Up until Monday evening, any training I’ve carried out has been at clients’ offices but now I’ve now discovered another useful option, training via webinar!
Training companies to use fairly complex business management systems, such as Mamut, requires face to face training with plenty of opportunities for the staff to practice the objectives of the training session. Three to four days are usually required to learn the entire system which would be an endless amount of 1-1.5 hr webinars. So, although I had received various training through online webinars, I had never considered training this way myself.
Then I discovered Xero, an online accounting system I love using (and so do my bookkeeping clients). It is a simple to use system and very cost-effective. How could I make training cost-effective too? Travelling to the client’s office would only be a realistic option if the company had at least 6 people to be trained. Travelling to my office would only work for companies within a certain radius of Stockport. The only, but now exciting, option left is online training.
Once I’d designed my online training sessions, I needed to find willing testers to find out if I was on the right track. Helen Stothard suggested offering my new webinars to a group of Virtual Assistants who had recently been introduced to Xero. This was quite a daunting prospect as they are proud to tell everyone that they like to test things to destruction! (see Helen’s Blog). In actual fact they are a well-informed, friendly group of women who made my debut as a webinar presenter a very enjoyable experience.
The feedback so far has been very good. I’m now very much looking forward to presenting the remaining webinars to the VAs. It’s always a fantastic feeling to discover new ways of doing things and to learn new skills.
