How to get more from trainings and seminars

Every year more and more educational events are held in IT: conferences, trainings, seminars, community meetings, webinars, etc. Many take care of their development and education by attending interesting trainings in order to familiarize themselves with new technologies, practices and approaches. It really allows you to save time and get a lot of information in a short time. Speech in my article will go about how you can make attending training more effective and useful. This is a kind of instruction for participants. For whom it is important, I ask under the cat.

I decided to share the painful ones and play a little bit on Captain Obvious. I have enough experience in organizing public events for 10-1000 people, including various trainings (public, corporate, coaching). People come to trainings in order to gain new knowledge, motivate them to apply and change in their current project, systematize existing knowledge, and simply expand their horizons. At the same time, it is logical that the participant should be getting the maximum level for the money spent (in other words, ROI).

Unfortunately, in most cases the participants do not try to get more from the training, and often they do not try at all. I want to give some advice to those who go to the training in order to really learn:

• Study at least superficially the topic of training. If you are familiar with it, then systematize knowledge, make a list or mind map of areas of interest to you. Take the time to update the information, if you have not experienced the topic of training for a long time. Thanks to this, you will have an idea about basic things and will be able to more easily perceive new information.
• Make a list of questions for training. Scroll through your head and remember all the points regarding the topic of training, with which you had problems in practice. Formulate for yourself a list of questions for the coach and be sure to take it with you. Also, it is useful to synchronize questions with the training program, to ask them at the right time, not looking ahead, but not postponing to the very end.
• Be sure to specify whether there will be presentations and other materials from the coach. This will help you not to do extra work and not to take notes of the already available information. You can only make important notes and then synchronize them with the materials, giving more time to getting new information.
• Prepare for training technically. If the training takes place on a technical topic and you need to bring a laptop with installed software, then do all the preparatory steps in advance. Do not just install the software, and get the initial level of its application. To do this, you should ask for help from your colleagues, read the manual or part of the book, try basic things in practice. Just try, because the theory may not be so simple. What is it for? Usually there is not much time for practical tasks and it is very stupid to lose it on basic things like installing software and trying to learn how to use it. Instead, you should get new knowledge and try in practice what the coach has prepared for you.
• Come on time for training. Being late, you make two mistakes at once - you have less time to bring yourself to school (drink coffee, eat, go to the toilet, prepare the workplace) and you miss the acquaintance with the trainer and the participants. You will not learn about the problems of other participants, the specifics of the coach’s work, the structure of the training, or organizational issues. Which means you will not be so productive at the training, which is stupid when you spend money on visiting it.
• Take a rest before training. Do not hang out on the eve of the whole evening at a bar or club, get drunk with friends, and then do not think anything the next day. You can do it after training.
• Be sure to bring a notebook and pen. Even if the idea seems obvious to you, you will forget it anyway (it will simply be supplanted by other thoughts). There is nothing better than a notebook and pen for such information. Electronic devices (phone, tablet, laptop) will distract you more.
• Do not be distracted by a variety of devices and external sources of information (mail, Skype, Internet). Our brain is not so simple and, falling out of context even for a short time, you will not be able to go back very quickly. A constant context switch leads to rapid fatigue, which significantly reduces your productivity. Are we trying to achieve this at a training?
• Feel free to ask questions. If you misunderstand something, ask the coach, discuss with your colleagues at the break, ask a question after the training, but in no case do not score. Any doubt and misunderstanding leads to two processes - you are constantly in the background thinking about it and you may misinterpret further information. And this is fraught with the fact that you will soon “get lost” and the coach will have to spend a lot of time on your return to a common understanding.
• Do not argue with the coach. The dispute is one of the most costly training sessions. The psychological structure of a dispute is very complex and it is not always the one who is right that wins over it. Therefore, do not waste your time and group time on disputes. If you do not agree with the coach, ask clarifying questions, give counterexamples, but do not argue. The discussion can be continued at the break or after the training, if you do not change your opinion before this time. Many people resist the experience and opinion of others, so they can not wait to pour it all on the coach and the group. Do not do it - it is not your goal to attend training.
• Never leave the training ahead of time, especially with many days. The risk of missing something important, on which the rest of the material will be based on, is very large. And you will no longer be able to continue working at the training with the same level of productivity. Postpone your business or do not go to the training at all. Partially acquired knowledge can be much more dangerous than ignorance. :)
• Communicate as much as possible with other participants in the training. You gathered in one place not by chance - you all are interested in the topic of training. You have different experiences, different problems, but often you have solutions for each other or just useful information on the topic of training. It is foolish not to get it, just sitting on the breaks on the Internet or mail.

I will be glad to hear your recommendations in the comments! Perhaps I will post my observations and tips on actions after the trainings. But that's another story ... Go to the trainings productively!