What a young horse trainer can teach us about (classroom) training

One of my signature stories on the speaker platform is the tale of my very first experience training in front of a group. It was the local (unnamed suburb) Community Health Centre and bored at home with a very sleepy baby after a very dynamic role in L&D at ANZ, I decided that I would run courses at night while dad stayed with bub. As a freshly minted psychologist I offered the unnamed centre an array of good topics - stress management, assertiveness, conflict resolution and even relaxation and mindfulness (I was clearly ahead of my time).

What did they have budget for?

Alcohol education courses for convicted drink drivers! After three years of that every Wednesday night I resolved to run a course one day for someone who actually wanted to be there. Luckily, that has happened a few times since.

I love running training courses. I know I’m in 'flow' more often doing that work than any other because I can feel on some days like we just said hello to each other and before I blink we are saying goodbye. All facilitators probably have a collection of those magical emails and cards from participants saying they had a major revelation in the training and did something powerful with it. Yes, I do believe passionately in the value of formal training. The right message evokes a great insight sparks an adaptive action.

But having worked very recently with the Victorian Racing Club and really only tuning into racing this week to see the grounds, gardens and the track those proud employees so lovely prepared, I came across an interview with James Cummings, trainer of the winner of Saturday’s Victoria Derby. James is great-grandson of Jim Cummings and grandson of five-time Derby winner, the legendary Bart Cummings who died last year. James attributed his success to a good horse, a great jockey and learning about horses through a hundred years of "osmosis" as he called it. The accumulated knowhow of four generations, he said, has brought him immeasurable confidence.

Living and breathing horses and horse training since childhood and picking things up as he went along, James is said to have asked questions yet mostly observed. Moreover, James accredits a lot of his confidence to the fact that successfully training horses was seemingly in his DNA; that his family had achieved so much success since their horse training beginnings in 1911 that he just believed. And he continued to believe in Prized Icon and its jockey even when the horse performed in somewhat lacklustre fashion the week before at Moonee Valley.

I'm not a punter and my views on sports betting and advertising are probably obvious to those who know me but James' story epitomises the most famous of learning models developed in the 1980s by the American Centre for Creative Leadership and the thought leader Michael Lombardo et al. The model, known as 70/20/10, posits that 70% of knowledge and skills are acquired on the job via experience, 20% is acquired through social connection and discussion and only 10% via formalised (e.g. classroom) learning.

I will continue to train groups until they're all like the drink drivers who don’t want to be there. However, Cummings’ success is a timely and vivid reminder of the power of dedicated mentorship, skills coaching, on the job instruction and feedback which from a cultural point of view require time, discipline and generosity of spirit coupled with the humility and enthusiasm of a learner who decides to watch, listen and ask. Being told to attend training and to stay long enough for someone to hand out a Certificate of Attendance is a far cry from really 'showing up' in the classroom or the boiler room or the boardroom. The benefits of showing up as the leader or the learner are there for all to witness.