How was it for you?

Whilst we are naturally expressive people who are passionate about the work we do, our clients are our greatest enthusiasts. This is what some of them have to say:

“I just love what Sold Out Trainers are doing for our people. Since we met them six years ago they have become a really important part of our team. Now they have made such a positive contribution to the work we do that we have extended their brief to our offices in other parts of the world.”

Carol Hamilton - Human Relations Director
Pearson Education

 

“When we need to create fresh training ideas that will address new issues within our business we ask Sold Out Trainers to work with us. They have what we have found to be a rare ability to connect with what it is we are trying to achieve and deliver - a
training program that hits the nail right on the head.”

Helen Quinlivan
Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines

“Sold Out Trainers – they help us with sales and other soft skills training and we would not work with anyone else. It’s just that once you find people who understand your business and what they are doing they do so well, why would you ever want to change? We consistently get great feedback about all of the courses you run for us, which is largely due to a combination of your innovative training methods and your pragmatic approach. This means that delegates remember your training and want to apply their learning when back in the office.”

Claire Thomas - Human Relations Manager
Penguin Books

 

“Actors and Theatre Workshops -  it took a while for us to understand what they really deliver. If you are serious about the way you train your people and the outcomes you want to achieve, you really ought to ask Sold Out Trainers for a demonstration…it will simply change the way you think about training."

Jimmy Gaffney - Training Manager
Stena Ferries
     

Training that can be trusted to make a real difference is not always easy to find. Training companies that have the capacity to become a valuable part of your team are even more difficult to unearth. Now that you have met Sold Out Trainers in the virtual world, why not go the rest of the way and talk to the real people - see the contacts page for details of how to do that or read on for some case studies about what we have enabled our customers to achieve.

Case Studies

STENA LINE - Customer Services Case Study

The Company:

Stena Line is a leading international transport and travel service company and one of the world’s largest ferry operators. Their network of 18 strategically located ferry routes operates in the North Sea, the Irish Sea and Scandinavia.

The Challenge:

Sold Out Trainers was asked to focus their Customer Services Training on the 127 front-line ship and shore staff who work on the world’s largest ferry, the Stena Voyager, which carries up to 1500 passengers on the Stranraer-Belfast route. Stena training officer, Jim Gaffney, explained. “We were looking for training and coaching techniques that could mimic specific real-life situations so that the delegates understood how to represent the company in what can sometimes be difficult situations. An important goal was to deliver a ‘wow!’ factor for all our guests. To help to achieve this we required our staff to be aware of, and able to deal with, customer emotions.”

The Solution:

Debra Stevens, Director of Sold Out Trainers, went on the Stena Voyager as a passenger herself, to experience first-hand the service customers were receiving. After that, Debra sat down with two of her experienced roleplayer/writers, and devised a series of 9 short scenes, based specifically on real-life Stena Voyager situations.

The training itself then consisted a one-day course, held in groups of 12-16 employees. It started by focussing on the six main points of contact and the importance of customer care, explaining why developing the customer experience is so important to the company’s future. Then two professional roleplay actors performed all 9 scenarios, which demonstrated a range of behaviours from ‘wow’ through to ‘bad’. Employees watched each scenario and ‘rated’ what they saw.

“Then they were given the opportunity to ‘direct’ scenes, ‘pausing’ and ‘rewinding’ the live action and dictating to the actor who was playing the Stena staff how they should respond,” Jim Gaffney explained. “They could also ask the characters how they felt during a scene, what affected them, and why they acted in a certain way.”

This gave Stena employees a safe environment in which they could sit back and evaluate their own behaviour, without feeling judged themselves. Once comfortable with interacting in this way, the staff could then volunteer to put themselves into a scenario with the actors playing a variety of difficult customers.

Debra Stevens, firmly committed to this form of experiential learning, puts it this way: “Unlike chalk-and-talk training, delegates in experiential training do not sit in front of any presentations. And unlike traditional role-play, confrontation between colleagues is avoided. Delegates have the opportunity to develop awareness at their own pace, working in familiar scenarios and situations.

“The key to achieving this is through the use of specially trained actors. We are not talking here about the John Cleese-type of training videos of the 1980s that, although often entertaining, are in the main just another derivation of chalk-and-talk. Experiential training is about immersing the delegates in scenarios where they discover for themselves what works and what doesn’t work.”

The Results:

Jim Gaffney reported: “We are constantly striving to improve our customer care and continually monitor our service for compliments versus complaints, with the assistance of our dedicated customer-care department for this route. In previous years we had received four complaints to every compliment. Now that the training is complete, we have reversed this to four compliments to every complaint.”

Jim summed it all up by saying: “This style of training was excellent – very hands-on and different from what we had undertaken in the past. It certainly provided a major boost to the staff. They all felt very positive about it and thoroughly enjoyed it. If you are serious about the way you train your people and the outcomes you want to achieve, you really ought to try this out… it will simply change the way you think about training."

PENGUIN - Management Training Case Study

The Company:

Penguin Group is one of the world’s largest English-language trade book publishers. Penguin UK is home to some of the most familiar names in publishing- Ladybird, Rough Guides, Puffin and Dorling Kindersley- covering everything from the best literary fiction to a toddler’s first board book.

The Challenge:

Back in 2003, Claire Thomas, Senior HR and Development Manager at Penguin UK explained: “Management training is integral to the work we do in publishing, with all Departments such as editorial, sales, marketing and production needing to work together. We need to work and liaise with a wide range of people, both internally and externally (freelancers, agents and authors) so it is imperative that our communication skills are excellent.”   Penguin wanted to ensure that their Managers had a holistic understanding of the entire life cycle of an employee, in terms of what they can and need to contribute to a business, as well as understanding their role as a people manager.

The Solution:

Kurt Rowe, Trainer/Coach and Sold Out Trainer’s Account Manager for Penguin, used two methods to devise their programme. Firstly, Penguin conducted their own Training Needs Analysis and Kurt followed up by speaking with various Managers to get more specifics on the TNA. Kurt then devised a comprehensive course that included training on a wide range of soft skills such as assertiveness, dealing with challenging situations and understanding different personality styles. Equal emphasis was also placed on the role of a manager, basics of appraisal, delegation, giving and receiving feedback, dealing with pressure and goal setting.

Secondly, once he started running the Course, Kurt listened to Delegates and made a number of tweaks to content and style, based on their feedback.

The course was first rolled out in April 2003 as a 2-day Course, run with groups of approximately 12 Managers. Two years later, owing to its success, the programme was increased to a 3-day Course, with Day 1 giving a foundation in communication skills and Days 2 and 3 following shortly thereafter giving in-depth coverage of all the skills.

As with many of Sold Out Trainers’ courses, professionally trained roleplay actors are used during this Course who enact different real-life publishing scenarios, created by Kurt through his in-depth understanding of Penguin; Managers are then able to interact with the different personalities portrayed by the actors and practise the skills they learn throughout the 3 days.

Since 2003, Kurt has trained more than 400 Managers within Penguin, including Dorling Kindersley, and, as Claire Thomas says, “The feedback is consistently excellent.”

The Results:

Whilst the longevity of this course indicates its success, in addition, Claire Thomas has reported the following, specific benefits for Penguin UK, based on her observations and Managers’ feedback:

Claire sums up by saying, “Feedback for Kurt’s training is always excellent, largely because he is able to create such a supportive, yet challenging learning environment that sits just right with the culture of our company. I can not recommend Sold Out Trainers highly enough, we certainly want to keep on working with them as much as we can.”

PEARSON EDUCATION - Sales Training Case Study

The Company:

Pearson Education is the world’s leading educational publisher, with offices in over 30 countries; they are part of the global media and education group, Pearson. Their texts are sold into schools, universities, language institutions and bookshops worldwide.

The Challenge:

Six years ago, the Management Team asked Sold Out Trainers to devise a Sales Training Module that was totally bespoke to Pearson Education. One of their concerns about previous Training Companies they had used was that case studies and forum theatre were generic, rather than tailored specifically to them. They wanted the material to accurately replicate the jobs of their sales staff.

Within a year of working for their Higher Education division in the UK, Sold Out Trainers were asked to devise Sales Training for the ELT (English Language Teaching) Team, which has now led to Sold Out Trainers running their Courses in over 25 countries, across all five continents. They also train their Schools and Professional divisions.

As a result, Sold Out Trainers’ ultimate challenge was to create a Sales Training Module for Pearson Education’s Sales Staff that would be beneficial cross-divisionally and cross-culturally, i.e. that would be relevant whether selling a science textbook to a Kenyan university, English Language books to a private Greek language school or a Manager’s handbook to Waterstones in Birmingham.

The Solution:

Debra Stevens, Director of Sold Out Trainers, undertook extensive research within Pearson to determine the sales tools that would be most valuable to them. It included shadowing many Sales Reps in Higher Education, Schools, Professional and ELT. Debra flew to Athens to spend a day learning about private language schools and how they operate- and even flew to Beirut to meet the Sales Manager of Nigeria to discuss upcoming training for them.

The overall Sales Module that was created became PASS, Pearson Applied Selling Skills. However, for each department within Pearson, Debra devises different Training Manuals, reflecting each market and their challenges. Separate Forum Theatres and Case Studies are written every time and, as their Markets change and grow, so do Sold Out Trainers’ training methods. They always consider the culture within each country and tailor their programme to best reflect their customs. There are also frequent meetings to discuss new trends. Recently, within ELT, the PASS model became PLUSS, Pearson Longman Unique Selling Skills, to reflect ELT’s new branding which gives support and recognition to teachers.

Each 2-day Sales Training Course has a group of approximately 12 delegates, and covers a wide range of communication skills that includes rapport building, listening, questioning, probing, matching needs and objection handling.

A strong ethos of Sold Out Trainers is that people learn best when enjoying themselves and for this reason, Sold Out Trainers do not use “chalk and talk” but use experiential training, where delegates are involved in each stage of learning. This is done through a series of group exercises, games and competitions, as well as unpressured interaction with professionally trained roleplay actors, who all have a good working knowledge of Pearson Education and play characters specific to their market.

To date, Sold Out Trainers have trained more than 1000 Pearson Education Sales Staff around the world- and the number continues to grow.

The Results:

A frequent comment from Managers throughout Pearson has been that PASS Training has increased their profits: a powerful, bottom line benefit.   In addition, there has been consistent, positive feedback from the Sales staff themselves during the past 6 years, such as:

Lastly, Pearson Education also works in many emerging markets across the world and, whilst it is extremely challenging at times, it is a pleasure and privilege for Sold Out Trainers to be part of a process that involves improving the skillset and education of people in developing countries.

 

 

Copyright 2008 - Sold Out Trainers Limited