Yes, it’s true. When you are conducting a train-the-trainer session, you need to work with your subject matter expert (SME) to train them how to teach their own material. It sounds silly. In fact, your SME may not want to be taught how to teach their own material! But as part of a train-the-trainer session, make sure you include this vital component.

To review from last week’s blog on train-the-trainer (TTT) sessions, they need to include three main topics:

• The material to be taught
• Vocal quality and body position
• Classroom management

This week, we will explore how to make sure your SME is teaching the program that you have designed together.

TTT for the Unconscious Competent

In my book Working with SMEs, I discuss different types of subject matter experts including the type you most often will work with – a brilliant unconscious competent. Briefly, an unconscious competent is someone who knows their subject so well that they don’t even know how much they know.

In a class with targeted material and a limited amount of time, this can get very messy. As the SME begins to teach the real class, they will think of a million examples and stories from their career. Their love for the topic is the whole reason you want them to teach the class. It is that enthusiasm, however, that can become a runaway train. The SME may be very engaging and the class may love the session. However, without a little structure, the actual training material and lesson plan may be lost.

Therefore, before you put your SME in front of a class, remind them to follow the training program they worked with you to develop.  You can achieve this most easily by asking them to teach a module to you and a few other people using a clock and the timed, written materials. When they teach a lesson to you and are required to stick to the facilitator’s guide, you will both discover:

• How well your timing actually works
• How much flexibility the trainer can take to add their own stories and examples
• If their discussion includes all the points in your learning objectives

Demonstration, Observation, Feedback

Ideally, you will teach the entire class as written to a group of trainers-in-training who will experience the course in its entirety before getting in front of a class. This allows you to get feedback and make any final tweaks in timing, activities and content level.  After you’ve demonstrated the way the class is designed to be taught, turn it over to the trainers to teach back to you. Give each trainee one section of the program to teach; it is unlikely you will have time for each trainee to teach back the entire course.

Some of your trainers who are not SMEs will probably follow your script pretty closely. It is your SME-trainers who most commonly may take the topic and run with it.

As you observe your new trainers, the non-SMEs will learn a lot from listening to the experts. And the SMEs will learn the limits of teaching within the structure of a designed learning experience.  Everybody wins in this scenario.

Finally, make sure to also observe your new trainers for their first few classes. When your SME actually goes live, you can be guaranteed that it will be a different experience for them. Your ongoing support through the transition to teaching real classes is very valuable. Hold their hand until they become an experienced trainer who knows how to teach their subject in a linear way.

The students will benefit and the SMEs will enjoy the experience much more as they become increasingly successful.