Quality System Induction Training for New Employees

[Skilz]

Hi All,

Im looking at improving our current "9001/14001 Induction Training" for new employees. The current induction thats being done is very dull and need to be spiced up a bit, to make it more attractive to the new employee.

Does anybody have a template or even slide show i can use to adapt my system to?

Thank you all for this great forum, I always get great reads

 

[Jean_B]

If it's the interest and engagement level that's waning then a template or pre-fab isn't going to fix it.
Engagement is determined more by interactions and delivery than by how attractive something looks.
Interest is linked to motivation, be it extrensic (make this or miss out (on money, promotion, a job)) or intrinsic (partially influenced by engagement but more up to the culture of the workforce and the character and experiences of a person).
If there's confusion then the structure of a template or someone else's might help as inspiration, but it isn't a replacement for making and knowing your own presentation by heart (hint: if you need more than a glance at the slides now and then you don't know it well enough).

For engagement the biggest effect our company (medical device) achieves is done with equipment to simulate the condition of our patient. This is timed to coincide with the point in the induction where we mention what our core objective is, and how hard our personal and working life would be if we would suffer from these conditions. This hits home quite well, on the awareness of the end result we're going for. (It doesn't garantuee attention on all of those baby-steps in doing and supporting production, R&D and customer service matters).
Interest is too personal to make comments about without knowing the people and the company. It is recommended to talk with each of the attendees on a personal or inclusive group base before the presentation, and some research suggests having looked each other in the eyes before training increases effectiveness.
Structure-wise, think of breaking stuff up, even if it's just by switching away from a particular topic to come back to it later. Long stretches without breaks are terrible for interest, attention and learning capacity. Also switch the people presenting in a team manner, instead of one-out, other-in; this shows how well you work together (if you pull it of). Have duo's present and support or take over from each other on the long stretches if you must have those, because there are only very few people that keep interest going before their voice, mannerisms and looks becomes their focus instead of what they're saying.
For making stuff attractive, Presentation Zen was always a nice and clear book.

 

[Skilz]

If it's the interest and engagement level that's waning then a template or pre-fab isn't going to fix it.
Engagement is determined more by interactions and delivery than by how attractive something looks.
Interest is linked to motivation, be it extrensic (make this or miss out (on money, promotion, a job)) or intrinsic (partially influenced by engagement but more up to the culture of the workforce and the character and experiences of a person).
If there's confusion then the structure of a template or someone else's might help as inspiration, but it isn't a replacement for making and knowing your own presentation by heart (hint: if you need more than a glance at the slides now and then you don't know it well enough).

For engagement the biggest effect our company (medical device) achieves is done with equipment to simulate the condition of our patient. This is timed to coincide with the point in the induction where we mention what our core objective is, and how hard our personal and working life would be if we would suffer from these conditions. This hits home quite well, on the awareness of the end result we're going for. (It doesn't garantuee attention on all of those baby-steps in doing and supporting production, R&D and customer service matters).
Interest is too personal to make comments about without knowing the people and the company. It is recommended to talk with each of the attendees on a personal or inclusive group base before the presentation, and some research suggests having looked each other in the eyes before training increases effectiveness.
Structure-wise, think of breaking stuff up, even if it's just by switching away from a particular topic to come back to it later. Long stretches without breaks are terrible for interest, attention and learning capacity. Also switch the people presenting in a team manner, instead of one-out, other-in; this shows how well you work together (if you pull it of). Have duo's present and support or take over from each other on the long stretches if you must have those, because there are only very few people that keep interest going before their voice, mannerisms and looks becomes their focus instead of what they're saying.
For making stuff attractive, Presentation Zen was always a nice and clear book.

Thanks for your input Jean

 

[DrTBurns]

Hi Skilz,

If you want quality training that "spices it up a very big bit" and is as motivating and engaging as you could ever imagine, a new generation of learning using interactive 3D games and exercises is available. It covers quality in general however, rather than specifically ISO 9001.

 

[RoxaneB]

For any presentation to be meaningful - and memorable - it needs to resonate with the attendees. I start off any presentation planning with WHY. WHY should these people care about what you have to say.

Just yesterday, I sat in a meeting with some clinical leaders at a site as they outlined their upcoming Skills Day. This is actually a week of learning for our front line staff (e.g., nurses, personal support workers, and therapists). They are learning (or re-learning) some basic clinical skills - everything from properly charting/documentation to diabetic foot care to medical technology found in homes and so on. It's a pretty intensive time - held over one week, but staff come in for only one day.

The clinical team ran through everything, turned to me with smiles on their faces and asked "Well, did we miss anything?"

"Why?" I challenged them. "Why should our staff come in and learn all this stuff that they hopefully learned back in school?"

"Because it will refresh their knowledge." Was the response.

"So?" I persisted. "If I supposedly know something already, why should I bother coming in for this?"

I was greeted with blank stares.

"You're telling them WHAT to do and HOW to do it, but not WHY. Make me give a [email protected]"

"Well, it's part of their job requirement."

"I can get a job somewhere else, if I'm a nurse or personal support worker. There's a shortage. Anyone will hire me. Try again."

"To stay current on your training?"

"Has it really changed? And if it has, why are we waiting so long to get the information out there? Shame on us. I still don't want to come."

At this point, the site leader spoke up, "Okay, I know what Roxane is getting at. It's technical, but we need to find an emotional connection. How do we do that?"

Silence. Then 5 sets of eyes turned to me.

"Tell a story." I said simply. "We spoke before this meeting about a little boy who was given the incorrect dosage of medication because the nurse didn't read the pump properly. You have a station for that particular pump. Why not post of picture of 'little Timmy' (not his real name) and what happened to him when his insulin dosage was wrong? Say how little Timmy felt...and his Mom...and the fear during the trip to the hospital. I presume the majority of our staff went into healthcare because they wanted to help people like little Timmy. Have them think about *him* while they learn about the pump. Make them care. That's your why."

So, you want to make quality and environmental training more interesting? Tell a story. Talk about an environmental disaster - not necessarily your own if you prefer - and how an EMS could have helped address it, manage it, learn from it, and reduce the likelihood of recurrence.

Stories are a powerful tool and an excellent way to help provide the WHY. They are grossly underused in business, maybe because we associate them with children.

 

[Randy]

If your training isn't relevant to the audience it doesn't matter how many bells and whistles it has or how fun it is. The vast majority of 9001/14001 much of the time isn't relevant to the average worker in a manufacturing or office environment
All it takes for most of what you want to do is provide 3 statements.
1 - Here's what we are doing.
2 - Here's why we are doing it.
3 - Here's how you can help.

Beyond that it's mostly non-essential gibberish, fluff, smoke & mirrors.

 

[Sidney Vianna]

In order to avoid the boredom of a typical presentation, the instructor has to engage the audience. And, to engage, you need to connect. As someone who delivered many ISO 9001 related courses, I know that, unless the audience feels they will gain something from it, they zone out. I wholeheartedly support what Roxane posted, you have find ways to connect with the people in the receiving end of the training. Use real world, recent examples of problems to show how the system needs improvement. Connect at any level you can; technical, commercial, emotional, business, etc...

But until the instructor connects with the audience, we typically end up on a torture by PowerPoint scenario.

Good luck.

 

[QC Dave]

For any presentation to be meaningful - and memorable - it needs to resonate with the attendees. I start off any presentation planning with WHY. WHY should these people care about what you have to say.

Just yesterday, I sat in a meeting with some clinical leaders at a site as they outlined their upcoming Skills Day. This is actually a week of learning for our front line staff (e.g., nurses, personal support workers, and therapists). They are learning (or re-learning) some basic clinical skills - everything from properly charting/documentation to diabetic foot care to medical technology found in homes and so on. It's a pretty intensive time - held over one week, but staff come in for only one day.

The clinical team ran through everything, turned to me with smiles on their faces and asked "Well, did we miss anything?"

"Why?" I challenged them. "Why should our staff come in and learn all this stuff that they hopefully learned back in school?"

"Because it will refresh their knowledge." Was the response.

"So?" I persisted. "If I supposedly know something already, why should I bother coming in for this?"

I was greeted with blank stares.

"You're telling them WHAT to do and HOW to do it, but not WHY. Make me give a [email protected]"

"Well, it's part of their job requirement."

"I can get a job somewhere else, if I'm a nurse or personal support worker. There's a shortage. Anyone will hire me. Try again."

"To stay current on your training?"

"Has it really changed? And if it has, why are we waiting so long to get the information out there? Shame on us. I still don't want to come."

At this point, the site leader spoke up, "Okay, I know what Roxane is getting at. It's technical, but we need to find an emotional connection. How do we do that?"

Silence. Then 5 sets of eyes turned to me.

"Tell a story." I said simply. "We spoke before this meeting about a little boy who was given the incorrect dosage of medication because the nurse didn't read the pump properly. You have a station for that particular pump. Why not post of picture of 'little Timmy' (not his real name) and what happened to him when his insulin dosage was wrong? Say how little Timmy felt...and his Mom...and the fear during the trip to the hospital. I presume the majority of our staff went into healthcare because they wanted to help people like little Timmy. Have them think about *him* while they learn about the pump. Make them care. That's your why."

So, you want to make quality and environmental training more interesting? Tell a story. Talk about an environmental disaster - not necessarily your own if you prefer - and how an EMS could have helped address it, manage it, learn from it, and reduce the likelihood of recurrence.

Stories are a powerful tool and an excellent way to help provide the WHY. They are grossly underused in business, maybe because we associate them with children.

Great idea Roxanne!

When I was promoted to QC Manager 2 yrs. ago, one my directives was to make the QC/ISO 9001 training more interesting. I created a PowerPoint that tells a story imagining that as soon as they clocked out today that Quality Control, ISO 9001 & standards did not exist. It ends with photos from a well known accident in our area that I survived (but which unfortunately a young lady did not). Basically showing how, if it was not for the airbags and quality of the car I was driving, I might not be here.

It seems to get their attention.

QC Dave

 

[DrTBurns]

Some great comments. As Roxanne points out stories are a wonderful way to get messages across. We have used this in our new interactive 3D quality training, particularly with one classic story of process improvement by Sir Percy Scott, over a century ago. He encountered the same barriers to brilliant ideas, as are common today.

Randy pointed out that no matter how great the story story, the material must be relevant to the employee. I'd agree most employees would see plenty of "non-essential gibberish, fluff, smoke & mirrors" in ISO9001.

When it comes to quality, more commonly these days, employees are ignored. Instead, pseudo-experts are trained beyond their ability and understanding, to run around telling the real experts, the workers, how to suck eggs. ”The transformation is everyone’s job” - Professor Deming.

 

[rogerpenna]

For engagement the biggest effect our company (medical device) achieves is done with equipment to simulate the condition of our patient. This is timed to coincide with the point in the induction where we mention what our core objective is, and how hard our personal and working life would be if we would suffer from these conditions. This hits home quite well, on the awareness of the end result we're going for.

Interesting. I can think of ways to adapt that to the Infrastructure Civil Engineering Company I work for. We don´t do projects. We execute them as contractors to municipal and state level government or infrastructure agencies.

Maybe raising awareness to how everybody complains about the state of roads and streets, or how after big rainfalls some streets may flood due to malfunctioning drainage systems, etc, etc. and that certainly some employees are themselves affected by those. Or how faulty roads can cause accidents.

And that while we are bound to limits on what we can do as contractors selected by lowest price bidding (where doing MORE for your client can be illegal), we can do it well and right, to help reduce such problems. And who doesn´t like to drive in a good road eh?