all will benefit your learners in the long run. I do encourage that you give them some variety sometimes, insert a non-relevant short activity like a game especially after the lunch break. Your learners (and even you – some times) are in that siesta mood state after having lunch and therefore, have not exactly shifted to the learning mode just yet. So what do you do? You need to wake them up and shake them up back to that learning mood and mode. Something as simple as a “Bring Me” game and give them prizes – I usually give them a candy or chocolate bar or some toy from the dollar store like a stress ball or those squiggly balls. You can be silly or be creative on the prizes there are no rules. Do keep in mind that these intermission games or activities are very short, will not take more than 10 minutes and be sure will not take most of your training time for the rest of the day. Once you have succeeded that your learners are awake and out of that siesta mode and ready to learn, segue on to the next topic in your training schedule. Be very wary though when inserting a non-relevant activity or game in your training day. Some trainers make the mistake of using non-relevant games way too much during their training day that they end up not being able to finish the topics scheduled or not getting the more important training aspects or highlights done on time. For the relevant activities, you can still incorporate the game-like aspect into them say like a “Jeopardy” game. Use the information in your training topics as the Jeopardy topics. Separate them into two groups, a number of players on each group to take turns playing and then giving the winning group a group prize. Why not do a “Family Feud” activity, again using relevant information from the training as topics. Learners learn the material more when it is infused in a fun-filled, yet engaging and useful activity. Do not be afraid to think of activities. When you are creating activities for your next training program, make sure that it is engaging, everyone will be able to participate, related to the topics at hand and do not forget to give time to give a wrap-up of the activity. Reiterate the takeaway from the activity and even ask your learners what did and did not work. By adding and giving variety in your training program, your learners will not only welcome it but thank you for it and everyone – including you – will be ending the training day on a high and positive note.

Ever gave an instruction to someone and they just end up doing it all wrong in the end? When you ask them if the instructions were not clear, you get a response of either 'no, everything was clear.' or 'some were and some were not.' Sometimes, you will even get silence as a response which really does not give you an indication if it was a 'yes' or 'no' or 'maybe'. Whatever response you get, however, if the end result was not what you had envisioned, then something went wrong. You would probably conclude that they were not listening very well to your instructions, right? Wrong! Most of the time, the problem lies on your instructions. It could be a number of things. One, maybe you were not clear enough. Maybe you used words that did not describe what you wanted to describe. Maybe it was how you gave the instructions too. You probably gave them way too fast that the person could not keep up with steps. Or you could probably given them way too slow that the person fell asleep halfway through it. You did not ask them if it was all clear or if they have questions after giving them the instructions. Whatever the case is, if you want people to accomplish something right the first time around (so time and effort will not be wasted for both you and the other person), you need to learn how to give instructions properly. Let us start with clarity in your instructions. When I was taking Toastmasters' speech classes several years back, the first thing I learned was to be clear about what topic you will have for your speech. What do you want to talk about and how do you elaborate on that throughout your speech? It is the same with giving instructions. What do you want your team to do? Be clear at what end result do you want them accomplish. If you are doing training, instructions for activities in your program are very common and giving instructions are very critical. Your trainees need to know what the relevance of the activities are to their overall learning and how the takeaways from these activities are can be applied and help them in the workplace. Choosing the right words to use in your instructions go hand in hand with your being clear about what you want them to accomplish. Sometimes, people use the wrong words when giving instructions that it should not be a surprise if their team gets it all wrong in the end result. Words are vital in giving instructions. Do not go hifalutin words to impress them with your vocabulary. Use words they would understand, simple and effective words. One thing you do not want to happen is that your words gets lost in translation, right? You want them to understand your instructions not analyzing them because of the would need a dictionary to look up the words you just used. Be specific, be simple, be clear. Phrase your instructions well. How you give your instructions, meaning, pacing is also equally important. Do not be in such a hurry to finish the instructions because you have other things to do. Give enough time to give instructions. However, do not fall into the monotone pace either that your team would be so bored that they end up daydreaming or dozing off to never never land instead of listening to you. Be sure to have a moderate pace so that people can understand and your instructions will sink in better as you give them. Probably the most important that most people miss out on when giving instructions is to ask the person you are giving the instructions to if they got it, understood it or they have questions about your instructions. How do you know if they got it the first time around? You can even take time asking them to repeat what you said. By doing this, whatever was missed out on or not clear can be addressed beforehand. Saves you time and effort too, instead of them coming back to you to clarify something about the instructions while they are already in the process of doing them. So remember these the next time you give instructions: 1) Be clear; 2) Watch your phrasing; 3) Watch your pacing and 4) Ask them to repeat the instructions or ask them if they have questions. Once you apply these, you will be sure that you will get the end result you wanted to happen from your team.

Whether you have finish training your trainees or have had a performance talk with your subordinate, remember to always do a follow-up. One common mistake a trainer or a supervisor does is not doing this and just think that the training done or the talk done is good enough. News flash – it is not! For a trainer's perspective, how do you know that the trainees will apply what they learned from attending the training? For a supervisor's perspective, how do you know that the subordinate will do what you have both agreed on? Well, you will probably say “I trust my staff” or “I trust my trainees.” The issue here is not about trust. The issue is about knowing that whatever discussed between you and your subordinate or trainee was understood. Whatever message you have conveyed was interpreted the way that you need them to get interpreted. Sometimes, along the way, the time gap that you have last seen each other plays a major role on the takeaways or advice given being misconstrued and by the time you do check-up on them, it is not a surprise that they are doing something wrong or that they are just plain confuse on what to do. You will then find that all this time was wasted. If you had done a follow-up immediately, then they would have been on the right path from the very beginning. I have encountered supervisors who say did a follow-up on a performance issue with their team members and yet the monthly performance results were still on the problem areas pointed out before. No surprise there that there were no changes. That is another thing that follow-up does. It reflects the results in the end. If your supervisor says they have done a follow-up to a subordinate on the problems areas and yet, every month, the same problems areas are still the same, then you have to look closely at your supervisor's way of following-up. Ask them, how do they follow-up? What do they say? How do they get their subordinates commitment on the performance improvement? Do the same if you are handling trainers instead of supervisors. Do the next step. Join them on their sessions with the subordinate or trainee. Observe how it goes about. Observe behaviors and reactions or the lack of it from both your supervisor or trainee and the person concerned. You can get a lot and learn a lot from these interactions. After the concerned person has been talked to and you have observations regarding the exchange, talk to your supervisor or trainer. Give feedback, give them advice on what went well and what did not. Give suggestions then observe them in the next exchange as they apply those suggestions and feedback that you have shared with them. It is not that you do not trust them, it is more of how all concerned parties will benefit from the follow-up once it is done properly and simply get done. Keep in mind that the follow-ups you do and how you do them will yield the positive results you want to see.

Sunday at church before the preacher started his sermon, he made some announcements and one of them was a 99th birthday celebration of one of the members. He asked the man to stand up and the man did. When the man seated back down, the preacher recalled a short conversation he had with the birthday celebrant. He asked him if he ever had any negative days in his life. The celebrant said “I do not have time to be negative.” What a great outlook, is it not? I am pretty sure he did not say that because of his age, although it does make sense if you think about it. I think he lived that long because he had that outlook all along. Most of the corporate training programs I facilitate greatly deals with attitude shift. Whether it is about customer service or team building or even leadership and management programs, it will almost always involve an attitude shift. You may also know it as a paradigm shift since changing your attitude depends largely on changing your current outlook in a situation. Whenever I create and design training programs that deals with attitude shifts, I always ask the same question as any training professional asks. “Can you really teach an attitude?” My answer would always be, you can guide them the to the ideal attitude you want yo convey however, the changes will happen if the attendees are open to it and willing to learn to accept the change. If they do not, then you certainly will not expect any attitude shift to ever happen once the are done with the training. There are no guarantees because the results depends solely on the person. Openness and willingness. These are the two keys in attitude shifts. You do not have to be a 99 year old birthday celebrant to say “I do not have time to be negative” in life. Why not start now – at whatever age and stage you are in your life. Have that outlook that being negative is a waste of your time. When you think about it – it is, anyway! So start now. Shove the negativity out of the way and move forward with positivity in mind every day – starting this minute.

“The relationship between time and you is always one of master and slave. List making - it is your anchor, your harbor in the storm of life. Start each morning with your wish for the day, and then move right on in into your daily goal list. Remember to keep them in behavorial terms and be specific. Why? Because a specific list is a happy list. And don't forget it's chaos out there. We conquer that by taking control, setting priorities. Life cannot be based on whim. Those who fail to control whim are destined to be controlled by it.”
Frank Allen From the movie The Chaos Theory

Do you prepare a To-Do list? Daily? Weekly or Monthly? Yearly even? Do you finish all that is on the list? How do you come up with your list? Does your list follow a certain pattern? Is it a routine for you? Is it specific? Is it a happy list? Or maybe I should ask “Are you happy with your list?” I remember learning about making a to-do list when I was in 4th grade. We had these notebooks where the 2nd page would usually have this Time Schedule page. We were taught to write down what subjects we hour every hour including the am and pm breaks and lunch time which you write down break or lunch. Beyond the school hours, we were taught to write down which of our subjects we had homeworks and what time to schedule once we get home. On weekends, I had to write down what was up like if I had to do weekend homework or piano or ballet lessons and church. I remember our teachers would look and check them when they collect our notebooks to check if we did our designated homeworks. So I guess you could say that I learned making to-do lists at a young age. Of course as we grow older those lists would be less basic and have grown to more specific ones most especially our to-do lists at work. In my line of work as a training and development professional/consultant/manager, my lists are endless. I am sure yours are too. If you are handling people, you have assessments and performance evaluations to deal with, even job descriptions and responsibilities, productivity reports and added to that are incidents or grievance handling reports, promotion, termination papers. Do not forget your every day responsibilities of handling your department issues and concerns. Yes, to-do lists are never ending. You have to admit, though that a sense of happiness comes over you when you start writing down what you need to do because as Frank Allen said that “chaos is out there and we conquer that by taking control, setting priorities.“ We do need lists to go by our day and to never forget what we needs to be done and dealt with. Otherwise we forget and whatever it is we wanted to do remains undone or unfinished. When you check off that item on your checklist, does it not feel like you have accomplished something great even if it was just a simple task? A to-do list gives you a path to take that day and lets you know you cannot stray away from it. There is that inner voice that tells you “Yes, you need to deal with this today. You cannot put it off any longer.” Would you consider yourself uptight or obsessed if you have a to-do list? I do not think so. Having one just helps you deal with thing for the day and helps you focus on what needs to be done. Use your time efficiently and wisely because we all know time flies fast. Being organized is not a bad thing, you know. So do not freak out if you find yourself making a to-do list one of these days (if you are not the type) and just go with it. You might even discover that it helps you get things done faster because you know what to do and not waste time wondering what it was you needed to do. Grab a paper, grab a pen and start writing. You are not alone.