Enough With The Training Sessions

Ever since I started blogging again, I am constantly receiving emails from unsolicited marketers trying to sell me a training session. The ones that get me riled up are those that offer to help me find a job. It’s annoying because 1) I already have a job and 2) I am the one who helps others secure employment.

The sheer number of training requests I receive on any given week is disturbing. Everyone appears to be an expert at something I’m engaged in and they want to teach me how to do it better, faster, and more innovative. As I’m deleting these burdensome requests, I’m thinking to myself, whatever happened to learning things on your own?

Most times, training sessions don’t tackle a particular challenge. They are set up to be general and cover a broad range of ideas. Chances are, I find about 95 percent of these training offers irrelevant. They may cover a topic I’m interested in or expose me to information and data I already know, but I can’t say that I’ve learned anything from the sessions I’ve sat through.

This is coming from someone who used to play by the book. There was a time where I would come home with a huge stack of self-help books from so-called experts who wanted to teach me something new. There wasn’t a task I didn’t take on unless I had a book from an “expert” instructing me how to accomplish something the “right way”. Turns out I was wrong. I’ve come to learn that it’s better to tackle any new project or idea through the “live and learn” method. You merely jump right in and learn as you go. Most times, the experience leaves me empowered because I’ve completed the task at hand on my own.

Besides, who has time to train all the time? Most days, you’ll find professionals trying to keep up with their normal workload, let alone having to feel pressured to complete a training session on nothing, really.

So, thanks but no thanks. Or in the words of Beyonce, “sorry, not sorry”. You can take me off your mailing list. I prefer to learn on the fly.