Upgrade Your HVAC Technician Training

Upgrade Your HVAC Technician Training

 

How skilled your team of HVAC technicians are has a direct impact on the business. And the way that they become skilled is through effective training. Offering ongoing HVAC learning opportunities will ensure that everyone is upskilling and can do their best work. There are a number of traditional ways to keep your team educated and informed, but you can take your training to the next level with these HVAC technician training ideas.

Provide Different HVAC Technician Training Options

When determining what kind of training to provide your techs, it’s important to consider how they learn best. A mistake service managers often make with training is offering only one learning style, which can alienate those who learn better in a different way. That’s why it’s so important to offer multiple training methods to continue learning and training.

Some examples outside of the traditional classroom style training include:

  • Online HVAC Training: Which can be accessed on the employee’s own time, from anywhere, and referenced when needed. 
  • On-site Training: Which can keep technicians motivated by taking them out of the classroom setting and into the field to get hands-on experience. 
  • 3D Simulations and Virtual Reality (VR): Which allows technicians to train risk-free in life-like field scenarios in the comfort of their preferred location, like with the use of SkillMill.

A blend of the above styles will provide all of your technicians, from “green” ones to seasoned ones, the options they need to train effectively.

Consider Gamification to Encourage Participation

No matter the training style, your team members are likely to soak everything in better if you make their training more fun. Long videos, thick textbooks, and endless exams can feel a little reminiscent of high school.

Avoid boredom and burnout by introducing gamification into your HVAC technician training. Interplay Learning’s SkillMill training platform makes training fun by combining learning with elements of game-play. Your team members can earn points by watching videos, completing simulations and testing their knowledge. Then, they can compare their scores with their teammates on a team leaderboard.

To make training even more enjoyable, unleash the competitive side of your HVAC techs in a productive way by offering incentives. For example, at the end of a quarter, the highest-scoring team members or the ones who advanced the most in their HVAC courses could win a gift card, paid time off, or other similar prizes.

Focus on Customer Service

Your varied, gamified HVAC training should not only include technical knowledge, but also emphasize the importance of customer service skills. HVAC technicians will be required to interact with residents of multi-family unit buildings in the course of regular inspections and repairs. They don’t just need to be smart – they need to be friendly, open and able to communicate well with all types of people.

Methods to feature customer service elements alongside standard HVAC training include:

  • Instructing your team in the “LAST” method when interacting with multi-family building residents. They should first Listen to the problem, then Acknowledge the inconvenience it has caused, Solve it quickly and efficiently, and finally Thank those who brought it to their attention. 
  • Engaging in role-play scenarios during training. Team members can pretend to be residents experiencing various HVAC issues. Make sure to have everyone give feedback on their fellow technicians’ methods of handling each situation! 
  • Encouraging the sharing of stories. Have team members talk about times in their own lives when they experienced poor customer service. Then, as a group, discuss how the situation could have been handled in a better way.

A team of HVAC techs who have been trained in customer service will not just be skilled, efficient and hardworking. They will also be kind, empathetic, careful listeners whose work improves the lives of residents in multi-family buildings.

Upgrade Your HVAC Technician Training with SkillMill

If you want to give your technicians training that’s engaging, efficient, and encourages continuous participation through fun game play, SkillMill is the answer. Your team will advance farther, faster and have fun learning as they collect points, compete, and explore a wide range of training options — including videos, 3D training scenarios and virtual reality-based simulations.

Ready to give your technicians the training they need?

 

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