No matter how well you as an expert are prepared: If your participants do not understand the purpose of the training, have different expectations of you, or simply lack basic knowledge, the success of your training is at serious risk. With our four methods, you can achieve perfect preparation. Each requires a maximum of 30 minutes investment for motivated participants and sustainable training success!

Why Preparation is So Important

As a trainer or coach, you have surely experienced this: Participants come to your seminar or coaching and have no idea what to expect. Instead of diving straight into the content, you must motivate skeptical participants, clarify fundamental questions, and compensate for missing prior knowledge. Such a start disrupts your content and schedule.

It is particularly dangerous if participants do not see any added value in the training at the beginning: They do not engage, take in little new knowledge, or do not apply it in their daily work. The sustainability of your training suffers even before you begin with the content.

Prerequisites for an Ideal Start

A good start with motivated participants looks like this:

• Your participants know why they are here and have clear individual goals.

• You know the goals of your participants and can address them directly.

• Your participants have content-related questions or examples from their everyday lives prepared.

• You know the level of knowledge of your participants.

If these four points are met, a truly great seminar or coaching session is possible. Your participants are motivated, have a clear goal in mind, and focus on the important content. Ideally, they have already engaged with the topics in advance and have interesting content-related questions that will also help the other learners.

Do you also want motivated participants and an effectively utilized seminar time? With good preparation, that is possible! We will show you four very simple methods for great training preparation and how you can implement them with little effort. The catch: You can implement each method in 30 minutes!

4 Methods to Prepare Your Training

The following four methods have been tested by numerous trainers and are already widely used. All methods are so fundamental that they fit nearly any training or coaching. You can choose one of them or ideally use them all.

1. Preparation Method: "What is Important to You?"

“What is important to you?” Asking participants about their expectations helps you clarify questions and address wishes specifically during the training.

Why? Often, your participants come with different expectations at the beginning of the training. If you gain an overview of their expectations, you can address them specifically in your training.

How? Your participants will receive some questions from you before the first live session. The questions should be answered in bullet points. Open questions are well suited, for example:

• “What effect are you hoping for from the seminar?”

• “What behavioral change do you wish for?”

• “In what situations do you want to be able to react differently/better?”

You will evaluate the answers before the seminar or coaching. This way, you can prepare for specific wishes and expectations.

2. Preparation Method: "What is Your Current Level?"

“What is your current level?” Questions about the current state of knowledge help not only you but also the participants identify knowledge gaps and prepare for the upcoming topics.

Why? Your participants check their own knowledge about the seminar topic even before the training and can better prepare for the in-person session. If knowledge gaps are identified and eliminated before the in-person session, you can be sure that your content will be understood.

How? Consider which topics will be covered in the in-person session and jot down two good questions for each topic. The questions should encourage participants to self-reflect and should not ask for specific content yet. Good questions would be, for example:

• “How well do you assess your knowledge of (your topic)?”

• “Which 3 terms do you associate with (your topic)?”

Participants should also have enough time before the in-person event to answer the questions and prepare for your topics.

3. Preparation Method: "Start Well Prepared!"

“Start well prepared”: With preparatory tasks, you can gather examples from your participants' everyday lives and simultaneously sensitize them to your topic.

Why? Examples and observations from your participants' work life provide a good basis for your in-person session. In addition, the participants tune in to the topic during preparation and sensitize themselves to it.

How? Ask your participants several weeks before the actual training to pay attention to something specific at their workplace. Provide them with support, such as a checklist with important questions.

Such a task can look different and depends on the theme of your training. For a seminar on “Communication,” it could look like this:

• Task: “Pay attention to when communication problems occur in your communication with colleagues.”

• Checklist: 1. “What was it about roughly?” - 2. “How was it communicated (in person, email, phone)?” - 3. “What was the problem?”

One or two weeks before the seminar is a good time frame, depending on the extent of the task. Consider whether you want to evaluate the results before the in-person session or if participants should bring them directly to the seminar.

4. Preparation Method: “Look Forward to…”

“Look forward to…”: Clearly communicating the agenda and topics gives your participants security and builds a positive expectation.

Why? Knowing exactly how your in-person session will progress helps your participants to adequately prepare for the topics. Clear communication creates a positive expectation and encourages them to express specific questions and wishes.

How? Briefly summarize the flow and topics of your seminar. You should ask yourself a few questions to clarify participants' queries.

For example:

• “What happens on that day?”

• “How can my participant prepare? What should they bring?”

• “What is particularly exciting about that day?”

Keep it brief! Add a call to action for them to share wishes, comments, or especially important aspects. A personal video, in which you explain the process and motivate the participants to take action, is particularly suitable for this preparation method.

Practical Tips for the 4 Methods

1. “What is Important to You?”

Added value: You learn about the expectations of the participants through open questions and can adapt to their wishes.

Practical tip: Casual formats with open response options are very well suited here. An interactive online accompaniment with quizzes or surveys can be quickly set up and offers great added value for your training. Bonus point for you: You can easily collect and evaluate the answers.

2. “What is Your Current Level?”

Added value: Your participants identify and close knowledge gaps before the in-person session. And you can adequately prepare for their knowledge level.

Practical tip: Asking participants for a personal assessment (“How well do you assess your knowledge of the topic?”) encourages self-reflection without creating pressure.

3. “Start Well Prepared”

Added value: Participants observe situations in their daily lives – you use these as examples in training to enable effective learning transfer.

Practical tip: If you use an online platform, offer helpful material as a flexible download. For example, a checklist as a PDF. This way, no distributed paper can get lost, and participants can be flexible in how they integrate the tasks into their daily lives: printed, on the PC, or smartphone?

4. “Look Forward to…”

Added value: You provide participants with precise information about the flow and topics of the training, make them curious, and ensure a relaxed start.

Practical tip: A video in which you personally address the participants and highlight the most exciting topics is best suited for this. This way, you can start building a personal connection even before the first appointment. You only need minimal equipment for high-quality self-produced videos!

With 40 Online Methods to Success

If you want to redesign your training, consider an online accompaniment! Not only can preparation methods be quickly and easily implemented on an online platform (see “Practical Tips” above). An accompaniment between multiple in-person sessions or support after the actual training is also possible.

Online accompaniment offers numerous opportunities to integrate new methods into your training. The preparation methods are just four examples from our rocket pack: Our card set includes a total of 40 methods for a combination of in-person and online learning! This makes it easy for you to create a so-called “Blended Learning.”

Do you want to accompany your participants flexibly, cost-effectively, and sustainably? Are you curious about the 36 other great training methods? Then secure the rocket pack with proven methods, many practical examples for implementation, and additional online resources with step-by-step instructions!