"Does Salesforce.com actually work?" That is what some of your resistant users are asking themselves. They also ask questions like, "Why do I need to enter all of this information?" or "Things were working just fine - why change?"

As a Trainer and an Admin, you've been put in charge of answering these kinds of objections. The tricky part is that many of your users don't actually ask these questions out loud - most just don't sign in or update data. 

So, how can we get everybody to "dance?"

As a Salesforce Admin and Trainer you may feel that you are being asked to do the impossible: 

• Make your training engaging
• Keep it short
• Make sure you cover everything

How can you cover everything that you need your team to know, keep it engaging AND do it all in a 1-hour session?

In training scenarios, we do everything exactly how it's supposed to be done. But maybe it would be better if we let our learners do it wrong.

I recently moved from the Washington, D.C. area (Tysons Corner) to a city just outside of Charlott, NC.

I don't actually have cable (see here to read why), so I couldn't watch the game between Brazil and Germany. But I figured it would be like most other soccer games - 90 minutes of running around with only 1 goal to show for it.

Late last night I checked Facebook and saw this post from a friend of mine - "The grown men crying in this World Cup are breaking my heart." Grown men crying? 

I figured it was a joke, but when I checked ESPN for the score, I realized that it was not a joke (although it took me about 5 minutes to believe the final score of 7-1 was accurate). And then I began seeing all of these images of grown men (and women) crying, just like the Facebook post said.

The business environment is not very friendly towards trainers. Just when you have everybody on the same page, management decides to change all of your processes by introducting a new platform, application, or division.

I've noticed that when I speak to Admin, trainers, and managers, there is a common perception that training and documentation are two separate things. Training is a time to pound concepts and workflows into users' heads, hoping that everybody will remember all of the PowerPoint slides and the onscreen demonstrations.

My first job out of college was in Pasadena California. Just outside of Pasadena, there is a large population of Korean immigrants, and as a community service, I volunteered to teach them English.

My first class was a lot of fun - I used Keynote, and included a lot of graphics bouncing around, English words appearing on screen, and a video of Jack Johnson playing the

I really enjoy organized learning programs when they're done right. But when they're done wrong, it is a very frustrating experience. 

Here is the story of a training I attended that was a huge disappointment, and 3 lessons I learned so I never repeat it.

To have an effective training and teaching session, you only need two things:

1. Somebody who is sharing information
2. Somebody who is receiving the information

So why is training so ineffective? That seems like it's pretty basic!