How do you evaluate and improve your own skills as a group trainer?

In addition to establishing the S.M.A.R.T. learning objectives, it's important to be clear on the learning goal or outcome. The learning goal serves as the vision for the course. It is broad and sets the intention for the course.

To evaluate and improve skills as a group trainer: 1. Reflect on each session. 2. Ask for feedback. 3. Attend workshops and training. 4. Observe peers. 5. Practice regularly. 6. Stay updated on industry trends. 7. Use evaluation metrics. 8. Be adaptable to diverse learners.

It’s important, especially while leading a group of individuals with varying abilities, to make certain the training you provides consists of progressions and regressions. People need to be taught movements that work to their abilities, whether above or below the mean of the class. Make sure to address all facets of the session; warmup, upper and lower body push and pull, single leg work, cardiovascular conditioning and mobility/flexibility. https://philross.com/

In retreat events, I will energetically test my planned experiences against each registered participant to make sure the exercise will work for each person. If just one doesn't work, I will either work an alternative for that person or redesign that experience and then retest the energetics with each person so that the results are consistent across the board.

Our live events always end with a debrief. We encourage participants to share whatever they are feeling - good, bad, or indifferent. We point out that being witnessed in your journey is actually part of the process and encourage them to be with where they are. All shares are valid and all are received similarly. Afterwards, at the staff debrief we determine whether there is anything on our end to take from that feedback. And if the participant had a challenge with staff or the event, one of our members will take the person aside to discuss it if they are open to it. (My work is transformational in nature and therefore some triggering of client feelings is to be expected. )

My team debriefs at the end of each event. We talk about the experiences we witnessed and got feedback on from participants. We discuss how the experience was for each of us and how it could be improved. We share what we saw in each other that was good and what could use work (self care, timing, etc). So we are in a constant state of self improvement.

You can also learn from other's events that go badly. I've attended events where the litany of things that went wrong caused me to upgrade the training for my staff to make sure that we didn't ever do the same thing.

Be careful when adding in new elements though. Each element has its own challenges and can impact the group in ways you can't necessarily predict. I like to do my experimenting with friends before bringing it to a paid group. I also like to attend something with that element as a student before trying to run it if I don't have someone on my team who has done it before. This way I know what the participants are experiencing.

When looking for ways to improve your skills, don't stick with just your area of expertise. Consider branching out and learning new things that can impact your presentation and course design. For instance when I talked at the top of this article about testing the efficacy of different aspects energetically. Or perhaps improve your speaking and how you hold space in the room. Or consider studying how to bring music into the model. Or how to include physicality into the experience, or scent and how it can expand the experience. Take vocal lessons to improve your tonality. You are a whole person and so are your participants. Improve yourself and you'll expand your impact.