Educational institutes often hire best of the trainers or training partners to enhance the skills of their students and make them employable. Yet, the trainings don't always yield the best of the results; and a number of students fail to secure jobs in the placement drives. It is therefore imperative to consider the following eight factors to get more out of your Campus Placement Training.
1. Acknowledge The Difference Between Teaching And Training:
Most of the training programs fail to deliver because the difference between teaching and training is not acknowledged. Teaching is exam oriented. It enables students to clear exams and score well.
On the other hand, training is performance oriented. It enhances performance through Brain Storming, Role Plays, Simulations and most importantly, Constructive Feedback. It takes the learners as close as possible to reality and provides opportunities to practice the skills learned.
Writing answers in an exam is different from exhibiting the skills in real life. Hence, we need to look beyond teaching and adapt to training. It will help the students acquire the skills needed to become employable and achieve success in their careers. Specialist trainers with right kind of expertise and experience will translate your training into success.
2. Identify The Training Needs Of Your Students:
Imagine a doctor prescribing medicines without even asking for the symptoms. Will the medicines help? Of course not. This applies to your training too. Therefore, identifying the exact training needs of students is vital for the efficacy of any training program.
Training needs keep changing with the market requirements. Hence, consider the following:
Understand what skills the recruiters are looking for.
Check if your students have those skills or up to what extent do they have it.
Conduct the right kind of Tests, Assessments, Surveys, Interviews etc. to identify the skill gaps.
Always remember, that this identification of the training needs defines your training plan.
3. Plan And Execute Your Training Well:
Once the training needs are identified, the next step is to design and develop a training plan with the right Objective, Content and Methodology that is perfectly in line with the desired outcome.
Don't just buy whatever is offered by the training partners. It's advisable to delve into the programs offered by them to check if they actually meet your expectations. The success of the training program ultimately depends on how well it's planned and executed. Hence, select the right training partner who helps you with planning and executing the program.
4. Provide Group Specific Training:
A student with excellent academic scores could struggle with other skills; while a student with average academic scores could be good at it. Hence, form groups of students based on the skill gaps and not their academic background. Then provide group specific training. This is exactly what the world leaders like amazon do to great effect.
5. Don't Consider Training To Be A Mere Formality:
Most of the institutes have trainings just before the placement drives, in which the students are bombarded with a variety of skills. However, just knowing about a skill doesn’t help. Practice is the key. Hence, allow enough time for training without rushing through it.
Imagine a session or a workshop that covers "Interview Skills" in which the students are taught a variety of skills for success in interviews in just 3-4 hours. They are neither made to practice these skills nor they are given feedback to improve performance.
In other words they are not made to apply the skills learnt i.e. Write their own resumes, Get interviewed, Get Feedback for improvement etc. Thus they don't really get to experience the interview process. Do you think these students will be able to perform well? Remember the difference between teaching and training here.
6. Observe The Training Sessions:
No matter how great the training plan is, if it's not executed well, it won't get you the desired outcome. Keep interacting with the students to know what happens in the training sessions. Discuss activities that are conducted during training and what they learnt from them.
Do visit the sessions (Surprise Visit) whenever possible to observe if:
The trainer follows the teaching or the training approach
The trainer is engaging everyone in the session
Appropriate examples are given to clarify doubts
The activities in the sessions are in line with the expected outcomes
The students get ‘Constructive Feedback’ for improvement
7. Use the Right Method to Evaluate Training:
Evaluation of training should never be done merely based on the feedback given by the students. Most of the students are bound to be impressed by the way a trainer interacts with them and end up giving good feedback.
Consider the following for effective evaluation of training:
Set right benchmarks according to the recruiters' expectations.
Compare the Objective and then the outcome of the training to these benchmarks.
Record the Mock Sessions, Activities or Simulations during training; so that, you can check and compare the students’ performance.
8. Upskill Your Placement Cell For Success:
Placement Cell plays a pivotal role in strategizing and executing the placement process. A well trained placement cell helps in attracting new recruiters and retaining the existing ones.
It's imperative to have skilled members in the placement cell. Be it their telephonic and face to face conversations or emails to the recruiters; their etiquette matters. They need to have the expertise to understand the expectations of the recruiters and communicate the same for enhancing the quality of your training.
Trainopaedia is on a mission to help the educational institutes with enhancing their training processes. We offer custom-made cost effective solutions to all your training needs. Please get in touch with us for a free consultation. We'll be happy to help you!
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Hi I am Sawan, a Certified Corporate and Voice & Accent Trainer with 11+ years of experience in the training industry. I have worked with market leaders like Amazon and several other prestigious educational institutes, leading training organizations, domestic companies and multinationals. Having worked in different domains in the training industry and observing the nooks and crannies of the same; the need for world class custom made training that is accessible and affordable to everyone became of paramount importance to me. Thus I founded Trainopaedia. Since its inception in 2018, we have been helping various Educational Institutes, Corporates and Individuals with their training needs and enabling them to succeed.