Top Tips for Extending Learning Beyond the Training Room

Why This Matters

A course can introduce ideas, create space to practise and bring people together. Its impact depends on what happens afterwards. Learning grows when people revisit it, discuss it, test it, connect it with experience and receive support to use it in practice.

Introduction

Training is one valuable route to learning, but it is not the only one. We can learn through podcasts, books, articles, videos, conferences, webinars, professional networks, coaching, mentoring, shadowing, observation and everyday problem-solving. The best route depends on what the person needs to learn, why it matters and how they will have an opportunity to use it.

Real-Life Example

After a course, one participant chose a single idea to test rather than trying to remember everything. They discussed it with a colleague, used a practical checklist and returned to the topic during supervision. The original course lasted one day. The learning continued because it was revisited through conversation, action and reflection.

Mike’s Reflection

I have never believed that learning ends when people leave the training room. That is why I use Study Buddy conversations and create resources such as INSPIRE Learning Guides and Companion Toolkits.

A course can open the door, but people need prompts, tools, conversations and opportunities to carry the learning into daily practice.

This Week’s Top Tips

Explore different routes of learning

• Listen to a short podcast, watch a trusted video or read an article that offers a different perspective.
• Use books, journals, conferences and webinars when you need greater depth or current evidence.
• Choose resources because they support a real purpose, not simply because they are available.

Learn through people and experience

• Use coaching, mentoring, networking or a professional community to explore questions with others.
• Arrange shadowing, an exchange visit or observation to see how another person or team approaches the work.
• Use a Study Buddy or trusted colleague to share one thing learned and one thing you will do differently.

Turn learning into workplace action

• Choose one realistic action and decide when and where you will try it.
• Use an INSPIRE Learning Guide, Companion Toolkit, checklist or prompt to revisit and apply the learning.
• Ask a manager or colleague to discuss progress, notice impact and help remove practical barriers.

A Gentle Reminder

Collecting resources is not the same as learning. Choose fewer things, engage with them purposefully and create an opportunity to use what you discover.

October Learning Challenge

Try one learning route you do not use regularly. Share one useful idea with another person and agree one way to test it in practice.

Over to You

Where does your most useful learning happen, and what would help you create more of it?

Remember: Small Actions can Create Big Opportunities.

Evidence and development notes

• The National Careers Service lists formal training, online learning, mentoring, coaching, shadowing and secondments as different ways to learn at work.
• Learning at Work Week 2026 uses the theme “Many ways to learn” and emphasises inclusive lifelong learning, social learning and understanding barriers and motivators.