SENSITIVITY TRAINING

Sensitivity training laboratory also known as T-Group learning, D- Group learning (development) or laboratory training, is an experience-based, unstructured variety of learning where learning or development takes place by sharing experiences, particularly those generated within the group.

1. It is a participant centered learning oriented towards participants’ know-how. 
2. It accepts the participants as they are and attracts upon them as resources for operating in the research lab. 
3. The assumption is that effective learning influences the attitudes and behavior and it comes through emotional and intellectual involvement. 
4. The goal of this research laboratory is personal growth through increased self-awareness and social competence. 
5. It additional aims is to form the group members a lot of sensitive to the emotions of others and themselves, so that they study the results of their own actions. by specializing in their own actions and therefore the  feelings of others. 
6. As they work in as a group they acknowledge the various undercurrents at work – take into account the fact that the facilitator is present only to mediate and that too in a exceedingly restricted capability. The participants are on their own so far as individual decision-making is concerned.

Their pure feelings and basic emotions are the only area of their judgment-making process. They perpetually run the danger of over or undervaluing the feelings and actions of their peers, thereby diluting or concentrating the intensity of their inferences within the method. This leads them to acknowledge their inherent leadership-styles, their innate sensitivity to others and their overall ability to hone their emotions so as to subsume the views and biases of their peers, in their analysis. They need a far better overall understanding of their perceptions of other people as well as peer-perceptions relating to them.

AIMS OF SENSITIVITY TRAINING

The aim is to harmonize group-behavior and produce the members into harmoniousness, furthermore change them to harness the ability of this increased understanding to extend the effectuality of their roles as team players and managers. 

1. In the starting as the group meets in an casual atmosphere with the trainer there is intentional lack of leadership and any formal agenda like the manner one is employed in different systems of learning.
2. As the trainer does not go with the normal expectations of the participants from the teacher, there is an absence of matter.
3.  People look askance and find means to fill this vacuum. This brings in centre of interest the interaction processes within the group. 
4. And every one starts building his role in the group. Now as the group goes ahead the trainer becomes open and sympathetic and expresses his feelings in a negligible manner. However, the most important participation is from the group. 
5. Members who come to know about their own behavior provide the feedback. And new sorts of linkages comes up. 
6. The members function as resources to each other and east the experimentation with personal, interpersonal and collaborative behavior. The group identifies new manners of solving problems a as a whole.

ISSUES IN SENSITIVITY TRAINING

1. Issues like who is a listener, leader, assistant comes out. 
2. Emotional issues also come to the fore. 
3. There are queries like: who am I in this group (identity), what are my goals and needs what do I wish?, 
4. The amount of power and control do I have, how much do I believe others and create that trust, do I oppose authority, do I resist personal dominance, do I ask for support from the others and so on. 
5. Such issues come to the fore front. 
6. In the final stage all these issues are examines in relation to the experience at the place of job. 
7. This period of about one week is directed towards personal growth and better understanding of self and the environment. 
8. There is continuous feedback through out the entire stressful process for the trainer as well as the people involved. 
9. However, the final result is one that may relieve stress as a full. 

APPLICATION OF SENSITIVITY TRAINING

Sensitivity training is applied in wide variety of situations and to a wide class of people: from the middle and top-level management to professional helpers like social workers, teachers and even students:

1. This not only helps in their personal growth, but it also aims to make them aware of the processes at work as they interact with people, thus developing their team building capabilities. 
2. Organizations use this training for OD intervention. Family laboratories and cousin labs are used to initiate organizational change and reduce conflict in the work place.
3.  It is also a useful tool to develop team spirit in the people. 
4. This can also be used to enhance the sensitivities of the people to the processes at work and the emotions of the colleagues and others that work with them.
5.  Organizations today are using this tool along with others to achieve the above-mentioned goals. However one important thing is that for this training to be really beneficial and to bring about a lasting change in the members is has to have a system of continuous follow up among the members. Also the members have to consciously make the attempt to implement the learning is their practical lives. But this tool is a powerful one that organizations in all spheres and all over the world can use to increase the overall organizational effectiveness.