I’m curious if anyone here can offer some insight or firsthand advice on making the transition from doing BO in a business environment to providing training for others, either through a consulting firm or independently. I’m starting to find that the training aspects of my job is the part I most enjoy and I would like to explore BO training as a possible career move. Any “starting points” I should look for to break out of the cubicle and into the training room?
Training is rewarding, but can be hard work. Many companies (Business Objects included) require their trainers to travel more than 50% of the time as well. That can be fun if you have a flexible lifestyle; I loved being able to see different parts of the country. Now that kids have cub scout campouts and soccer games and things I don’t want to miss I am less interested in being on the road that much.
You would travel to local training centers (Business Objects has several throughout the US) or to clients to do on-site training. In one case when I arrived at the training center for the client they pointed me to a stack of boxes at the side of the room and told me those were the training center computers. We had to unbox them and set up Business Objects on every system before we could even thing about starting the training class. And yes, that is a true story.
I began working with a BO partner after spending 6 years in report development, and have now run nearly all of the BO training courses available for the partner over the past 15 months.
Most of the training I do is at our own offices, with up to 10 trainees, but I’ve also run a few courses at client sites.
As for tips, I would recommend getting certified (ie BOCP-CR, BOCP-BOE) and/or accreditated (Webi, Deski, Universe etc) for whichever courses you want to do training in. Certifications are done through Pearson Vue (www.pearsonvue.com), and accreditations are done through Business Object’s Learning Management System. You have to pay for both, but in effect once you are certified/accreditated you are basically allowed to train that course, according to BO, as you have sufficient knowledge.
You should also look at the training materials provided by Business Objects (you may have undertaken the training yourself?), which have resource CDs that contain all the required databases, universes, reports as well as the solutions. As the trainer, you should know the course inside out, but also be able to provide relevant and interesting examples from your own work. I find that students really appreciate if you can value-add to the training.
Thanks for all the replies, they were very helpful. Unfortunately there are no training partners in my immediate area (Milwaukee would be the closest) so it looks like I would have to consider traveling, which I’m not quite sure I’m prepared to do at this point. I have much to ponder now, though.
Look at it from different perspective, if there is no training partner in your area, it can translate to opportunity for you to provide much needed training services in that area. Keep in mind that not every company can afford to bring a trainer on-site, and not every company can afford to fly their employees to another city for training.
(BOB member since 2004-01-16)
Many companies (Business Objects included) require their trainers to travel more than 50% of the time as well. That can be fun if you have a flexible lifestyle; I loved being able to see different parts of the country. Now that kids have cub scout campouts and soccer games and things I don’t want to miss I am less interested in being on the road that much.
And yes, that is a true story.
(BOB member since 2002-06-06)
(BOB member since 2007-01-08)