Greetings Everyone,

There area lot of places that claim that they invest in their people but the reality is that they would prefer their employees to just do their job. I know many who aren't satisfied with their jobs mainly because there is no real progression route or opportunities for growth.

So I wonder... are you encouraged to learn and practice more skills where you work? If not are you finding any alternative ways to learn?

Maat

Did an apprenticeship with big company. I strongly recommend them so much because of the training I recieved. Even though I'm no longer with them I gotta say the training I recieved was first class. The basic of the schedule was observation of technician which simply meant following a guy around and watching what he did. These guys would explain everything and teach you how it is done in practice. The training manager then set you tasks. You had a log book to show all the faults you worked on and how you solved them. The most important thing though was the working procedure (which believe me is a minefield). Then you has one day a week to do day release in college (all paid for) to learn you theory. Then every now and again they sent you on courses. These courses would cost an individual £1000s but were all paid for by company for me. I still hold certificates in all sorts of machinery and theory as well as other things I can still put on my CV like the first AID course, presentation and public speaking and all sorts of other funny things I wouldn't have thought to do. I really think more people should look into doing things like that. The mix of real practical experience and theoretical paperwork as well as bonuses is not to be sniffed at.



Ubrarchist

You can read all the theory and physics but I've found that with electronics the best thing is to actually play with stuff. Buy those kits where you put together radios and things while learning how they work and move on from there. When you play with the components and see what they look like, how to read resistors and capacitors for example and recognize what part of a circuit does what it becomes even more intetesting. Nothing like fiddling with a fuse box or messy peice of old jumbled trunking to amuse you and show you whats what LOL

@BlackMatta: LOL No I wasn't joking at the time but I just read back what you said. I think that when employers don't want to take a risk in the people it employs, they then can spend a lot of time and money on recruitment and lose a lot of good people because they didn't want to take that risk.

@SoulRebel: Nowadays there's more focus being put on training and devlopment but it's convincing the people at the top about thebenefits ofdeveloping people. Where I work it is possible to go on many courses as long as it's related to the job you're doing. That limits what people can do and some don't find alternative ways or perhaps they don't want to . When they do go on the courses and feel they are limited in their role, they don't always see opportunities to get the experience themselves.

I agree that it is the responsibilty of the individual ultimately to learn but this can take the focus off the employers responsibilty to develop their people too. It can be hard to find alternative ways to learn and so true about finding the best way we learn. It's not nice seeing people who feel they can't achieve their goals somehow, so hearing about situations such as yoursis very helpful.

@umbrarchist: Thank you for all the links and referencesniceone.gif. Electronics isn't my field bit I'm sure this information will be of great use to anyone who field it is.

@DrunkMonkey: How refreshing to hear of this apprenticeship. I thinkmixing theory and practice is one the best ways to learn. Funny how some professions (likemedical and legal) see this way of workmore important than othersconfused3. It would be great to hear from more who have taken part in these things.

TUC claims bias hits job training (please click for more)