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Action Planning and Showing How
Good leaders are also good teachers. While managers may be an expert at something they are asking others to do, they are not necessarily an expert at teaching others how to do it. Maybe they have not consciously considered what it took for them to learn the skill. Perhaps they have not appreciated the role of teaching.
Whatever the reason, Action Planning and Showing How—effectively teaching others—is a critical leadership skill for developing people that is lacking in too many managers. Managers need to clarify outcomes and expectations with their people, but they also need to anticipate what people need for achieving the outcomes and teach them how to meet the expectations.
The fundamentals for Action Planning require managers to do their homework: What will it take for a person to achieve the desired outcomes or master a skill? What sequence of steps will most likely lead to a successful outcome? How much time is required for learning at each stage?
The fundamentals of Showing How provide managers the way to help a person understand, practice, and master a skill over time.
When managers learn to effectively action plan and show how, they realize ...
- My people will progress and get up-to-speed faster—with less pain, frustration, and struggle.
- When I teach a skill or task well, people will do it the way it needs to be done. In the long run, it results in a certain uniformity and consistency based on the most effective way to get the work done.
- It will reduce errors. I will make more efficient use of my resources. I will not have to be in rework and recovery mode as often because there is a higher probability that the work will be done right.
- The process of action planning opens up opportunities to do things differently and better than they have been done in the past.
- There is extraordinary joy in teaching and helping people grow, learn, and master something important to them and the organization.
Action Planning and Showing How develops more respect and trust between leaders and those they are responsible for developing.
Audience
Action Planning and Showing How is designed for use by organizations of all sizes.
- The primary buyer is director level or above in an HR, OD, or Training capacity looking to improve communication skills in his or her organization.
- The primary user is an individual in a supervisory or management role.
Program Format
The experiential learning activities are built around logic puzzles that enable participants to focus on practicing the fundamentals of Action Planning and Showing How without getting derailed by the content of what they teaching. They will understand how to set up the teaching/learning experience and deal with those who initially may balk at puzzles they think they don’t like or are not good at doing. This reaction is a great opportunity for a learning experience: Leaders must often teach people how to do tasks that they themselves don’t relish. Or, they have to take the time and shoulder the responsibility for finding a good teacher who will explain to others how to do it.
Upon learning the fundamentals, participants apply and practice them, using a real work experience.
Action Planning and Showing How is a four–hour sustainability module that is designed to be presented as a classroom session after SLII® or other Blanchard training initiatives. It can also be presented as a free-standing workshop.
Learning Outcomes
- Feel confident that they can show someone how to perform a task or develop a skill
- Appreciate how they feel when they receive effective and appropriate action planning and showing how behaviors from another person
- Recognize inappropriate action planning and showing how behaviors
- Identify the nine Action Planning and Showing How Fundamentals
- Understand the difference between action planning behaviors and showing how behaviors
- Describe how the action planning and showing how behaviors are used differently depending on a person’s development level
- Demonstrate effective action planning and showing how behaviors
- Be clear about how they will use these behaviors back on the job
The Action Planning and Showing How program can be purchased before any type of training with Blanchard, as an additional item within the training, or after the training as a stand-alone item to provide reinforcement and skill enhancement.
Contact us for purchasing information
Sustainability
Sustainability describes the learning process and activities that need to occur before, during, and after training to ensure on-the-job application of new behaviors that are required to maximize the probability of achieving business results. There is a vital link between learning and development, your business issues and strategic goals, and accountability. It rests with having a sustainability strategy for turning learning into behavior.
Coaching to Support Learning
Communication Skills for Managers and Individual Contributors