This Is Why Your Training Isn't Working

I know why storytelling training doesn’t work.

Which sounds ridiculous considering that one of my jobs is as a storytelling trainer at my company EveryRung . But let’s be honest, so much of it doesn’t. One of the key lessons I’ve gleaned from current clients and those I’m still trying to get is that too many have been let down by training that’s dull and impractical.

Not as bad as the infamous episode from Ricky Gervais’s The Office. Still it’s no wonder that, even at a time when skills training has become one of the most important things a company can spend its money on – something that LinkedIn’s CEO Ryan Roslansky has been brilliant at vocalising - training budgets are being cut.

But there is a solution.

Last week I endured one of the most intimidating experiences of my new career as an upskilling consultant. Surrounded by a semi-circle of insight and data experts from one of the world’s top consumer companies – and my biggest-ever client – they analysed my performance after two days of training. The feedback was great, especially for my Journaslim approach (not a spelling mistake).

But the most interesting bit had nothing to do with me. It was this: ‘Why can’t we do more training sessions that are actually useful?’

The problem with storytelling training is the word. Training. It’s as if we’re saying that a few hours (days if you’re lucky) in a room with some slides, whiteboards and expert guidance will transform your storytelling abilities. ‘These are the 10 off-my-shelf rules you need to follow. Here’s some takeaway templates. Thanks so much for inviting me. Good luck.’

Would you pay a driving instructor to do the same, a swimming coach, or anyone in the business of training transferable skills?

The Financial Times recently ran a brilliant series of articles about the crisis in skills training. Here’s a small excerpt from a piece by Emma Jacobs :

According to research by City and Guilds, a UK-based skills organisation, 59 per cent of employees found their training content was not “exciting or engaging”. Many also failed to see an impact on their career progression and performance at work, or an understanding of their sector and organisation… A report published last year by the Learning and Work Institute argued that the UK risks “sleepwalking to stagnation in skills” because spending on training employees fell more than a quarter in real terms between 2005 and 2019, from ￡2,139 to ￡1,530 per year.

I got into this industry by mistake. The best mistake I ever made. A former journalist trying to figure out how to make the skills from 25 years in high-profile media roles, useful for an entirely different purpose. And like all accidental career-changes, I watched and learned before doing anything. I’m still learning.

I started to wonder why so much of the brilliant data and insights generated by companies wasn’t being acted upon. It was as if the gold dust slipped through the fingers of decision-makers because data itself simply isn’t engaging. It needs a story or a narrative to bring it to life.

Many of the companies I’ve been lucky enough to work for will be at the ESOMAR Congress this month, no doubt trying to solve that same dilemma – how can we make the data matter more? I’m looking forward to joining them, listening this year rather than speaking.

One of the answers to making data matter more is to make skills matter more. And one of the ways people like me can help that happen is to make training matter more. With one simple tweak.

We need to be learning before teaching.

We need to learn about a company’s bad habits, why work isn’t working, the type of inspiration people are looking for, how they’re utilising AI, where things are going wrong, who the stakeholders are and how they operate, what the work actually looks like and how it’s being delivered, what kinds of storytelling will and won’t be effective. And then we need to learn how our advice is or isn’t being used.

How can you train people to become better storytellers if you’ve no idea why they aren’t already? (Secret: They are. You are. You just need a nudge.) Figure that out first and then you can create a series of workshops, mentoring sessions, a full-scale coaching programme that, above all else, does one thing brilliantly.

Makes storytelling useful.

That word – useful – is more important than I ever realised. Training budgets are being slashed because training isn’t nearly as useful, simple and tailored as it should be.

Instead of everyone simply listening to me, I need to listen to you. That’s where the value is – learning together.