Friday, April 25, 2014

A word of advice... if you are ever a teacher/trainer

I've been a teacher, and I've been a corporate trainer for several of the companies I've worked for in the past. So I do try to hold back judgement on other trainers and training classes. But sometimes you just have to comment to SOMEONE. If you are a trainer, whether of humans or other animals, you cannot allow a behavior and then get mad at the performance of said behavior. Case in point... I am in training for my new job. I am at the end of week 3. During those three weeks, we have had 2 different trainers. Trainer A is female and is a loud, hyper, rather distractable personality. Trainer B is a bit more serious, still likes to have fun, but isn't as prone to going off on tangents. Week 1 was primarily led by Trainer A, first half of Week 2 was both trainers at various times with the second half being Trainer B exclusively. Week 3 was also divided in half. The first half was Trainer B exclusively and the second half is Trainer A exclusively. Both trainers have been very lax about enforcing the "all eyes on me" mentality. There have been numerous people who do not pay attention during class. They surf the internet, they play on their phones, they color, they chit chat, etc. Well, here we are at the very tail end of week 3, and suddenly Trainer A is mad at certain people (who aren't her favorites) for continuing to do all these things. And she yells, or whistles loudly, or using obnoxious noise makers to show her displeasure with the behaviors that she has not only allowed, but at times actively encouraged in previous weeks. She does not curtail undesirable behaviors in her favorites (like the little twit girl who has to make a personal statement about EVERYTHING to show how it is all about her. Things like "Well, that (whatever type of computer the customer may be using) doesn't matter, I use a PC!" or "Well, I know everything already, I have an iPhone!" I find the learning environment to be nearly untenable. There is so much down time that it makes me crazy. I am bored, and I do already know quite a bit of what they are ostensibly teaching us. I don't know this because I am a know it all. I know it because I have been in tech support before and the techniques don't vary that much. I have used knowledgebases for YEARS and they haven't changed much either. I want to learn what they have to teach me. I want to make sure that I am as prepared as possible before I start taking customer interactions. However, neither trainer is particularly good about finding out the answers to questions if they do not already know the answer. Trainer B at least will acknowledge if he doesn't know the answer and will make a note of the question so that if he has time he can see if he can find an answer. Trainer A just gets nasty and insulting towards the person asking the question if she doesn't know the answer. So I've stopped asking her questions. Because what is the point? I'm not interested in being insulted by a rude, juvenile, insecure idiot. I can find out the answers on my own when I have time. I wake up every day NOT looking forward to going to work. I find myself angry most of the time. I try to breathe and remind myself that this is for a year so that I can move elsewhere in the company. The problem? I've heard that before. I've worked in call centers before. I've had to be in this situation before. And you don't get out of it that easily. But back to the main point. If you are ever a trainer or a teacher. It is YOUR job to set the tone for your class. If you start it off with random singing, playing Youtube videos, and other things that have absolutely NO connection to what you are supposed to be teaching... and you let it go on for weeks, then do NOT be surprised when it is still going at the end of your class sessions. (and we're not actually at the end, we are right at the middle.)

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