Online vs. In-Person Training

We are currently reviewing whether it makes sense for us to deliver some or all of our content online instead of as an in-person class setting. This has been a hard decision for us, as we originally said we would only deliver our course content in-person. However, due to travel restrictions for both us and our potential attendees, we are now going through a full review process to determine if delivering our courses online might be a better option for our attendees.

The Advantages of In-Person Training

We originally said that we would only deliver our course in-person because 1) the length of the full three days, and 2) to make sure that we have good participation. Specifically, much of our course content relies on audience feedback and interaction. For example: we have flip-chart activities throughout the entirety of the course. Some other advantages of having an in-person class include:

Mock presentations using best practices taught in the class
Working with the group to create personalized mentoring plans
Role-playing how to give proper introductions
Ability to monitor the room and re-engage the audience when energy is low

The Advantages of Online Training

For all the advantages of in-person training, there is one major draw-back: you need to gather people in one place! What we have found over the course of starting this business is that it is hard to work with schedules, especially when we are offering a class that people are normally taking on their time off work. Most people have a variety of other commitments, most normally family. Asking people to not only attend, but also travel to a remote location is a barrier to getting people to attend. Some other advantages of providing online training include:

Removing the need for our travel, and being able to offer more classes
Reduced cost of having to rent a location, which we can pass on to our attendees
The ability to offer classes nation-wide, instead of just in a specific location
Allowing attendees more flexibility to fit the course into their schedules

Through this analysis, we have decided to start by offering our first day: Operational Business Skills, as an online webinar as well as an in-person event. This day overall has the most advantages of being held online with the least amount of potential complications. We will monitor how this course goes, and will then decide the best way to offer the rest of our training.