Robotic training

Quote

At the end of the day it's expected that the trainee will be able to pick product, teach spline, park product back and change tool.

All of that in one day, are you sure that is an achievable target?

I can offer the following points, although it may come across as a little official:

1. Safety

- You are the HSE of the session.

- Get the group at the start to safety assess the environment, open a safety discussion period first.

- Go over the safety devices and safety instructions of the training equipment.

- Be prepared for the unexpected, robot collisions could occur, so always be mindful of attendees and robot working envelope.

- Be prepared to 'police' this and don't be afraid of pointing this out, if you feel attendees are not behaving adequately.

- But remember, keep it as casual and relaxed as possible, but safety is something you need to police.

2. Preparation is key:

- Create an itinerary and bullet point this at the start.

- Usually during training, itineraries are difficult to adhere to, so expect deviation and be comfortable with the fact it will happen.

- If you have prepared a manual/documentation, do a trial run with someone non-biased and listen to the feedback.

- Check the equipment safety before each session and operational capabilities.

- Be prepared for the robot to not behave during training, remember 'people' love pushing buttons before understanding what they do.

- This will introduce stoppages/errors during training, use these periods for the attendees to resolve themselves as group consolidations not yourself to fix.

- Try and make sure everyone has equal time for hands on, this way attendees will not feel ignored and are likely to engage more in the activities.

3. You are supposed to be the expert and the host - all eyes will be on you:

- You are likely to get a mix of people in regards to interest, current skill and enthusiasm including personnel whom may be jealous of you etc.

- Break the ice, by having a casual 10 min intro, with a drink, introduce yourself, ask attendees to describe their current day to day duties and ambitions.

- Nerves usually play a factor in your deliverance and also those that attend, so try and engage to all attendees, and not talk down to them.

- Remember, some people in groups sometimes feel embarrassed to ask questions or are embarrassed to say they don't understand.

- Ensure from the outset, there is no such thing as a stupid question so try and demonstrate/let them carry out as much hands on as possible.

- They may not understand the terminology you are using, try and adapt to different terminology so that they can easily understand it.

- Make sure you let them all know, you are open to any and all questions, comments and feedback at all times.

- Strike up an even balance, remember you are training them, but also listen to their comments, you will also learn from them, whilst training them.

- Be open to the concept, that you may be challenged by experienced personnel, welcome it and accept the fact that they may know more than you.

- Move around as you are explaining things, and don't stay routed to one spot.

- Overall try and make the training casual and relaxed, the key is to engage not only the group, but also as individuals (depends on class size).

4. Attendees exercises:

- Try and introduce as much hands on as possible.

- You are training basics, try and keep theory to a minimum, most basics can be easily demonstrated/applied without the need of 'death by ohp'.

- You find most attendees will benefit from more time on the robot and engage more.

- Their day to day roles, may not allow them time on the robot, so these hands on exercises will be key to their enjoyment and learning.

- Try and create consolidation exercises to cover what you have delivered to give them one on one time.....and give you a little break too.

- Also, time dependent, ask them as a group to come up with a scenario and see if this can be applied on the training equipment.

- Remember this is not a 'school' environment and you are training competent people with existing skills, allowance of some free time on the robot is key.

Hope this helps...…….and enjoy your new role...………..

You're welcome.

Just one at a time, makes things a lot easier then and the benefit of one person, is they get full use of your training robot throughout the duration.

Only step in if you consider what they're about to do is unsafe or possible damage.

Otherwise, let them make mistakes and try not to intervene and see if they can rectify it themselves.

Also, if they ask you a question, that you can answer easily, and if applicable try adopting the

'lets try it and see what happens' philosophy.

This way, they get to answer they're own question and not only learn a little more, but get the benefit of looking at situations on their own without being dependent on yourself for the answer.

It will build up their confidence very quickly.