Our feature on What Trainers Would Consign to Oblivion in Room 101, timed to coincide with our 101th issue of LearningWire, has received so much comment we thought it would be an informative exercise to summarise the results. Before reading on, anyone responsible for training venues should beware!
TrainingZONE's Room 101 must be pretty large to fit all those hotel rooms in - we've had complaints about hotel rooms which are too hot/cold, have over-enthusiastic air conditioning, resemble a broom cupboard, have pillars or are L-shaped (the problems of the last two seem to be insurmountable!).
Quite a few respondents felt that squeaky felt-tip pens in yellow or fading green (or indeed any colour as long as it's not black) were the root of all evil, but Peter Rendall may have a point when he says that trainers who moan about clients and/or hotels not providing fresh markers should be put into Room 101. As he says, should GPs complain that patients don't supply stethoscopes?!
It seems that all courses would be stress-free if it wasn't for irritating delegates who ask if they can leave early, ask what time they're going to finish even though they've had the joining details for months, who get called away, leave the mobile on and try to sell a house in the meantime!
Undoubtably some of the apparent lack of enthusiasm from degates is due to people who 'send' people on courses with no preparation and then expect a quick fix to a problem - something which several of our respondents have picked up on.
More moans about equipment come in the form of dodgy flipcharts, OHPs you can't see for the dirt and death by (sliding) bullet points, which apparently some trainers are happy to read out verbatim despite the fact that all those present can read.
Just a few more tips for trainers - uncover those transparencies and go easy on the mumbo-jumbo. The last word is from Chris Kelly, who would happily be consigned to Room 101 himself - "I'd happily train there if whoever owned it had arranged for the lighting to be truly controllable".
