Wayward Leaders®

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    • Home
    • Training
    • Health Indices
    • Research Services
    • Field Notes
    • About Me
    • Links & Contact
  • Home
  • Training
  • Health Indices
  • Research Services
  • Field Notes
  • About Me
  • Links & Contact

Training that holds up on the plant floor

Intermediate & Advanced VFD Training

Format: 2-Day Core + Optional Day 3 | $1,400 per seat (Day 3: +$700)


VFDs don't fail. Installations fail them.


This is the technical program that takes field technicians, maintenance engineers, and controls professionals from commissioning fundamentals through advanced PID tuning and industrial communications. Across the two-day core, students wire the motor model, run first rotation, configure for three different load profiles, and troubleshoot instructor-induced faults on live ABB drives. Fourteen hands-on labs. Every student touches the hardware.


Day 3 extends into advanced PID tuning for heat, cooling, and flow processes, a full classroom network build, Modbus and Ethernet/IP integration, and AI-assisted diagnostics at professional depth.


Covers industrial, water, refrigeration, and HVAC applications. Built for field technicians and electricians, plant and maintenance engineers, system integrators, industrial distribution specialists, and controls technicians.


Each seat includes a copy of Before the First Fault: A Field Guide to VFD Installation and a Certificate of Completion. Travel and expenses are included in the per-seat rate.

Details

Professional Technical Sales Training: Becoming a Specialist

Format: 2-Day Program | $1,500 per seat


Stop competing on price. Start competing on judgment.


This program fills the gaps left by Sandler, Challenger, SPIN, and Customer Centric selling frameworks. Those were built for salespeople selling software. This one is built for specialists selling promises buyers cannot verify. Students work through six major exercises that move them from theory to applied judgment.


Inside the program, students learn the Diamonds and Dogs framework, the Verification Question, the Validation Spectrum, the Divining Rod, and the bilingual translation that turns technical experts who resist the word "selling" into MVP revenue generators.


A fully loaded specialist costs $200K+ per year. If 60% of their time goes to customers producing 15% of profits, you are burning $120K annually on misallocation alone. This course pays for itself the first week one specialist hour gets redirected.


Built for application engineers and SMEs, inside and outside technical sales, independent reps, brand reps, managers who lead specialists, and distribution leaders.


Each seat includes a copy of The 10 Immutable Laws of the Industrial Distribution Specialist and a Certificate of Completion. Travel and expenses are included in the per-seat rate.

Details

What Every Open Enrollment Program Includes

Live industrial equipment.

Socratic method instruction.

Socratic method instruction.

Real drives, real relays, real sensors, real contactors. Every student gets hands-on time with the hardware they will encounter in the field.

Socratic method instruction.

Socratic method instruction.

Socratic method instruction.

We do not lecture. We ask questions. Students reason through problems in real time under the guidance of a PhD instructor with thirty-plus years of industrial automation experience. Nobody hides in the back row. Everyone works the hardware, fields the questions, and reasons out the answer in front of their peers.

Small class sizes

Socratic method instruction.

Brand agnostic curriculum

8 to 16 students per session. Every student gets time on the hardware.

Brand agnostic curriculum

Brand agnostic curriculum

Brand agnostic curriculum

We teach the technology, not the brand. Training transfers directly to whatever equipment your organization actually uses.

Purpose-built materials

Brand agnostic curriculum

Purpose-built materials

Each program is anchored by a published book or field guide written specifically for the curriculum.

We come to you.

Brand agnostic curriculum

Purpose-built materials

You provide coffee, lunch, and the location. We bring the hardware, the instructor, and the materials. Travel and expenses are included in the per-seat rate.

The Socratic Method Stands the Test of Time...

Find Out WHy I USE the SOcratic Method

Custom Industrial Training Development

Custom Industrial Training Development 


Type: Service Engagement | Format: 90 to 180 days | Investment: $15,000 to $150,000


When your team needs training that doesn't exist on the shelf, we build it. Custom Industrial Training Development engagements partner with your subject matter experts to design curriculum, materials, and measurement that hold up on the plant floor. Not generic e-learning. Not theoretical adult learning frameworks dressed up as deliverables. Training that an experienced industrial practitioner would recognize as usable from day one.


Wayward Leaders applies established instructional design methodologies (ADDIE and SAM) and adult learning theory, then adds the part most ID firms can't bring: thirty-plus years of operating experience inside industrial environments.


Track record

  • 12 industrial training programs designed and delivered, including advanced motion control, variable frequency drive systems, and industrial reliability curricula.
  • Certification program consulting for Tier 1 global motion control OEMs, including competency framework development and assessment design.
  • 6 doctoral-level courses designed for university programs, including 4 original course builds and 2 redesigns aligned to updated learning outcomes.
  • Three published industrial training titles providing the methodology and content infrastructure that anchors the practice.


Typical engagements

  • New program development. Full curriculum design, materials production, assessment design, and train-the-trainer for a new internal program. Engagement length 90 to 180 days. 
  • Existing program redesign. Conversion from in-person to virtual or blended delivery. Modernization of legacy materials. Refresh of curriculum aligned to current standards and current equipment. 
  • Co-development with internal SMEs. Your engineers and senior technicians know the content. We provide the design framework, structure, and production. 
  • Certification and competency assessment design. Building defensible competency assessments and certification programs for internal or external use. 


Ready to discuss training for your team?

Ready to discuss training your team? Email carl@waywardleaders.com. We respond within one business day.

Why Wayward Leaders for industrial training

Practitioner-led, not theory-led. Every program is built and delivered by a credentialed industrial practitioner who has done the work. Curriculum decisions reflect what actually happens on plant floors, not what should happen in textbooks.


Mobile delivery. We come to your facility. Your team learns on familiar territory without the disruption, travel cost, or per-diem burden of off-site training.


Brand-agnostic specialist content. Our curriculum applies across drive manufacturers, distribution lines, and equipment categories. Your team learns transferable expertise, not vendor-specific procedures that age out with the next product cycle.


Documented competency outcomes. Every engagement closes with measurable participant assessment. Only 13 percent of training programs industry-wide measure outcomes for all participants. We do it on every class.


Industry-benchmarked pricing. Our standard programs deliver below the 2026 ATD industry benchmark of $120 per learning hour while maintaining specialist-level content depth and credentialed instruction.


Credentials backing the work: PhD, CMRP, ATD Master Performance Consultant (in progress), faculty appointments at Truett McConnell University, University of Sioux Falls, and Columbia International University. Three published industrial training titles. Thirty-plus years inside industrial automation.

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