Shifting the Focus

Although I don't do a lot of set training anymore - by that I mean training that follows a specific curriculum - there is one program I've been conducting a lot lately. At the end of January I will have delivered Job Relations, a 5-day program, five different times in the past 2 months, so I'm getting many chances to learn from the various audiences.

This Job Relations training is part of the Training Within Industry program that was developed by the U.S. government during WWII to keep production up when the workers went to war and we had to train new workers quickly. Consequently, it's not new training by any stretch of the imagination, but it's new (again) to us in the U.S. because we exported it to Japan as part of the war recovery effort, and then essentially forgot about it until the past 4 or 5 years.

So, although this training is set to follow a script, I've noticed in the past 6 months or so of delivering it, that the people in my classes have been ready for a deeper conversation. The training gives supervisors a 4-step method for solving problems with people they supervise. But as we focus on the problems, we keep bringing the problems up. The training also includes another focus called Foundations for Good Relations, which sometimes gets overlooked as we try to solve the problems. The people in the classes recently have been much more open to talking candidly and openly about the coaching aspects of their supervisory responsibilities and thus are much more open to sharing ideas, and the foundations are what we spend more time talking about.

It's proof positive that we can shift the outcome of the class if we shift the focus from what's not working to what is working. Last week one of the comments on the feedback form was "I wish I would have had this training years ago."

I'm excited to be presenting my observations and the outcomes the attendees have seen in their own organizations at a national TWI Summit in Orlando in June.

What are you noticing as you shift your focus from what's not working to what is working - in your business and in your life?