Announcement for Professional Trainers, Coaches, and Facilitators

Dear Colleague,

Are you one of the best? If the answer is "Yes", then read on...

As you may know the Register of Professional Facilitators has been publicly accessible on the internet for more than 10 years. Even though. We have never fully developed or promoted the site a number of those facilitators have received a high number of requests for work.

The arrangement we had with those registered was very simple - if you get work from the site, simply pay us 5% of the gross fees you receive on any initial contract or follow on work for the next 2 years. This has been like an 'honesty box' arrangement that relies on the integrity of each person listed.  We've never had any problems with this and those registered seem to really like the arrangement.

Getting registered on the database was a fairly simple process that required the potential registrant to:

1. Self evidence their professional capability to 2 colleague lead facilitators on the database using a mixture of evidence from the work they had done and clients they had worked with, providing personal written narrative and witness testimonies.
2. Provide the names and contact details for 3 clients for whom work had recently been completed that could be contacted for references and testimonials.

Once registered on the database, each client for whom a particular facilitator worked would be contacted to check their levels of satisfaction and the quality of the work that facilitator did. The results were fed back to the registered facilitator for action if needed and could be shared with the client if the facilitator chose to do that. Obviously if a facilitator was consistently hitting bad scores they could be taken off-line temporarily and offered developmental support from peers if needed.

Furthermore, if someone on the database knew lots of other high quality facilitators, trainers, coaches, mentors and organisation development people, that person could take on a lead facilitator role for a segment of the database. Under this arrangement they would be responsible in partnership with another lead facilitator for registering new facilitators and running the customer feedback process. This lead facilitator would then receive 3% of the gross fees of every piece of work that every facilitator in their segment of the database received.

These arrangements have worked well, though, as the database has grown, running the registration and customer feedback process has become a lot of work for lead facilitators and has costs that are quite hard to sustain. Also, on reflection, this process has not perhaps been as commercially useful to registered facilitators and their clients as it could have been,

3 things have happened that are causing us to review and upgrade the operation of the Register of Professional Facilitators:

The Register of Professional Facilitators is number 2 on Google!

Firstly, and fantastically, the Register of Professional Facilitators is now the number 2 site listed on Google for the search word 'facilitator'. This has happened without any marketing at all!! We now have a robust business model around the site and will be proactively marketing this directly ourselves and through our network of facilitators as an important resource to facilitator, training, coaching, mentoring and organisation development commissioners and purchasers. This will drive a lot business through the site. Buyers tell us they want somewhere they can really trust to source developmental support.

Changing needs in changing times

Secondly, the global recession has occurred and the way training, mentoring coaching and organisation is designed is changing. In fact we are sure a Rubicon is being crossed. Return on Investment (ROI) is the new requirement for training. If training can be shown to more than pay for itself, clients will purchase it. If it doesn't, its a cost that can't be countenanced, and its not being purchased. This is the new rule and its spreading rapidly like a virus through all training commissioners. The simple fact is that all training, coaching, mentoring and organisation development work can always be designed so that it definitely and provably pays for itself many times over!

Proving the worth of what you do!

Thirdly, we have found an American partner organisation that can give us an automated learning analytics system that will do everything we need and many new things that have commercial value to our registered facilitators and their clients. This is an expensive facility costing us tens of thousands of pounds each year.   It means that our registered facilitators can have a professional automated evaluation system that:

• Benchmarks their practice against international norms for their area of work.
• Gathers information before, at the end of and in the months after each development episode, workshop, programme or event.
• Provides an evaluation process and materials that is tailored and bespoke to each piece of development work.
• Calculates the 6 types of Return on Investment (ROI) that arises from the intervention or work that they have done.
• Enables them as a facilitator, trainer, coach, mentor or OD practitioner to provide their clients with excellent dashboard style reports that demonstrate clearly the value of what they do.
• Enhances their professional reputation enormously and instantly puts them above other 'also ran' facilitators, trainers, coaches, mentors and organisation development practitioners who don't evaluate professionally.

So what does all this mean?

Buyers are changing what they buy: Firstly we have renamed the database to The Register of Performance Improvement Facilitators.   This recognises the shift that is taking place in buyers' mentality in that all development work, whether it is personal growth, organisational, training, mentoring or coaching needs now to be done in a climate of, "So what provable return on investment does that get for the individual and their organisation or sponsor?"

Time to raise standards to stay on top: Secondly, we have cleared the database.   We recognise that in order   to have maximum credibility with buyers all our registered facilitators need to be signed up to this higher order set of professional practice principles.   Those registered evidence this by their ongoing use of the learning analytics which will be of substantial commercial value to their business and useful to their marketing efforts in securing more future sales.

Even easier registration: Thirdly, registration is much easier.   If you want in, you show your credibility by using the learning analytics on all your work, whether it arrives from the facilitator database or from other sources.   This will quickly enable you to prove your credibility.   If you feel you need further training to help you redesign your work or the way you deliver your practice we can provide you with   a cost effective 1 day workshop suited to your main interest area or more personal 1:1 support.

Free registration? Finally, if you know other high quality practitioners who would like to be registered on the database you will receive a sixth of their subcription fees - ongoing for as long as they remain registered.  This means that if you know 6 other people, your registration will have no cost to you and if you know more than 6 you will receive a net income! We will send a payment to you every month via paypal.

The Benefits for You

Integrity: Well, firstly, the principle of a 5% 'honesty box' fee remains unchanged.   This means we get paid a little every time you get work from our website and you get paid a lot!   We know that 5% of gross for any work that you get from the database is still a popular notion.   We simply rely on your integrity to pay this promptly.   We don't want to have to keep checking up on this though we may sometimes do this.   This is 'Principle 1' for us and complete integrity is a condition of registration.

Return on Investment: Secondly, how do you get access to the world leading learning analytics™   Well if you bought your own access to this you would have to pay tens of thousands of pounds a year just like we are.   Even to have the right to use just the proprietary questionnaires, would cost you many hundreds of pounds per year and you would still have the problem and costs of doing all the analysis, calculations and reports yourself.   This way it all gets done for you.

Huge opportunities for you: We recognise you will be wanting to avoid a massive initial financial outlay.  So what we propose is this: We will give you access to the learning analytics for just £60 + VAT per month.  We will spend the first 3 months getting to know you and what you do to tailor the analytics questionnaires to you and your clients. This will also give us time to incorporate your branding etc. on everything that goes out, train you in the use of learning analytics, support you with any product redesign or improvement you would like to do.  There is also a one-off one time registration/induction and training fee of £294+VAT. You can opt pay this all at once or pay it as instalments of £24.50+VAT per month over 12 months.  Thereafter you will be live on the analytics system and all you will need to provide is a simple Excel spreadsheet containing relevant details for each new trainer, course/intervention and cohort of participants and the rest will be done for you.  This will immediately enable you to:

• Benchmark your practice against international norms for your specialism.  
• Present to your client as a facilitator, trainer, coach, mentor or OD practitioner that uses a world leading independently sourced evaluation system on all the work that you do.
• Show that you are committed to high quality training and results for your client.
• Save your client the money they would otherwise have to spend on their own independent evaluation.
• Provide your clients with clear dashboard style reports that demonstrate clearly the value of what you do.
• Enhance your professional reputation by demonstrating world leading standards to which you operate.
• Identify the areas of your own practice or product designs that need attention to perform better.
• Measure the effectiveness of up to 7 trainers and associates who do work for you and highlight areas for their development.
• Compare and contrast the effectiveness and Return on Investment (ROI) for each of your products and programmes.
• Strengthen your sales and market position by using the prestige and credibility of your registration as a real client benefit due to your ability to evidence the value you add.

The bottom line is that you get £1000s worth of learning analytics support for just £60+VAT. And, in the unlikely event that it doesn't work for you, you can just cancel your registration at any time.  The risk is low. The potential benefits are massive!

Raise your profile: Thirdly, once you are using the learning analytics we will then take this as evidence that you are committed to the principle of providing learning and development interventions that add real value to your clients and pay for themselves many times over.  This means that you get full registration on the database.  This also means that you get marketed to buyers all over the country along with all the other people who are registered for all the types of work that you do. 

How to Subscribe

Registering as a performance improvement facilitator is a two step process;

Step 1: Setup your monthly subscription of £60 (+VAT)

Step 2: Pay your initial one-off registration/induction fee £294 (+VAT)

Click the PayPal link below to subscribe now. NB: Once you have paid your subscription you will be taken to a new page to complete step 2: Payment of your initial registration fee.

Subscription and Analytics (incl. VAT at 15%) Subscription and Analytics Subscription Free? Remember the commission rules that apply to the subscription fee. Just as this is right for you, it will be right for others too. We will give you a sixth of the fees received, ongoing, for people you introduce, so its easy for you to get and stay registered free of charge or even at a profit. We will send you a payment for each month they are subscribed. We will provide details of how to invite others as soon as you have paid your subscription and one off registration fee. So Click the PayPal link below to subscribe right now. NB: Once you have paid your subscription you will be taken to a new page to complete step 2: Payment of your one-off initial registration/induction fee. Subscription and Analytics (incl. VAT at 15%) Subscription and Analytics   © Copyright 2009 The Performance Improvement Project Ltd