Training Center Webinars Now Offered Online

The executives at Mitchell Communications Group’s The Center in Fayetteville thought long and hard about the translation of their services into a digital context.

Founder and senior vice president Blake Woolsey believes strongly in what she considers to be the bedrock of The Center — instructor-led, customized training.

She and Elise Mitchell started the concept of The Center with the formation of Executive Communications Consultants in 2000, recognizing a need for business-training solutions and professional career coaching, and since then the in-person approach has been its bread and butter. 

However, because of convenience and affordability, e-learning was a piece the leadership team deemed an inevitable requirement for the future of their industry.

“We knew we had to go there,” Woolsey said. But at the same time, she and her team didn’t want to compromise the quality of the personalized training available through The Center, which has been a shared service of Mitchell Communications Group since 2008.

That meant digital classes needed to do more than replicate in-person training courses. The Center needed to create a whole new service in order for it to be effective, she said.

Three years ago, The Center began producing monthly webinars on subjects like conflict in the workplace, influence and values-based leadership.

The free webinars started out drawing a handful of people, but soon the audience ballooned to reach an average of 125-250 viewers per webcast — although Woolsey believes that estimate could be low, as some managers show the videos to their entire teams.

The Center even has people from as far away as Russia tuning into its webinars.

 “It just grew and grew,” Woolsey said, “and then we realized, this is a product.”

And demand for that product was high. Clients continually asked for copies of the webinars, either to watch again or because they or someone else missed the original webcast.

In response, The Center now has the webinars available for download on its newly launched website, ProfoundSkills.com.

Clients can purchase single webinars, a subscription for monthly webinars, or a Trainer’s Toolkit, which includes a modulated version of the webinar, along with other learning materials.

The new product allows for people to “learn on their own time,” Woolsey said. “I know a lot of times people might have a thin slice of time available for a class.”

Each pre-recorded video also comes with an interactive PowerPoint presentation, according to the website.

The leadership team at The Center believes the move toward adding online services to its repertoire is the right one, citing data from an E-Learning Market Trends & Forecast 2014-16 Report that predicts the e-learning market will grow from $35.6 billion in 2011 to $51.5 billion in 2016. 

Meanwhile, it was important to the team to make the webinars affordable. The live webcasts are free.

“When budgets are stretched, training is the first thing to go,” said Gina Miller, senior director of The Center.

But Miller said training is an investment that can have one of the biggest impacts on a company.

“Most companies do not have metrics in place to measure the impact that mobile- and technology-based learning is actually having. This is why it is so important to be sure a company’s invested dollars are actually resulting in the desired behavior change,” she said. “This idea is central to what [The Center] has done in the use of reinforcement and by utilizing a customized, learning-focused, online learning design.”

Re-enforcement might involve, for example, providing tools for managers to give instruction to and support positive professional behavior changes in an individual.

It is one of four steps in what’s considered by the leadership team to be the firm’s unique and effective process, starting with an evaluation of the clients’ needs, which can vary from an individual who wants to work toward earning a raise or a leader looking to get more out of his or her team. 

The Center aids its clients in working toward these goals by improving their knowledge, skills and abilities.

The idea is to help businesses cultivate a “culture of development and growth” and because of the broadness of those needs, the evaluation process is important. 

“It’s not cookie cutter,” she added. “It’s a very customized, blended approach.”

And Woolsey said the online version underscores this business philosophy. “It’s very true to the instructor-led training approach and it’s very branded. We hope that people watch it and think, ‘This feels very Mitchell.’”