Shadowing feels like training.
It is not.
It is watching.
I’ve watched plenty of team members shadow other team members in my career.
Watching them never made me better.
Reps did.
Here is the problem.
Two weeks of shadowing builds zero skills.
It builds familiarity.
Familiarity does not answer the phone.
Here is the fix.
I call it the Repeat Back Rule.
After every call your new hire shadows, they repeat the call out loud before the next one rings.
The greeting.
The questions.
The close.
Thirty seconds.
Now watching becomes practicing.
Every single call.
Here is what I would do this week.
1. Install the rule today.
Tell the new hire and the veteran at the same time.
The veteran holds them to it.
2. Flip the seats by Friday.
New hire talks.
Veteran listens.
One call is enough to start.
3. Cap shadowing at three days.
After that, every skill gets practiced.
Not observed.
Here is the shift.
Nobody gets better at golf by watching golf.
Skills are built in the swing.
The faster your new hire moves from watching to doing, the faster confidence shows up.
If you want a first week built on reps instead of watching, that is what we train inside Ignite Agency Training.
Better every day,
Zach Sabin
Founder and CEO
Ignite Agency Training