Well, it's January, so our first blog is inspired by the world of health and fitness. Having put on weight over the festive period, I have decided to embark on a diet and exercise programme. Now I'm not the first and I surely won't be the last, but I realise that we all approach this in quite a different way.
Many people join a gym, get a personal trainer, and join Weight Watchers or Slimming World. They have set their mind to a goal and are giving it 100%. I truly admire these people. Unfortunately, if I joined a gym I would hardly ever go. I just find it difficult to find the time... It's not just the time in the gym, but is the time taken to get there and back, and the time in the shower. When I then start to take into account the restrictions of days and times I could actually go, I'd be lucky if I could get their once a week... Not a good use of my money!
So, being a realist I have instead invested in "Just Dance 3" for the Wii. It cost me around £30, and I am able to do anywhere between 20 and 40 min every day. It doesn't matter if my kids are in bed, my husband is at work, or I'm waiting for conference call to begin. Exercising little and often just fits better into my life. And yes, I am seeing results. Okay I may not be seeing them quite as quickly as someone who has joined a gym and got a personal trainer, but I am slowly but surely reaching my goal.
I think this is one of the reasons that I am a hige fan of work-based, bite size training. I'm not suggesting that you can condense a full day's training course into one hour – of course you can't. But some people find it hard to fit traditional training workshops into their lives. They prefer to drip feed their development and make improvements little and often.
So if you are responsible for running training courses, and find that people often drop out at the last minute, it may be that other demands are being made of their time. Consider alternatives to traditional training, such as bite-size sessions, on-line learning, coaching or informal buddying. It may offer a way to achieve your goals (possibly not as quickly) but as long as we get there, it shouldn't matter how we do it.
