How do you use your best employees to train the rest?

There's often one employee who solves a problem. Find them. Observe what they do. Ask questions. Document their expertise. This helps you do two things: 1. Quickly find a proven solution 2. Establish credibility with other learners Other employees are more likely to buy-in during training. They trust procedures they know their colleagues use successfully.

??Identify top employees who excel and are willing to share knowledge. ??Encourage these employees to lead training sessions and workshops. ??Pair them with less experienced staff for mentorship programs. ??Develop structured training materials based on their expertise. ??Use their feedback to continuously improve training processes. ??Recognize and reward their efforts to motivate them. ??Foster a culture of continuous learning and knowledge sharing. ??Schedule regular check-ins to ensure the training is effective and inclusive.

Your best employees are ones with a willingness to share their expertise with emerging ones and to assume accountability of the learning plan. Recognize and incentivize their progress throughout.

I leverage my top performers by identifying their strengths and expertise, then incorporating them into the training process. This can involve them co-leading workshops, mentoring new hires, or creating bite-sized training modules based on their real-world experience. This not only deepens the knowledge transfer but also fosters a culture of learning and peer-to-peer support.

By appreciating them for whatever good they are doing and supporting them whenever they are facing any challenge. This will encourage them to do things differently and efficiently.

If you are looking to train someone in the organization for skill X , you can ask someone who specialises in skill Y to do the same. How do you avoid this?, by having clear training objectives, define what exactly is needed, how would you measure progress. Having these points clear right at the beginning creates a huge impact on the overall training of employees.

Along with the training objectives, it's important to contextualize: "Who specifically will be trained by whom and when?" Then determining formats, such as formal vs informal, on-the-job, seminars, group training, one-on-one, etc.

One thing that is helpful in a training class, is there must be a course objective to determine the need, and assessment of the course. We must have clear goals, aligned with the right outcomes. A training manager must have an organization vision, and what they expect from each student. The course curriculum must define the process and the problem. What deliverables, and methods. Most training instructors must abide by the syllabus, of the course. The assessment determines who is learning and growing, and who needs more training.

Welcome to the world of Train the Trainer. It is a must-have training model in successful organizations to equip their employees with the ability to train others. A model curriculum would enable the potential functional trainers learn several basics to strengthen their Training Ability and more importantly the participants Learning Ability by Executing successfully what they learned from the Internal Trainer. These Trainers should be able to: Understand Adults-Learning essentials. The training principles The Training Cycle Giving Feedback Coaching ability Demonstrating a skill perfectly well How to be Approachable for Trainees How to become a Master Simplifier How to utilize Fun in a session How to handle questions &/or difficult questions

Selecting internal trainers requires respect and strategy. Always engage with managers first. Recognizing talent, I name them "subject experts" and often host 'Masterclasses' - a mark of premium, insightful training. The focus? Short, impactful sessions. It is always a win-win to create communities for trainers to share, refine, and grow. Feedback loops assess and applaud their impact. Harnessing employee expertise demands support, recognition, and the right approach.

I agree definitely set the ground rules and define what the training goal is. Invest in your trainers and provide guidelines. You can also help them to structure the training and so they are well organized when it is time to deliver. Provide timely feedback and check have a practice session with them to build confidence.

One of the aspect of preparing your trainers is that not necessarily the best employee can be also a good teacher. To be able to teach the high performing employee must have the will and the skill to teach. The trainers must be hand picked from high achievers who have a knack for sharing knowledge

Experts are rarely skilled communicators and certainly not a trained trainer. Giving them training to 'grow as trainers' is a good idea since it will give them an opportunity to grow as communicators and leaders.

Organizations should bring a modern management culture where best employees should be open to training without having them fear of their own job, people still feel that if they train someone to do the job then organization will not need or depend on them anymore however it's the other way around. Leaders create leaders and they should know this and organization should help such employees grow within organization

Something I found effective with every role I've taken is to create a functional trainer community. After identifying, running them through a train the trainer program, I have quarterly meetings with our functional trainers to refresh skills, teach new skills, or just gather to share case studies on effective and ineffective results for everyone to learn from each other. But honestly, it's just an excuse for all of us to get together and socialize once a quarter to remind everyone support is around when you need it.

Supporting internal trainers is extremely important and I do agree with the statement here. To achieve that there are many things that L&D experts may do alone, however building a strong internal learning culture on a company level is extremely beneficial for all involved parties. Employees shine when they have a safe space to share knowledge, but also feel comfortable to learn from others and trust them. From my perspective the strong internal learning culture has a huge positive impact on the business, employees, leaders, trainers and should be considered when it comes to finding ways how to support trainers.

From experience, I've seen that supporting your potential trainers is crucial. They have the knowledge and with a little bit of help, now have the skill to train as well, but they need support to bring the audience to them - the learners. Learners need to be made aware of the value their knowledge, best practices, and experiences will bring. These trainers need to feel valued in the community they are contributing to and they need to be made visible. They may not be aware of how to really do that. Lastly, creating avenues for feedback in the form of recognition and course correction. So, support your trainers so that they have multiple platforms, an opportunity to be a community top voice, and receive encouraging feedback to keep going.

In my experience the best training teams are constantly recognized. The team gets special uniforms, badges, certificates, off-site meetings at nice locations. Create a perceived “special treatment” for those who excel in training. Add extra help when they are actually taking the time to train a new employee. Make your training team be a “club” employees want to join to get the “extra” benefits for training your new staff. Make it a big deal when they are finally certified to train. This is a huge investment that pays off in then long term through lower turnover and better operations.

Use your best employees as mentors or trainers. Assign them to work closely with others, share their expertise, and provide regular feedback. Encourage knowledge sharing and create a culture of learning to leverage their skills for team development.

Measuring training effectiveness is a complex matter. Tests, scores, feedback sheets are but one method but in reality it all boils down to Execution! The real measure of training effectiveness is based on execution. So business results and growth trends is one of them but also one would look at the changed behaviors of the team and how their self-confidence became higher as a result of execution in the post-training period. In sales function it is easier as numbers would tell. But the real added value is when trainees turns the execution of the skill to become a second habit to their day-to-day work. This sets the right measure when growth results become consistent and frequently ongoing towards higher growth trends.

Identify specific skills your best employees excel in and create structured mentorship programs. Encourage open communication and feedback channels to gauge progress. Regularly assess performance metrics and solicit input from both mentors and trainees to fine-tune the training process.

I feel we have somehow fallen into a trap here. Becoming a skilled professional trainer takes years to achieve. Measurement of training is part of a long learning process, it is a complex and resource hungry exercise. Expecting to be able to turn someone into a trainer overnight is as unrealistic as is asking them to effectively measure their training intervention. We can not expect a high level of measurement from someone for whom this is an add-on to their day job. Remember these are your best employees - not your best trainers..the two are not mutually inclusive.

Evaluation is important to keep improving training standards. Staff/learner surveys can highlight areas for improvement. Regular review of KPIs is another way to identify the effectiveness of training interventions. Reward and recognition plays a key role in raising the morale, engagement, retention and leads to a learning culture.

What is a "best employee?" Find the RIGHT people to act as trainers. This may not be a "top performer." Instead, it may be someone with the motivation to help others be successful ... someone with the skills to break down complex processes into simple tasks for new employees ... someone who can effectively tell the story of your organization and the value a new employee will contribute. Don't assume a good performer can automatically become a good trainer. Different skills, motivations, sensibilities, experiences, etc.

The best employees don’t always make the best trainers. When working with SMEs you have to prepare them with skills to not overload the learners. We have to remember it is about getting the need to know information to do the job. Helping the employees understand what the goals of training are and what is out of scope is imperative to prevent cognitive overload.

It is very important to align on why I am choosing a certain employee as the best example. No one is perfect and chances are that they might not be the "best" at something else. So, I need to be cognizant in communicating what specific skill set these XYZ set of people have demonstrated that they are used as an example to solidify training. Their skill sets should match the objective of the training.

Also, just because an employee is great at doing the job does not mean they want to train people or will be any good at it. Being a teacher is a hard gig that takes lots of patience. So please please have a chat with the employee first to see if they even want to do this before forcing them to.

Identifying top employees to train peers is both an honor for the individual and a great move in career and professional development. Beware that some employees tapped to train others may immediately look for more money as some sort of "spot bonus" for their efforts. And you may deem that appropriate under certain circumstances. But coach your high-potential employees to stretch for growth opportunities like serving as "buddies" to new hires, community ambassadors, or internal trainers demonstrating their expertise. There's no better way to grow and develop their careers and pay things forward than sharing their gifts with others. And there are few opportunities to establish themselves as leaders greater than this.