SmartPulse — our weekly nonscientific reader poll in SmartBrief on Leadership — tracks feedback from more than 210,000 business leaders. We run the poll question each week in our e-newsletter.
What is your preference with respect to leadership training?
- I’d like to attend leadership training in-person: 75%
- I’d like to take leadership training by video course: 14%
- I’d like to do “on the job” versus formal leadership training: 7%
- I’d like to construct self-led leadership training: 4%
Live still thrives. While we hear a lot about “blended learning,” “scalable and distributed” offerings, and online training, your learners have a very clear and strong preference for in-person training. Why? As someone who has trained literally thousands of people in our classroom courses, I know it’s about the interaction and focused learning. Being in a room focused on one subject for 4 to 8 hours gets your brain in the right space to learn. You also have immediate access to an expert trainer who can answer your questions. While video and distributed learning are solid reinforcement mechanisms, clearly the classroom still rules.
Mike Figliuolo is managing director of thoughtLEADERS. Before launching his own company, he worked at McKinsey & Co., Capital One and Scotts Miracle-Gro. He is a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He’s the author of three leadership books: “One Piece of Paper,” “Lead Inside the Box” and “The Elegant Pitch.”