The Value of Monitoring Center Training

by guest blogger Caryn Morgan, Operational Excellence Specialist

The topic of monitoring center training is one that is extremely important to me. As a member of the CSAA Education Committee, I had the opportunity to meet and work with a number of highly qualified training professionals. As a team, we spent countless hours rebuilding and reworking the CSAA Level 1 class for training central station operators, preparing a class with an improved curriculum of industry trends. While this course is a great tool for central stations to utilize, I believe “training the trainer” is an equally important issue. So I was very pleased when the CSAA decided to host a forum on training practices during their Fall Operations Management Seminar in November. I was also very honored when they asked me to be a member of the moderating panel, along with a group of amazing people who are passionate about monitoring center operations and quality training.

During this forum, we discussed many topics, including:

  • Monitoring Center Training challenges such as:
    • Managers with too many jobs tasked and not enough time devoted to training and performance improvement.
    • Keeping training fresh so participants stay engaged.
    • How a learning culture from the top down isn’t always the reality.
  • The benefits of continuous learning culture advantages.
    • It builds bridges.
    • It encourages critical thinking.
    • It offers positive reinforcement of quality behavior.
  • Understanding training doesn’t “fix” problems. Two words that should be never used in a sentence together are “just” and “training.” A response should never be, “They just need training,” or something is “just web training.”
  • Training is more than just training the staff on the software they use! It requires educating them and the customer on the end user experiences.
  • Understanding and empathy without assigning blame is an excellent skill for everyone to have and teach.
  • There are some amazing TED Talks (watch them here, here, and here) which discuss innovative new paradigms of training.
  • Technology helps shorten the learning curve. It encourages self-education and a culture of learning.
  • Encouraging critical thinking by responding to questions with questions.

The entire panel was pleased with the way attendees engaged with us and each other. Unfortunately, we ran out of time before all of the topics were covered in the detail we hoped for, but that simply reinforced the message that training and learning, for both management and operators alike, are key issues to which monitoring centers should dedicate time and resources.

Bold has multiple monitoring center training resources available, from videos and manuals to full courses and onsite training. Our BoldGenius resource library is a great place to start, and all Bold customers receive three complimentary BoldGenius registrations. If you have questions about training, please feel free to contact us!