Why Project Management Training Doesn't Work for Everyone – and What We Can Do Differently

I've spent a lot of time in training rooms over the years, particularly during my career in asset management across Europe and the US, and one thing has become very clear to me: people simply don't all learn in the same way. It sounds obvious when you say it, but I still think it's something we can easily forget when designing and delivering professional training. 

Put 15 people into a PRINCE2®, AgilePM® or Scrum course and you haven't got 15 identical learners. You've got 15 people with different careers, experiences, confidence levels and ways of taking in information. Some will happily sit and read a manual, while others can look at the same page several times and it still won't quite click. Draw it out for them, relate it to something they've experienced at work or simply explain it in a different way and suddenly it makes sense. 

Within that same group there may also be people with dyslexia, ADHD, autism or other neurodivergent ways of thinking and learning. For me, recognising those differences isn't an additional part of good training. It's where good training starts. 

Passing the exam is important, but it's not enough 

I deliver accredited project management training, so of course I want my delegates to pass their exams. Exam preparation is important and people have invested their time and money in achieving a recognised qualification. But I've never believed my job ends with getting somebody through an exam. 

Someone can learn enough terminology to answer an exam question correctly, but the real test comes when they're back at work a few weeks later, sitting in a project meeting and actually having to use what they've learned. That's why I spend so much time trying to make the theory relevant. 

If we're talking about risk, let's relate it to a situation somebody might actually encounter. If we're discussing stakeholders, let's talk about that difficult stakeholder most of us have probably dealt with at some point in our careers. If we're learning a PRINCE2® principle or an AgilePM® concept, I want delegates to understand why it's there and how it can help them, rather than simply memorising a definition for an exam. 

I've found throughout my career that once people can connect new information to something real, it becomes much easier to understand and, importantly, much easier to remember. 

Neurodiversity has changed the way I think about training 

Supporting neurodivergent learners has become a really important part of how I teach. A delegate with dyslexia might find a page packed with terminology difficult to process but understand the same concept very quickly when it's explained visually. Someone with ADHD might struggle with a long period of passive listening but become one of the most engaged people in the room once you introduce discussion, questions and practical activities. An autistic learner might benefit from having greater structure and clarity around what we're covering, why we're covering it and what is coming next. 

These aren't weaknesses. They're simply different ways that people process information. 

My Learning and Development background, including everything I've learned through CIPD, has made me think much more about the way I deliver information. If somebody doesn't understand something, my first reaction shouldn't be that the learner is struggling. I should be asking myself whether there's another way I can teach it. 

Sometimes that might mean explaining it differently. I might draw it, use a practical example, break a complicated subject into smaller pieces or ask the learner to explain it back to me in their own words. Sometimes it's simply about creating an atmosphere where somebody feels comfortable enough to ask the question they're sitting there thinking everybody else already knows the answer to. 

None of that makes the qualification easier and it certainly doesn't lower the standard. PRINCE2® is still PRINCE2® and AgilePM® is still AgilePM®. We're simply giving people more than one route to understanding it. 

The interesting thing is that everybody benefits 

This is probably one of the biggest things I've learned from inclusive training. Many of the techniques we introduce to support neurodivergent learners actually make the learning experience better for everybody. 

You don't need dyslexia to appreciate somebody explaining a complicated concept clearly. You don't need ADHD to prefer an interactive discussion to sitting through another hour of slides. You don't need to be autistic to appreciate structure and knowing where the day is heading. And you certainly don't need a diagnosed learning difference to occasionally need something explained for a second time. 

That's why I don't really see inclusive training as something we should add when somebody tells us they need additional support. For me, it should simply be part of good training from the beginning. 

Creating a classroom where it's OK not to know 

There's another part of this which I think is just as important, and that's confidence. I've trained some incredibly experienced and successful professionals who have walked into a project management course absolutely convinced they're going to struggle. 

Sometimes they haven't studied or sat an exam for 10, 15 or even 20 years. Sometimes they're sitting alongside colleagues who they assume know far more than they do. For others, previous experiences of education may have knocked their confidence. 

One of the most important things I can do as a trainer is create an environment where people feel comfortable saying, "I don't understand that yet." 

That little word, yet, really matters. 

If somebody doesn't understand my explanation, I don't see that as their failure. It tells me that I may need to find another way of explaining it. And in my experience, there usually is another way. 

What should organisations be looking for? 

When an organisation invests in project management training, particularly when they're developing large and diverse teams, I think it's worth looking beyond the course syllabus and the qualification. 

How will the training actually be delivered? Will people participate or mainly listen? Will the theory be connected to situations they recognise from their own working environment? How will the trainer deal with different levels of experience within the same room? What happens when somebody doesn't understand something the first time? And does the trainer recognise that the people sitting in front of them may learn in completely different ways? 

Those questions matter because ultimately an organisation isn't simply investing in a classroom, a course or an exam. It's investing in its people. 

For me, successful project management training isn't just seeing somebody's name next to the word "Pass". Of course I love seeing my delegates pass their exams, but some of the moments I'm proudest of are much smaller than that. 

It's seeing the person who was nervous on Monday contributing confidently to the conversation by Friday. It's somebody coming up to me and saying, "That finally makes sense." It's seeing somebody who didn't think they were particularly good at project management suddenly realise that actually, they are. 

And when they go back to work, I don't just want them to have another qualification to put on LinkedIn or their CV. I want them to have the confidence to actually use what they've learned. 

For me, that's when training has really worked.