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Roger S. Hall

The Boss Asks Questions About AV

ATD facilitator Jonathan Halls outlines the main characteristics of a master trainer.

What Makes a Master Trainer?

We are fortunate to work with some of the leading facilitators in the worldwide talent development community. Our facilitators bring a wealth of experience and insight to their classrooms. We’re spotlighting their stories here.Meet Jonathan Halls!Jonathan is the award-winning author of Confessions of a Corporate Trainer and bestselling author of Rapid Video Development for Trainers.What is your favorite motivational quote?It changes every week but at the moment I like this one from Carl Rogers: “I can’t teach you anything but I can help you learn.” It emphasizes that our role is to partner with learners.How many years have you been a facilitator? Did you find the career path, or did it find you?I like to say I’ve been a facilitator for more than 10 years and that’s not lying. But, errr, I’ve been doing it for more than 30 years. I’m a bit unusual in that I’m not an accidental trainer. I always intended to be a trainer due to the influence of a mentor in my teenage years. In fact, I was teaching broadcasting skills in my teens, so I was geeking out on andragogy and adult learning skills before I left high school.What is something you wish you knew before becoming a facilitator?I wish I realized that being a polished trainer with nice slide decks and well-formatted handouts isn’t necessarily learner-centric. My bachelor’s and master’s degrees are in adult learning so I knew all the theories from Knowles to Rogers to Freire. But knowing them and practicing them are different. What took me years to learn was that the key is trusting the learner and all the knowledge, skills, and intentions they bring to the learning experience.What is your go-to facilitation tool?Questions are my number 1 tool, partly because they’re easier to carry than trainer toys and laptops and projectors. But mostly because when a trainer asks questions, it unlocks the learner’s long-term memory to help them build new mental models for cognitive and psychomotor learning. That’s not all–questions also provide dignity. When we ask questions, we show that we value and honor the learner’s perspective and trust their capacity to learn. And we get to learn from them too.How has hybrid learning changed how you facilitate?Not a whole lot. Our job is still to help learners build their skills. I think it’s more important to focus on trusting the learner to learn than being polished with technology. And I’m not a luddite. Hybrid situations still require the learner to do the work. It’s less about what we do than what the learner does.What is your best piece of advice for anyone looking to become a facilitator?Study how the learner builds their learning and reflect on what your role as a trainer is in helping them do that learning. Ask yourself, do I really need to present? To talk? Have cool slide decks? Or do the learners need to be doing stuff? Then grab a glass of your favorite wine, sit back, gaze into the distance, and marvel at the incredible capacity humans have to learn.What is your favorite part about being a facilitator?It’s the privilege we have to partner with folks as they walk on their learning journey. It’s truly awesome and it teaches us so much about life, other people, and ourselves. I love connecting all that to organizational performance, which is about helping people learn new skills, gain confidence, and help their organizations thrive. It’s an awesome part of the job.What is your favorite song these days, the last great book you read, or your favorite hobby outside of work?I’m a classical music buff and like some jazz. I know this sounds really nerdy but every month I get hooked on different composers. This month I’m reveling in Mozart piano concertos because of their incredible precision and light touch, especially Piano Concerto No. 21.How have your facilitation skills and training aided you in other aspects of your personal or professional life?Gee, where do I start and where do I stop? They help me understand people. They help me be patient (well some of the time). They help me know when to shut up. Most of all they teach me about other people and all they bring into our lives.

“It’s more important to focus on trusting the learner to learn than being polished with technology.”

Sam Rogers is a veteran learning technologist and facilitator with 25 years of experience designing and delivering performance solutions for global organizations. He has led enterprise learning system implementations, technical integrations, instructional design, and instructor enablement programs for clients including YouTube, ADP, Del Monte Foods, Robert Half International, and National 4-H Council. Sam specializes in connecting learning strategy with business outcomes through data, systems, and storytelling. As principal consultant at Snap Synapse, he partners with clients to modernize their learning ecosystems and integrate AI responsibly into their workflows. He is also a frequent speaker on learning technology, analytics, and AI adoption.

Sam Rogers

Paul Trout helps leaders unravel complex business problems. Leaders often find themselves “stuck” when facing critical leadership, innovation, change management, marketing and/or sales issues. By leveraging cross-industry expertise in business strategy, internal politics, team dynamics, communication, research, facilitation, training and coaching, he brings an uncommonly wide range of problem-solving tools, talents and approaches to unravel clients’ complexity. He feels fortunate to have helped guide leadership through change in organizations as diverse as IBM, Harley-Davidson, Merck Group – EMD Chemicals, Alcan Packaging, the City of Green Bay, Alvarez & Marsal, Wisconsin Women in Government, Hu-Friedy, Foley & Lardner and many others. Early in his consulting career, he was selected to appear in IBM’s worldwide advertising campaign, “Who Do You Need?” in recognition of my work as a leading IBM Business Consultant. It was quite something to open the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, Fast Company and 12 other major business publications and see his name and face! More recently, his previous company, Shift Worldwide, was named a finalist in both the 2010 Chicago Innovation Awards and Innovate Illinois Competition. As you might have guessed, he enjoy writing. From 2005-2008, he was a syndicated columnist on the topic of sales and “building buy-in”; my columns appeared in nearly 50 association and trade magazines, bringing total weekly readership to over 300,000 people. He as also written articles on the topic of organizational change for the publications of ASTD (American Society of Training & Development), ALA (Association of Legal Administrators) and Human Resources IQ, among others. He ispassionate about giving back and was the past chairman of both the Professional Development and Entrepreneurship Committees for the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University. He also regularly volunteers with Howard Brown Health Center, a community‐based health services clinic. He received a Masters in Business Administration from the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University in Marketing and Information Systems in 1999 and also received a Bachelor of Arts from The University of California at San Diego in Urban Studies and Planning in 1991. He is one of the brave souls who has moved from Southern California, where he was raised, to Chicago, Illinois. He gets his “water fix” every day by living right on the shores of Lake Michigan in the Rogers Park neighborhood. Though he misses West Coast sunsets, he has come to love Midwest sunrises even more.

Paul Trout

Melanie Rogers is driven by a commitment to lifelong learning, and a strong desire to help others do their best. At Rosetta Stone, she provides consultative implementation training for langue learning programs and is involved in all facets of training development, delivery, and coordination. She is currently working toward her Master's degree in instructional design.

Melanie Rogers

Rashel has been developing leaders for more than 15 years. She has studied at the Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership and is certified in instructional leadership by the University of North Texas, an internationally recognized school for professional educators. Rashel holds a hybrid degree in business and economics. She serves as one of Root's resident experts in tools and learning design for virtual engagement. As part of the Root Compass team, Rashel has worked with clients like DFW International Airport, ITC Holdings, Protective Life, Hyster-Yale Materials Group, Wakefern Food Corporation, and UC Health in successfully transforming their culture to engage and empower people at all levels of the organization.

Rashel Rogers

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