16 replies to this topic

[Jean]

Dear Forum Members,

I am currently re-working on all my training slides on Allergen Management, HACCP awareness, HACCP internal auditing, Food Safety & Hygiene for supervisors and managers. Most of the time people dislike long hours of theory, this includes me as well and therefore I am trying to find out ways to make the training session interesting and enjoyable. Some interesting Icebreakers, group activities etc are something which can be considered. I am looking out for your ideas so that I can incorporate these during the training.

Thanks Simon for giving me an idea to start a topic on this.

I do have people coming straight to training after doing late night shifts till 3am and in such cases I feel sorry for them and though I advise their Big Bosses to avoid long hours work especially late hours a day before training, it hardly happens due to operations. How can I manage such situations?

Any ideas are welcome!

[Jean]

I forgot to add, all these are internal training programs

[GMO]

Oooh I love doing training courses!

These are some things I've done throughout the years. I've also had a situation where I've had to deliver training at the end of a shift and it's not ideal.

Ideally some of the things I do make things fun or at least if they don't, they make it less likely for people to fall asleep!

First of all, get people contributing, preferably while standing up as much as possible. This is easy to do with food safety or HACCP. For example, early in the training you could ask people to come up with ideas in groups for physical, chemical, biological or allergenic hazards. Organise some flip charts so it's really difficult for people to sit down! (Trust me, it works!)

Hmm, other things I've done. I've had a lot of people who don't speak English as their first language before so I often use pictures in the presentation and I also use flashcards. One thing which I've used now in two factories are flashcards on handwashing. This shows each of the 5 steps of handwashing that I get 5 people to hold a card up each and the others to put them in order. It might sound really silly but it leads to people interacting and I had a test paper question on it which people regularly used to get wrong until I brought in the flash cards.

I also do some "spot the problem" games where there are photos of dirty or badly organised workplaces and they're asked to identify the issues with them.

Where possible as well, I try to demonstrate things in their place of work. For example, we had loads of problems with people putting their clothes on in the wrong order for high care so I changed the training to end on this where I'd take the team to the changing area and take them through it all step by step. Works much better now.

I hope that's helpful.

[Jean]

Dear GMO,

I really appreciate you for sharing your experiences and sure I will try with flash cards, that's something new for me to give a try. I will have to make them...

Thank you GMO.

[Simon]

Speaking as someone who has attended many training courses in the past I agree with GMO that a certain amount of audience participation is very useful. People learn in different ways so having a blended training session that caters for all preferences is the key to success. It also takes some pressure of the trainer. I also find short courses of no more than 2-3 hours are much more effective than a full day course.

I like this saying:

“Tell me and I'll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I'll understand.”

Take from that what you will.

Regards,
Simon

[Jean]

Dear Simon,

Thank you for your comments. I have come across people with different learning ways / styles. Some prefer problems or experiences to be taught, few prefer detailed researches, models or theory and other few prefer practical training. People demonstrate different behaviours during learning, some are flippant, few challenging members and then the trainer has a lot of pressure in handling such few. I am still learning and fine tuning my ways, as each new batch helps me to discover a flaw.

Training is a lot more fun when you discover new paths / techniques to deliver, involve and manage people and develop them as intended.

[Simon]

You have to get the content across and I think understanding your audience is a big help. I learned many lessons, like when and when not to tell jokes. I suppose you should also know your own limitations.

[Anne Z]

Hi

I agree with Simon it all depends on the the audience. Joke and well tea, coffee and cookies help as well.
My last hygienic training was based on questions. Simple questions anwsered with yes/no or A, B or C. This was with a small group (6-10). Even though there are always people who will just sit and wait till it's all over.... So like GMO said try something interactive.

Good luck with it!

Anne

[Simon]

Thanks Anne. We have to say one thing that hygiene training is not the most enthralling of subjects in the first place.

[Abdul Qudoos]

Greetings for the day!


I too was facing similar problem in the beginning, now everything has been changed due to continual improvement.


As a trainer when ever i conduct HACCP/Food hygiene training to workers, supervisors and managers after completion of half-an hour session i show some video clips related to food safety, question & answer section - quiz competition and movie clip which has team working spirit - a lesson thought from an animated series- cartoon, and few morals and some interesting stories which can increase the productivity, group discussions and activities and followed by tea break and so on... everyone enjoys the sessions and another way its a kind of motivation.

[Jean]

Thank you Anne and Abdul for your comments. This time I am having few of top management executives for HACCP awareness and IFH refresher course. I am working out more on group excercises, tests and flash cards. Hope it goes well and fruitful.

[Shubham]

Oooh I love doing training courses!

These are some things I've done throughout the years. I've also had a situation where I've had to deliver training at the end of a shift and it's not ideal.

Ideally some of the things I do make things fun or at least if they don't, they make it less likely for people to fall asleep!

First of all, get people contributing, preferably while standing up as much as possible. This is easy to do with food safety or HACCP. For example, early in the training you could ask people to come up with ideas in groups for physical, chemical, biological or allergenic hazards. Organise some flip charts so it's really difficult for people to sit down! (Trust me, it works!)

Hmm, other things I've done. I've had a lot of people who don't speak English as their first language before so I often use pictures in the presentation and I also use flashcards. One thing which I've used now in two factories are flashcards on handwashing. This shows each of the 5 steps of handwashing that I get 5 people to hold a card up each and the others to put them in order. It might sound really silly but it leads to people interacting and I had a test paper question on it which people regularly used to get wrong until I brought in the flash cards.

I also do some "spot the problem" games where there are photos of dirty or badly organised workplaces and they're asked to identify the issues with them.

Where possible as well, I try to demonstrate things in their place of work. For example, we had loads of problems with people putting their clothes on in the wrong order for high care so I changed the training to end on this where I'd take the team to the changing area and take them through it all step by step. Works much better now.

I hope that's helpful.

[Shubham]

Hiiii...

Well i am new to this forum i request you all to please help me out in understanding this conceot of Food Safety management system.

Sir i would like to request you, to please email some of PPT on training om Food Safety management, HACCP etc so that i can lear bit fom it if possible.

I will be highly obliged for the same.

[Zeeshan]

Hiiii...

Well i am new to this forum i request you all to please help me out in understanding this conceot of Food Safety management system.

Sir i would like to request you, to please email some of PPT on training om Food Safety management, HACCP etc so that i can lear bit fom it if possible.

Searching this forum and google would give you a lot of free and useful stuff regarding food safety management system (FSMS) and HACCP. I am attaching a file I have probably find over this forum somewhere.

 ISO22000_Presentation.pdf   145.53KB   287 downloads

One more thing. If you have some particular question regarding any aspect of FSMS, ISO 22000, HACCP or other, ask it openly on the forum. There are so many good people over here to help you a lot.

Regards:
Zeeshan

[Simon]

Nice post Zeeshan. I gave you a point.

[Zeeshan]

........"spot the problem" games where there are photos of dirty or badly organised workplaces and they're asked to identify the issues with them.

.............demonstrate things in their place of work. For example, we had loads of problems with people putting their clothes on in the wrong order for high care so I changed the training to end on this where I'd take the team to the changing area and take them through it all step by step. Works much better now.

I was developing a presentation on Food Safety Basics. Trainees were belong to different areas and competency levels. Many already had knowledge of fundamentals of the topic. While I was preparing the slides, I got an idea I want to share with you people. I was preparing the slides that were based on the concept delivered in above quotes of GMO - "Spot the hazards/problem". Then an idea sparked in my mind that why I was only focusing the dirty or badly organized workplaces. As we all know that many visually cleaned, claimed to be washed, claimed to be sanitized, visually organized, visually sparkling surfaces and locations may contain biological, chemical or physical hazards. To shaken the brains of participants and get them involved more than normal, I added the pictures of actual locations of production, storage and other areas and asked the participants to think about what physical, chemical or biological (including microbiological) hazard may be there despite of apparently good condition. This practice, IMO, boost the brainstorming and auditing apptitude in every worker and when they returned to their workplace they use to see and think more objectively and act as a real contributor to food safety and GMP.

Regards:
Zeeshan.

[Simon]

I was developing a presentation on Food Safety Basics. Trainees were belong to different areas and competency levels. Many already had knowledge of fundamentals of the topic. While I was preparing the slides, I got an idea I want to share with you people. I was preparing the slides that were based on the concept delivered in above quotes of GMO - "Spot the hazards/problem". Then an idea sparked in my mind that why I was only focusing the dirty or badly organized workplaces. As we all know that many visually cleaned, claimed to be washed, claimed to be sanitized, visually organized, visually sparkling surfaces and locations may contain biological, chemical or physical hazards. To shaken the brains of participants and get them involved more than normal, I added the pictures of actual locations of production, storage and other areas and asked the participants to think about what physical, chemical or biological (including microbiological) hazard may be there despite of apparently good condition. This practice, IMO, boost the brainstorming and auditing apptitude in every worker and when they returned to their workplace they use to see and think more objectively and act as a real contributor to food safety and GMP.

Regards:
Zeeshan.

I think that's a fantastic idea Zeeshan,

Making it less obvious thus stimulating much deeper thinking, leading to greater understanding and hopefully improvement actions.

I think variety is the key, classroom based, theoretical, at the workplace, practical, fun, serious, looking at the same topic from different angles, using real data such as complaints, rejections, deviations, financial information, seeing other businesses to see how they do it, visits to customers, suppliers…It’s never ending - always something new to be learned.