Methodology For Training

 

I provide coaching, one to one or to a group. I provide one day training / workshop, but also five days courses. I train and coach with equal proficiency, in English and Arabic, including technical terms.

Training Beating DNA

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/training-beating-dna-stephen-m-sweid-dr-/

Yes, I am talking about the type of training that engraves deeply into the DNA, similar to the learning process of bike riding: You never forget how to ride a bike, although it is not part of the inborn skills such as walking! Same applies to swimming, skiing, driving etc.  I am talking about the type of hard and soft skills training that is more powerful than DNA and which reprograms your nature and entrenched habits, and that creates new anchors. I am talking from my own experience and the methodology I apply. I am only talking about the chance to rewrite DNA DURING the training course and not after.

So how is it done?

1 - A Positive, Creative And Stimulating Atmosphere Conducive To Opening Up And Pushing Limits: The Mindset Of Magic

It is about having a very positive atmosphere during training, all conducive to opening up. It is about opening up in a very positive atmosphere and then getting deep into the spirit and soul, the different layers of learning and associations. When people open up they become much more receptive to change, as with a blossom. With opening up deep rooted change becomes much easier to induce, followed by the blooming phase.

Trainer should create a very positive and creative atmosphere very distant from the conventional classroom atmosphere in school. It is all about positive learning, i.e. experiencing things and learning. Trainer creates a learning atmosphere that is very conducive to change. There are different possible approaches. Trainer is putting the people in a specific mindset of MAGIC. In essence, trainer is helping the participants resonate with the environment and vice versa, i.e. participants are in a state of resonance with the learning environment. It is also a lot of fun.

Respect Is Essential
Respect is essential, i.e. the trainer should respect every participant as an equal, with zero arrogance or patronizing. A lot of respect is involved. For instance, I never ask people to switch off their mobile, or to wait for me to finish before asking a question. Indeed, I encourage them to interrupt me, to talk and contribute.

2 - An Atmosphere Of Collaboration And Sharing

Engaging individually and collectively, with focus on collaboration between the PARTICIPANTS rather than competition, including sharing of information.
For instance, I make it clear at the start of the training course that it is much more useful to share information with others during the course rather than being discreet and secretive. Reason being this sharing will bring about an eruption of novel ideas and suggestions made by the peers and trainer in the course, this for the greater benefit of every participant. Participants feel this creative magic in the air right away, and start resonating with it and start opening up more and with more confidence every hour. They notice the difference sharing information makes to performance and are certainly inspired to apply same in their own organization.

3 - Pulling Participants Out Of The Box Right At The Start

I use different methods to drag people from their usual way of thinking and into a new territory. For instance, I do not apply a serial (sequential, linear) approach to the course, as many people do, but rather a parallel approach, where everything is addressed simultaneously to challenge the mind, and to keep connecting constantly between the dots.

4 - A Creative Physical Setting

It is imperative that the training space is remote from the actual office location, and it should be ideally in an open and creative setting, such as some hotel high up in the mountains, or a place mid in an oasis, with possibility of having intervals of the training in an open landscape, or better in the actual discipline being addressed, e.g. in a factory.

Very Nice Food And Buffet: This is all part of the inducing environment and it is very important: Chocolate is key here, but also the nourishing nuts of all kinds. Participants can keep their coffee or tea with them. Main purpose is to create a happy atmosphere but also participants are energized through calories and caffeine, and they feel happy and enthusiastic.

5 - Two Trainers Instead Of One For Added Resonance With Participants

This is not always possible, and it is difficult to get two trainers who harmonize well together. But when this happens, this helps a lot in triggering the needed change

6 - Making Participants Want To Change

This has to be done at an early stage in the training course. First step is to persuade people they want to change, otherwise change won’t happen: Participants have to WANT desperately to change some habits or acquire new skills. When a person really wants to then it becomes DNA change. It is very difficult if the participant keeps resisting change.

Some people come to the training courses without the right conviction or motivation, and they need to be persuaded first. I try and persuade participants that they embrace change through logic, motivation, benefits and the like. This is the first step: Every participant should want to put all the energy and willpower to acquire the new DNAs. I encourage them to WANT to change and to put all their effort and to get very involved.

The least I do is to motivate people to explore their limits and inherent potential, even if they are not sufficiently motivated initially. Once they discover the potential, they feel they want to take it to the next level, and are usually motivated and challenged through the positive encouraging atmosphere. They feel they are exploring new limits in their capabilities.

7 - Opening Up And Pushing Limits: Realizing Enduring Change Through Pushing Limits And Maximum Engagement

Trainer should help participants open up and then let them go through experiences where they are pushing their boundaries; this surely will make changes similar to bike riding. Once a person opens up he or she is learning on a very different level and different memory. I help them not only to open up but indeed to bloom and realize their full potential during the training. I motivate them to push their limits so as they can discover their hidden potential.
When people push their limits the DNA becomes stretched and flexed and is more malleable for change. Learning while pushing limits, while on the edge of capability, is like engraving in stone.

Maximum engagement: I put all my effort as trainer and I become usually exhausted; I ask the participants to put all their effort as well. This is the most important thing for inducing endurable change in a person.

I help people push their limits by motivating them for instance to speak in public and to present their views in public, reason being this is often quite demanding for most people. A lot of expressing and involvement helps in the reshaping of the DNA. When a person overcomes fear, i.e. he or she is pushing limits to extreme, the DNA will be changing in a drastic manner.

I use a lot of motivations for extra effort and pushing limits such as small but frequent prizes, and rewarding people who push their limits with regular applause and cheers.

8 - Realizing The Full Potential Of Each Participant

Trainer should try to extract the best from each participant. I help people change by letting them defy their inherent obstacles and achieve beyond their expectations. I help them discover and realize their full potential. This is how I help change DNA.

9 - New Challenging Experiences

When a person is trying out new things and having new challenging experiences then this person is changing the DNA quite profoundly. It is about a journey of self-discovery and exploration, and this produces changes on a very deep level surpassing DNA. In a very challenging situation the inherent DNA might want to go in a specific direction but I make it go in another, and it is reprogrammed and reinforced through the impact of new and challenging experiences, and indeed through practice.

10 - Engagement Of All Senses: Mental, Physical And Emotional

The role of emotion and feelings in learning from experience has been recognized as an important part of experiential learning. I try and Involve multiple SENSES in the learning process, visual, motion, talking, experimenting, challenge, sound, video etc. I use a number of gadgets for this purpose too, all similar to the learning of how to ride a bike. There is this experiential learning, together with coordination. It is about endurable inscription of the DNA through intensive engagement with involvement of all the senses.

11 - Use Of Tools And Gadgets

I always use tools in training. The new tools that are learned and practiced by the participants help them discover their hidden potential, and become intertwined with their DNA. The tools become the vehicles that help them explore new territories, and take them on new journeys. The tool can be a new abstract methodology or a combination of physical and mental techniques.

12 - A Lot Of Associations

Association is key to learning and reinforcement. I try and create a lot of mental associations to what the participants actually are and do (their work or business), or to what they need, and a lot of inter- associations of things, hence involving intensive associations with real things. Here the parallel approach I usually pursue plays an important role linking the different dots together.

13 - A Lot Of Practice

I usually allocate over 75% of the training time to individual or group exercises, providing ample practice. I often provide participants with special gadgets and exercises motivating them to apply what has been learned during the training hours to the rest of their working day; we can then talk about it in the next day of the course. Such tools act as additional anchors. I am not usually an advocate for giving homework per say, and I prefer to induce the change during the training hours mainly.

IN SUMMARY

Participants should do a lot of practicing after opening up and while pushing their limits. Trainer involves participants in the discovery of their inner self and what they can do. This experiential learning leads to a strong anchoring effect.