Seeking Your Best Ideas for Engaging Communication Skills Training for Freshers

I will be entering into the delivery mode of behavioral training programs. I am requesting guidance and tips from all of you to suggest activities, role plays, videos, etc., that can be included in this session. This will be my first session, so I am seeking guidance from all of you.

Objective of the Session

The objective of the session is to enhance communication skills, thereby boosting the confidence of the freshers. The number of participants is 18-20, and the duration is 5.30 hours. The freshers are from an engineering background and are from various small towns in Maharashtra.

I am anticipating wholehearted support from the Trainer's league.

Thank you.

There are many activities that you can do for communication skills. One is Chinese whispers, which I am sure you know about. Another activity you may include is to ask the participants to enact a scene without speaking to demonstrate non-verbal communication. Role plays can be based on their real-life scenarios. Including a video is always a good idea. Use a 5-6 minute movie clip; plenty of them are available on YouTube.

Hope it helps.

Regards,
Nupur

It will be an interesting challenge when the trainer is new to his job and the trainees are fresh. Your own preparedness is the first step.

Deciding the Curriculum

The next point is to decide on what is to be taught and what the participants already know. Hope you are considering English as the communication medium. If the participants are fresh, they might still have some idea of how a factory works when they have done training or internship. Ask everyone to narrate his experience, say 3 to 5 minutes each.

Assessing Communication Skills

To enhance communication skills, first, you must know what their present level is. To start with, ask them to write on any general topic, giving a time of about 15 minutes. Ask another person to read it without naming the individual who wrote it (there should be no way to know the name of the person). Suggest corrections and improvements. Give them tips on good writing, and some videos or PPTs on communication.

Inspiration from Great Leaders

Provide excerpts from a choice of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, JF Kennedy, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, Swami Vivekananda, and other illustrious personalities. After that, ask everyone to speak on his favorite topic for not over 5 minutes. The choice may be given to the candidate to read from his script or speak without seeing it. Ask the other participants what they liked best and what they felt could have been better. For every participant, sum up with your guidance.

Engagement with Seniors

Make sure that at least three or four seniors address them by way of discussions on what to expect in a workplace. Role plays are normally successful when people gain experience.

Managing Session Duration

A time of 5½ hours is too long if you are one faculty. You may request experienced seniors to share their experience. If it is possible to reduce the time, 3 hours would be OK.

Good luck.

Regards,
V. Raghunathan, Navi Mumbai

Considering that you have enough time, use a movie to teach communication skills. Take up a movie like "12 Angry Men," "Remember the Titans," or even portions of "My Fair Lady."

Of course, the faculty would have to prepare extensively for the class by making notes on the aspects of communication skills that would be demonstrated by using the movie. For example, using "Remember the Titans," you can teach effective communication for a winning team. You can use "12 Angry Men" for teaching nonverbal communication. "My Fair Lady" can be used to teach pronunciation and intonation in the English language.

Hope this helps you plan. Do share with us your experiences.

Cheers!
Radhika

Thanks, Mr. Raghunathan, for those motivating words and for understanding the dilemma that the new trainer undergoes. I liked the idea of giving the excerpts of great leaders to project good communication skills. I will also think about the time duration. Thanks once again for those valuable suggestions!