Why does a mindset that “training is easy and ‘anyone’ can train” exist in the workforce today?

As a workforce learning professional, it is very frustrating to encounter the attitude that training is easy and anyone, almost anyone, can be a trainer. Anyone involved in learning and development profession knows the exact opposite is true and such assumptions from champions and stakeholders has led to an absolute train wreck of disappointment, frustration and missed timelines and outcomes by those holding such opinions.

As learning and development professionals, we’ve all encountered this phenomenon numerous times. Through the years, I’ve formed a theory about why this is. It is because so many things get lumped into "training" (the laymen's definition of it, anyway) this is a very common misconception amongst everyone but workforce learning professionals.

Because almost everyone - regardless of profession - has participated in some activity in that broad laymen's definition of "training," (like showing the new person around the office or working with the new person for a day or so to show them the ropes) such activities give the misconception that those who perform these orientation tasks are therefore experienced providers of effective, high-quality training. Not so.

Also, many in the workforce get asked to put on presentations of one form or another on or off the job. Participants in such activities often springboard to the idea that though such presentations are based on very little standard, involve very little evaluative criteria of either presenter or audience or both, they are automatically, again, an experienced provider of effective, high-quality training.

These give rise to the misconception that learning development is quick and easy. Hence the old wave of the hand and directive, "go make a training program to fix this issue and start running it next week."  Why? Because it probably didn't take them long to prepare for it (if any preparation was involved in the above scenarios) and didn't take them long to deliver it.

All professions battle with their share of “urban legends.” The misconception that developing and delivering effective learning programs is so easy anyone can do it is ours.