Are you walking the walk?
When I'm training leaders, I often get asked by participants in the class, "Is my boss going to take this class?" Or they ask, "Did my boss take this class?"
Sometimes the answer is yes. And if the answer is yes, I say, "Why did you ask me?"
They say, "Because I see them doing it." Which is great — that means they're applying the stuff they learned.
Or they're saying, "Well, they're not doing it." Which, if they've actually attended, that's a problem. I can take some of that, but that's a problem.
The Real Question Isn't Whether They Attended
The point here is not whether someone took the training or not. It's whether they're taking action or not. Because behavior matters more than words.
It's not "you should take this." It's "I'm doing this stuff." That's what matters the most.
Two Questions to Ask
If you want your folks to take some action on the training they attend, there are two questions to ask.
Number one: do they know what's expected? Do they know that you want them to take action? That the actions they're going to learn in the training matter, make sense, and are relevant? That it's worth their time?
Secondly: are you modeling what's expected? It's one thing for you to say what you want people to do. It's another thing for you to be doing it. And if you're not doing it, it's not going to work.
If either of these are missing — if people don't know what's expected, and/or they don't see you doing it — the odds of people actually changing their behavior drop drastically.
What This Means for Leaders
From an organizational perspective, here's what to consider: make sure leaders know what's being taught, and make sure they're modeling it.
The words and the knowledge are important. But behavior is more important.
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