Week 11: Taking Inventory

Taking an inventory means to take stock. In the context of training it means to assess a situation.

At the end of a day’s session and at the end of the entire training program each trainer has to compulsorily take stock of the situation.

1. Personal Inventory
   This refers to a process where a trainer assesses his/her performance at the end of the day/and at the end of the entire training program. It is a process of self assessment.
2. External Inventory
   This refers to a process where the lead trainer or the co-trainer/s assess the quality of the training given by the trainer.

Steps to be followed

“A followed by S S C “

A – Stands for – Appreciation

S – Stop doing

S – Start doing 

C – Continue doing

In case of Personal Inventory:

Step-1: A – APPRECIATION:

Trainer has to identify and note down all the positive aspects of his/her training session, and appreciate himself or herself for the same.  

Followed by

Step 2: S – STOP DOING:

Trainer should identify what was/were the mistake/s committed by him/her and note down the same. He/she should take precaution not to do the same. He/she should give a strong signal to himself/herself never to do it again.

Step-3: S – START DOING:

Trainer should identify
(a) the mistake/s committed by him/her and note down the same.
(b) identify what must be done by him/her in future in order to stop committing the mistakes.
(c) He/she should take steps towards enhancing the quality of the training.

Step-4: C – CONTINUE DOING:  

(a) Trainer has to identify the measures to be taken to avoid doing the mistakes, and continue to follow the same till he/she has completely stopped doing said mistakes.
(b) Trainer has to continue to do all the positive things which has been noted down by him/her in the first step/A-Appreciation.

In case of External Inventory:

Step-1: A – APPRECIATION:

At the end of the session, Lead Trainer or Co-trainer/s or any other/s may l give fair appreciation to the trainer.

Step-2: S – STOP DOING:

The Lead Trainer/Co-trainer or others may indicate the trainer what he/she should not be doing and/or stop doing.

Step-3: S – START DOING:

The Lead Trainer/Co-trainer or others may indicate the trainer what he/she should start doing. They may suggest the remedy to the trainer.

Step-4: C – CONTINUE DOING:

The Lead Trainer/Co-trainer or others may monitor the trainer until the trainer corrects himself/herself.

EXAMPLE

A trainer who had extreme content knowledge coupled with command over language was always looking down and expressing his thoughts one after the other in a systematic manner. He was never looking at the audience throughout his session.

Lead Trainer told the following to said trainer as per the A-SSC method

Step-1: A – Appreciation: “Mr. X, your session was very good. You have excellent command over the subject and language. Congratulations.”

Step-2: S – Stop Doing: “Mr.X, it would be wonderful if you stop looking down throughout your session. It would be better to avoid talking to the carpet.”

Step-3: S – Start Doing: “Mr.X, I would suggest it would be better if you develop eye contact with the audience. It would be wonderful if you look forward and speak. Start doing it from the next session.”

Step-4: C – Continue doing: “Mr.X, start practicing it from today itself. Continue this practice until you master it, and overcome your habit of looking down while speaking.”

Post this External inventory, the sensitive trainer started working on himself. He also started taking personal inventory on this. As of today, he has totally stopped looking down throughout the session as he used to do earlier.

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(All rights reserved by the author S.Susheela)