We’d all love to think that our interactive training is incredible: the perfect combination of fantastic course material and practical tips that will keep your learners eagerly lapping up the (beautifully written and presented) content.
But no one’s perfect, and even the best training course authors can get stuck in content ruts.
Asking for suggestions on improving your training session is about more than just getting positive training feedback comments. Training feedback should be a guide towards creating the best possible online training for your audience.
When you take training feedback on board, you can improve your audience participation and experience and grow your online training through word-of-mouth recommendations and repeat learners.
This blog will explore all facets of online training feedback: why it’s important, how to ask for it, and what to do with it. Let’s get started.
The importance of training feedback
When you start designing a training program, you use static resources to guide you. You may find inspiration in past presentations, industry guidelines, or vendor materials. These are excellent sources of information for your training materials. They’re data-driven and factual. But they don’t tell you how to make the training materials engaging.
Feedback from the learners who’ve interacted with your online training session is the best way to improve your materials and presentation skills. When you ask for training session feedback, you tap into the source of what learners love (and didn’t love) about your online training.
User feedback can help guide you to online training success. Incorporating your audience’s suggestions makes your training materials more exciting and engaging for your learners. Learners who enjoy a course tell their coworkers and return for a second (third, possibly fourth!) training, allowing you to grow your online training program.
Don’t fixate on positive training feedback comments
We all want good feedback comments. But positive feedback isn’t necessarily the best way to improve your online training.
Remember that every comment is an opportunity to learn more about your online training and how to improve it. Positive training feedback comments are more pleasant to read, but negative comments can sometimes be more helpful in showing you where your materials and presentation could be improved.
Either way, feedback about your training session is extremely valuable because it can help you improve your materials and presentation style.
Types of training feedback
It’s worth learning about the different types of feedback and how to get the most helpful feedback for your online training. Content creators usually seek feedback on a training session using one of these three methods.
Live Feedback (Focus Groups)
In a focus group, people gather in a group (in a live, in-person setting) to discuss your training session. If you’ve presented your training session live, you can ask your learners to stick around for a few minutes after the session to discuss it and give their opinions.
Focus group participants are usually paid in some small way (gift certificates in small amounts are a popular option) for their time. And it’s also nice to offer a few snacks and (nonalcoholic) drinks.
To get the best feedback from your focus group, you should lean into a focus group’s biggest advantage: live person-to-person interaction. Ask questions that encourage group discussion, and ensure that everyone in the group gets a say. The wisdom of crowds is often an effective way to get insightful, relevant feedback. It can help you source training session improvement ideas you’d never have thought of yourself.
Training Session Follow-up Email
Sometimes, it’s best to solicit individual feedback a few hours after the training session ends. The best way to do that is through a follow-up email.
Compose an email asking for feedback using your attendee list as a mailing list. Include a link to a quiz, poll, or other method of collecting feedback. If you’re using a learning management system (LMS) like LearnRight, you can create your training materials, host your online training, send follow-up emails, and ask for feedback – all within the LMS.
You can also ask for feedback directly after your online training by asking a few questions at the end of the session. That said, your learners may share more insightful answers if you give them time to reflect on the training first.
Sending a follow-up email a few hours after the session lets them think about the online training and what was great (and not great) about it.
Comments
Always leave an open forum for comments about your online training. Though they might not all be flattering, the comments section of your online training program often gives you the type of blunt, unguarded honesty that can really improve your training.
And the positive feedback is brilliant, too! It’s nice to hear you’re doing a good job, and you can use those positive training feedback comments to help you unlock a few secrets of a great training session.
Ideally, you’ll gather training session feedback from all of these sources (focus groups, follow-up emails, and the comments section). Variety is the spice of life AND the spice of feedback! You’re more likely to get candid answers when you use several different feedback sources.
11 Questions to ask about your training sessions
We recommend including these 11 questions when soliciting feedback about your online training sessions. Here’s why:
Did the training meet your expectations?
This question is great because it’s more open-ended than it appears. Learners might use it to confirm whether the training covered the materials they cared about. Or, they might use it to state whether the quality of the presentation was what they’d expected.
Which topics did you find the most valuable?
With this question, you can understand whether your ideas for the training material match those of your learners. If the most popular topics aren’t the main focus of the training program, you might want to change your materials.
Did the training materials and examples support the training topic?
As an instructor, spotting gaps in your training programs can be tricky. But to a learner, those gaps are glaringly obvious. This question helps ensure that the materials and real-world examples you use to illustrate your points make sense to the learner. If they don’t understand the connection between the training topic and the examples you provided, they might be able to suggest better examples or materials to use.
Was the training presenter’s style engaging? Any thoughts on how to improve it?
Opening your presentation skills up to criticism is scary, so take any comments on your style and delivery with a level head and open heart. Maybe you do speak too quickly or read too much from the slide deck. We all have room for improvement, and if improving your professional skills creates a better learning experience, that’s a win for you, the learners, and your organisation.
Did you encounter any technical issues?
Technical issues are incredibly frustrating for learners. If they encounter problems when trying to log in to your LMS or join your training session, they’ll enter the discussion frazzled and unprepared to learn. Encourage your learners to report any technical problems and ensure your LMS customer service team is on hand 24/7 to sort them out.
Did the interactive elements of the training session (like quizzes or videos) make you feel more engaged with the course?
Interactive training courses are engaging and enjoyable, and interactive elements like quizzes and videos are the hallmarks of great training. Make sure you add as many opportunities for learner participation as possible to create a truly interactive session. Then, ask for feedback on ways you can make the next one a more engaging workshop.
Did the presenter spend too much or too little time on any area of the training session?
It can be hard to gauge whether your learners are losing interest in a particular section of your training materials. They might find some areas more interesting than others. While you must ensure your training is comprehensive, ask for feedback to learn whether some aspects of your training are more important to your learners.
Can you use anything you learned in the training session (like takeaways or strategies) in your job role?
The ultimate compliment to your training session – how you know you’ve done a fantastic job delivering practical training – is when your learners can apply what they’ve learned in their lives or job roles. Your training sessions should give learners the problem-solving skills they need to overcome future challenges, so make sure you’ve offered them solid, actionable advice they can use.
Would you recommend this training session to a friend or colleague? Why or why not?
Word of mouth is a powerful marketing tool because learners will only recommend training sessions that they find valuable. Use the answers to this question to determine whether your learners found the session valuable, and if they didn’t, ask for more information to discover why.
Are there other topics you’d like to see covered in future training sessions?
It’s always wise to have an eye on the future of your training program. This question helps you understand what topics are important to your learners. That way, you can start to strategise about the direction your training will take to support your learners best.
Overall, do you feel more equipped for your job role than before you took this training session?
Remember that while your training sessions should be helpful and engaging for your learners, they must also align with business goals. Your learners should feel more confident and competent in their job roles due to their training. If the training session hasn’t improved their ability to perform their jobs, you might need to recalibrate your training to support your business targets.
How to interpret 4 common types of training feedback
Let’s look at some training feedback examples and explore how to interpret them to maximise your future training sessions.
Positive comments (without much “meat”)
Training feedback example: “This training was great. Learned so much!”
This type of comment is nice to hear but doesn’t offer much information. You gain a buzz of flattered ego with generically positive comments but not much else.
The best way to deal with generically positive comments is to ask for a little more feedback. Reach out to the commenter and ask whether there were any specific elements of the training that they really enjoyed. Some gentle prodding might elicit more precise answers.
Negative comments
Training feedback example: “This training was boring. Flat presentation style, no new information included, and it was wayyyyyy too long.”
Negative training feedback can leave you feeling defeated. But try not to take it too personally. Instead, view negative feedback as a way to create helpful training programs and improve the learning experience.
Reach out to the learner to ask for more information. Try to drill down to the specifics of their dissatisfaction with the training. Ask for ideas on how you can improve. Accept the challenge of making even the most negative, unengaged learner love your training, and then put in the hard work to make it happen.
Mixed-feelings comments
Training feedback example: “This was a great course. But I couldn’t hear the speaker, and sometimes, there was a dog barking in the background. Also, they never mentioned the cover sheets for TPS reports, which is the whole reason I took the course. Loved the video at the end!”
There are nuggets of training-improvement gold buried in feedback like this. But to find them, you have to dig a little.
Take the positive parts of the feedback and use them to add more of the elements your learners love. In this example, the video at the end of the training was a hit. Interactive sessions are engaging for your learners, so use this comment as a reminder that every session should have interactive elements.
Then, explore the negative feedback. This learner expected to hear about TPS reports, but they weren’t discussed in the session. Possibly, the learner needed clarification about the topic of the training. But maybe your training topic was misleading, or your outline was incomplete. For this example, it would be wise to reach out to other learners in the same session to see if they, too, had expected to learn about TPS report cover sheets.
Positive comments (with specifics)
Training feedback example: “The training was excellent because the presenter used real-life experiences to show how to improve my sales. At the end of the training session, all the materials were made available to reread whenever I want. The presenter’s style was engaging, fun, and professional.”
Congratulations! If you’re getting loads of comments that include the specific reasons your learners loved your training content, you’re onto a winner. You know the feedback is genuine (and not just fluff) when the learners share concrete, distinct aspects of your training they found brilliant. Keep up the good work!
Choosing an LMS that helps you gather learner feedback
Using a learning management system to create and deliver your online training makes it easy to deliver a wonderful workshop to your learners. But the advantages of an LMS don’t stop there.
With the right LMS, asking for feedback after a training session is easy. In-software features allow you to compose messages to your learners. You can customise those messages based on key data like whether the learner completed the course or how well they fared on tests and quizzes.
Personalising feedback questions to reflect how a learner participated in the course makes the learner more likely to offer genuine, telling feedback.
LMS selection criteria
Including interactive elements in your online training makes it more attractive for your learners (and helps you get positive feedback!). Plus, you can easily explain concepts in a video or moving diagram that might be hard to explain in text alone. So, when selecting an LMS, make sure you choose one that supports a variety of interactive elements.
Before you finalise your LMS selection, check that the LMS offers messaging, chat forums, and follow-up polling/feedback features. You can use third-party software to create a survey or a poll, but gathering feedback within the LMS creates a smoother user experience for the learner. And it’s also easier for you to track and organise your feedback if it’s gathered and stored in one central location.
When you’re selecting an LMS, make sure it offers cutting-edge reporting and analytics features. You’ll want to tally feedback and responses from all the sessions within a specific training program to see how one course fares against a similar course, or whether your feedback has improved over time.
LearnRight: Your answer to the LMS selection process
If you’re looking for a fully-featured LMS that helps you track and analyse learner participation and feedback, your search is over!
LearnRight offers best-in-class reporting and analytics, and our baked-in messaging features let you create personalised questions to pose to your learners.
Take LearnRight for a spin today and unlock the next-level features that create a truly great course.
