From the Top 17 Training is everyone’s responsibility
It’s been a while, but I still remember my last day in full time education and the feeling of relief that I would never again have to study or do any more exams. I was of course very wrong, writes Ian Carroll, sales and marketing director, FG Eurofred.
IT’S BEEN A while, but I still remember my last day in full time education and the feeling of relief that I would never again have to study or do any more exams. I was of course very wrong.
I soon discovered, when I joined the world of work, that any worthwhile job required continual study and every day was an exam.
This is particularly true of a technical industry such as ours. New equipment, controls and regulations are coming out all the time and it is very easy to let your knowledge get out of date. In the current economic climate, all businesses try to run with the leanest staffing levels possible, so, although we may all know in theory that we should keep up with the latest information by attending more training courses, finding the time is always a problem. However, I would urge all of
you, whatever your role in the industry, to find that time and to allow employees to also have the time to attend courses. It is important for a number of reasons.
Firstly, from the business point of view, unless you are up-to-date, how do you know you are giving your customers/clients the best advice or information? If you are competing with another company that takes training more seriously, are you going to lose out in the tendering process because they know a better alternative? Even if you win the contract, are you going to lose out financially because there may be a more profitable option that you do not know about?
From the industry point of view having fully trained contractors and consultants will mean systems will operate at the optimum efficiency,
end users will be happy with the outcome and the image of the industry as a whole will be enhanced. As I have said before, there are lots of people out there who are happy to criticise us on environmental grounds. The fewer excuses we give them the better.
However, the responsibility for training does not just lie with those who need the training; it also lies with the trainers – trade bodies and manufacturers such as us. As a manufacturer ourselves, we have always tried to make training as affordable and accessible as possible, offering courses on everything from splits to VRF commissioning in our three purpose-built training rooms with working, hands-on equipment.
We encourage our customers to attend our free courses and our distributors to nominate their customers.
In a recent initiative, for the past few months, we have been taking training out to consultants by providing continual personal development sessions at their premises during lunch hours or other convenient times. While we are proud of what we do, we are always seeking to improve it, so if you have any suggestions, I would be happy to hear from you.
We all need to take training more seriously than we do and reading the articles in the feature devoted to the subject in this issue of ACR News is a good place to start. Agree, disagree? Let us know by emailing
fromthetop@datateam.co.uk
Advanced Engineering - Coolsafe
Visit ACR News online at
www.acr-news.com ACR News September 2014
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