Establishing a comprehensive training agenda allows you to plan and organize your training events so they run smoothly. By clearly defining your audience, speakers, time frame, learning objectives and topics, you ensure that training programs fulfill their intended purpose. Typical training agendas for professional development include managing change, negotiating effectively, making decisions and solving problems. The agenda usually includes an introduction, icebreaker activity, lecture, exercises and optionally, a test. The agenda may also specify breaks and homework assignments.
An example agenda for a training course on managing change typically includes practical advice for handling change. It lists theories, such as management expert John Kotter’s eight-step change model. The agenda also allocates time that allows participants the opportunity to practice analyzing a situation, preparing a plan, implementing actions, overcoming obstacles and objections, and monitoring progress.
Participants completing a training course on negotiation typically follow an agenda that begins with an overview of the negotiation process. This includes assessing their own interests, understanding the interests of the other party, developing options to present some sort of value to the other party and avoiding barriers to agreement. The agenda also includes time to participate in role-playing exercises. For example, the facilitator might divide the class into pairs to practice handling a relevant conflict, such as how much to pay for a critical supply. One person plays the customer. The other person plays the supplier. For the first five minutes, the pairs practice using the distributive negotiation strategy, so that one person wins. For the next five minutes, they practice using the integrative negotiation strategy, so that both parties come to an agreement that suits them both. Then, the agenda specifies time for the pairs to discuss the different methods.
Training courses on decision making usually include an agenda that starts with lectures on how to identify issues, generate multiple alternatives, make a decision and communicate the decision to everyone impacted by the outcome. The training agenda might also include examining case studies that help participants practice evaluating the effectiveness of decisions, refining decisions and choosing alternate paths based on data and calculations.
A training agenda for a course on problem solving prepares a participant to think more strategically when solving critical business problems. Overview presentations and lectures provide participants with details about counterproductive thinking patterns. The agenda typically includes self-assessment activities that help participants determine their current ability to frame problems effectively so that they can find solutions. During the subsequent training-agenda sessions, participants learn how to recognize and gather information about problems to determine assumptions.