Designing hybrid work training for managers

Hybrid work training methods were starting to become more commonplace as restrictions lifted, and the client knew this would need to become part of their workplace going forward. But that meant upskilling managers to be able to adapt to these new ways of working….

Our partnership with this organisation started at the beginning of the pandemic.  Like many others, they had realised the need to transition their training to the virtual environment and had completed our virtual train the trainer program. We were thrilled to hear that following on from this, the VTT methods, skills and way of training was now firmly embedded in their training delivery. The company wanted new trainers joining the company to be consistent with these high standards and be able to train the “VTT way”. We continued working with them to train any new coaches and ran a series of supercharged TTT’s for any new trainers entering their company to get them up to speed quickly.

Flashforward, and the country is starting to lift restrictions. Coming out of lockdown, more people were eager to return to the office. As an organisation, they were keen to support this — they wanted to encourage their employees to work in a hybrid way, in what they dubbed as “smart working”. Understanding that smart working would need to be part of their policy going forwards — they wanted to support managers on how to work smartly with flexible training, how to manage teams smartly, and how to adapt to the smart working environment.

The metrics

• 6 topics
• 12 workshops
• 15 hours of design per workshop

Challenge

We were asked to design a fleet of bespoke branded workshops, focused on smart working. Curating high quality workshops was paramount — the training was to be delivered on a huge scale — to thousands of managers across the UK. With so many leaders to upskill, and with the VTT virtual train the trainer already completed, the organisation opted to deliver the workshops themselves internally — once VTT had designed it.

When it came to the development process, collaboration needed to be at the core of our work. Co-creating the workshops our design team at VTT worked with their client point of contact which required constant communication to ensure each workshop was exactly what they envisioned.

There were 6 key skills that needed to be covered in the workshops to ensure hybrid work training goals were met:

• Change and transformation
• Decision making
• Difficult conversations
• Engagement and motivation
• Performance management
• Smart meetings

Solution

• One of the things we pride ourselves on at VTT is adaptability. Our approach is never a one size fit’s all, and when designing the right flexible training for this business, this was certainly the case. When it came to the design process, we made sure they were involved in every step, discussing improvements to ensure the results were aligned with the client’s goals until the workshops received the client’s final stamp of approval.
• However, we knew that having well designed workshops was only the first step. Being able to deliver the workshops in line with the design was crucial for successful learning transfer. We developed coach notes and video walkthroughs of each workshop to ensure the company’s own coaches and trainers felt confident with their workshops and had all the support they needed to ensure participants enjoyed the best possible learning experience.

Result

• A series of 1 hour workshops designed specifically to upskill in 6 key skills, with customer own branding — all ready to be delivered by their own coaches.
• Following the successful delivery of the UK smart working skills training for managers, we were contacted by another subsidiary of the parent business requesting delivery of the workshops across their management teams.