September 30th, 2009PC Support Training – Insights
You should feel pleased that you’re on the right track! Only one in ten folks claim contentment with their job, but vast numbers just bitch about it and nothing happens. Because you’ve done research we can guess that you’re at least considering retraining, so even now you’re ahead of the game. The next step is to get busy to find your direction.
Before we even think about specific training programs, look for an advisor who can help you sort out the right type of training for you. An advisor who will take time to get to know your personality, and find out what types of work suit you:
* Do you want to interact with other people? If so, do you like working with the same people or are you hoping to meet new people? Or are you better working in isolation?
* Are you considering which industry you maybe could work in? (Post credit crunch, it’s essential to choose well.)
* Having completed your retraining, would you like your skills to see you to retirement age?
* Do you think being qualified will give you the chance to find the work you’re looking for, and remain in employment until your retirement plans kick in?
It would be an idea for you to really explore Information Technology – there are more positions than people to do them, and it’s one of the few choices of career where the sector is on the grow. Contrary to the opinions of certain people, it isn’t a bunch of techie geeks staring at their computers the whole time (if you like the sound of that though, they do exist.) Most positions are done by people like you and me who enjoy better than average salaries.
A major candidate for the top potential problem in IT training is often the ‘in-centre’ workshop requirement. Most training schools extol the virtues of the ‘benefits’ of going in to their classes, however, they quickly become a major problem because of:
* Repeated visits to the centre – 100’s of miles in many cases.
* Weekday accessibility to events can be usual, and with 2-3 days to book off work, this is usually problematic for most working students.
* Most of us find 4 weeks off each year is not really enough. Spend at least half of this for educational classes and you’ll experience even more problems.
* ‘In-Centre’ workshop days can ’sell out’ fast and often end up larger than is ideal.
* Tension can run high in many classes where different students want to work at different paces.
* The growing costs associated with travel – driving or taking public transport to the training facility plus several days bed and breakfast can mount up each time you attend. With only 5-10 centre-days costing 35 pounds for a single over-night room, plus 40 pounds petrol and 15.00 for food, that equates to four to nine hundred pounds of costs that we weren’t expecting.
* It’s important to maintain privacy. We don’t want to risk losing any advancement that we’re owed while we retrain.
* Most of us find that, at times, it’s uncomfortable to raise questions in a class full of other trainees – who wants to look like they’re the only one who doesn’t get it?
* It should be remembered that days in-centre become basically unreachable, if you work elsewhere in the country for days at a time.
The best possible solution is watching a filmed workshop – providing direct instruction whenever it’s convenient for you.
Do them at home on your desktop computer or out in the garden on your laptop. Any questions that pop up, just make use of the 24×7 support (that we hope you’ll insist on with any technical courses.)
Just do the modules at any time you need to revise. And of course, you won’t need to take notes as you have the lesson indefinitely.
Quite simply: Time and money is saved, you have reduced hassle and you completely avoid polluting our environment.
A proficient and professional consultant (vs a salesman) will cover in some detail your current situation. This is paramount to calculating your study start-point.
If you have a strong background, or sometimes a little work-based experience (some certifications gained previously perhaps?) then it could be that your starting level will be quite dissimilar from someone with no background whatsoever.
For those students commencing IT study for the first time, it’s often a good idea to start out slowly, starting with some basic PC skills training first. Usually this is packaged with any educational course.