Training, course, seminar, workshop?
Anyone involved in the field of education and training may have wondered what the differences are between the various training formats. As a coach or trainer, you have probably used some of these formats yourself. We would like to briefly introduce the significance of some forms of training here.
A course consists of a coordinated sequence of lessons. It is about learning a specific skill, focusing on personal or professional advancement. At the end you will receive a certificate of participation.
A training course is structured similarly to a course, but usually ends with a mandatory final exam that must be passed.
A workshop is an event where participants are asked to perform practical exercises under the guidance of a facilitator. The aim is to work together on issues and achieve practical results. Ideally, the workshop starts with a problem or question and ends with a solution.
A seminar is similar to a workshop in terms of content. However, it is primarily about knowledge acquisition, and the seminar leader can combine moderated parts with interactive elements.
A training with a large number of participants
The training provides standardized knowledge and skills in a specific area. The emphasis is on frontal teaching as opposed to training. For example, if you are training a group on presentation design, you will primarily be explaining facts, showing examples, answering questions, giving tips, and perhaps to a small extent having participants practice a few things. The active part of the trainer is about the same as that of a teacher in the classroom. Unlike training, this form of education allows knowledge to be imparted to a large number of participants at low cost.
Are you still in school or are you already training?
During training, the focus is on hands-on practice. Whether it’s a soccer team practicing plays on the field or participants learning how to use PowerPoint professionally with a coach, it’s all about acquiring skills through active participation. In the training, the focus is clearly on the individual’s own actions, and the training instructor provides instructions and assistance for implementation.
Of course, there are also mixed forms of the individual formats. For certain events it is useful to use different forms of knowledge transfer at once. One such example is our Presentation Rocket Day on 11/18/2016. On this day, we offer a mix of lectures, workshops and seminars, a combination of professional conference and training day, so to speak. Participants benefit from the use of a wide variety of tools and the diverse transfer of specialist knowledge.
Dipl.-Wirtsch.-Informatiker Matthias Garten is the expert for multimedia presentations. He is an entrepreneur, speaker (TOP 100 Speaker), trainer (TOP 100 Excellence Trainer), multiple book author, presentation coach (presentation training), member of the GSA and Club 55, organizer of the Presentation Conference, Presentation Bootcamp and Presentation Rocket Days. In addition to PowerPoint and presentation training, he inspires and advises companies to present themselves even more effectively and thus stand out from competitors. He is the business owner of the presentation and PowerPoint agency smavicon Best Business Presentations and with his team has created over 15,000 presentations for over 150 industries since 1993.
