Workshop Success: 6 Teaching Methods to Make Your Training Effective (Meeting Notes)
Here are six teaching methods to use in your workshops. From conversational techniques and practical activities to stories, visuals, and comparative learning - helpful for - trainers, coaches, and educators.
I hope you are safe and well. I've been very busy at Lambert Towers updating my website, fixing a load of SEO issues, running a couple of Communication Workshops for a client and generally getting life organised.
The kids are back at school this week! My youngest is also starting secondary school – how time flies.
For those new to the Meeting Notes newsletter, welcome, I’m Rob, ChiefTeaching Officer at Cultivated Management. This newsletter is about mastering the art of communication and creativity - and cultivating a bright future of work.
Teaching Methods That Work
A lot of my career has been spent teaching through workshops. I caught the bug early on, and it’s stayed with me ever since.
The very first workshop I took to a conference — The Communication Superpower — won best tutorial. I’d run it internally before, but that award sparked something in me. I ran it at other conferences, again winning best workshop each time. Clients loved it, public sessions were packed, and the feedback was glowing. I'd got something I could be proud of.
So, I applied the same structures and approaches to other workshops, like the 10 Behaviours one. Same outcomes – same awards.
At first, I chalked it up to charm and charisma. (I have some, but not nearly enough to carry a workshop on its own 😄.)
Last year, I spent my spare time breaking the workshops down to understand why they all worked so well. I then did masses of research and built it all back up into a simple, easy to follow and easy to read framework and guide – the result; my latest book: Workshop Mastery.
Today, I’ll share some ideas from one of the chapters on Teaching Methods – methods that you can start applying in your next training session at work or at a conference.
However, before then, here are four principles that sit behind these methods:
Avoid dullness — dullness saps attention – without attention no learning can take place.
Variety — different people learn in different ways.
Context — some methods fit certain subjects better.
Check comprehension — if people aren’t learning, everything else you pile on top is window dressing.
Running a workshop isn’t just about what you teach. It’s about how you teach — and whether people truly understand the subject.
Before we jump in, you can grab a free download of the very lesson plan I use for the Comms Workshop.
1. Conversational Teaching
A good conversation can unlock understanding faster than a lecture. But not every conversation is teaching. Don't let conversations meander and drift off and instead use them to teach, to check comprehension and to engage the students.
Questions are your best tool here. Done well, your students won’t even feel like they're being taught. Just don’t put people on the spot unless you know they’ll enjoy it.
2. Exemplars and Demonstrations
A good demonstration beats a great explanation. Model what “good” looks like and give people something to aim for. Showing people what good looks like is a great way to set in their mind a bar to aim for.
3. Practical Activities
People learn best by doing. Practical sessions energise the room and cement lessons.
Keep instructions simple.
Don’t spoil the “aha” moment - let the students discover it.
Always tie the activity back to the principles and content being taught.
Half your audience will want more activities, half fewer. That’s fine 😄. I say in the book how you won't get it right.
4. Comparative Method
Put two approaches side by side. Compare strengths, weaknesses, and trade-offs. It can be a really powerful way of seeing the subject from different angles, or understanding why one thing may be better than the other.
5. Reviews
Don’t wait until the end to check understanding. Build reviews into the day.
Quick recaps after each section strengthen the foundations before moving on.
👉 In the comms workshop, we review before every transition, often using conversational teaching.
Stories bring lessons to life and make them memorable. Visuals, when kept simple, can communicate more than a page of text.
👉 In the comms workshop, I weave in stories throughout. In the book, I dive deeper into visuals, because they’re trickier than just “showing a picture.”
Rounding Out
Workshops aren’t about one method. They’re about choosing the right method at the right time — shaped by subject, audience, and context.
The best teachers have a plan, but they also adapt in real time. They don’t force a method to fit. They choose the approach that makes learning happen. Without a plan it's chaos, sticking to the plan rigidly, especially when learning is not happening, will create dullness.
And at all times, aim to avoid dullness. Nothing derails learning faster than boredom — or seven hours of the same method.
These six methods are just a fraction of what’s in Workshop Mastery. Inside, I cover learning methods, delivery, structure, environments, planning, handling questions, developing character, avoiding conflict, logistics and more.
"We have to face the fact that most men and women out there in the world of work are more stale than they know, more bored than they would care to admit.
Boredom is the secret ailment of large-scale organisations. Someone said to me the other day “How can I be so bored when I’m so busy?” And I said, “Let me count the ways.”
Logan Pearsall Smith said that boredom can rise to the level of a mystical experience, and if that’s true I know some very busy middle-level executives who are among the great mystics of all time."
Some of the links on this page are Amazon affiliate links. If you decide to buy, I earn a small commission (at no extra cost to you). It helps keep the lights on here — thank you for the support! Full details in the privacy policy.
Becoming Bulletproof by Evy Poumpouras — interesting reading about an ex secret service agent. Some good insights into controlling emotion, developing your voice – and plenty about non-verbal communication. (Buy on Amazon - aff link)
Alongside my work at Cultivated Management, I take on small creative projects that keep me experimenting and learning.
This week I was messing about with Affinity Publisher and thought – "wouldn't it be cool to bring together all of the posters from the book, Take a Day Off, into a few single posters?"
