Tuesday, November 13, 2012

#806 I threw my hands up and shrieked

Being out of the office in another state attending training in a packed conference room without windows isn't everything it's cracked up to be. The temperature in the room varies from really cold to really warm. The chairs start out comfortable, but after several hours, they are not comfortable anymore. And sometimes, the topics that are covered do not apply to me at all and I have to find a way to stay focused and involved. You never know. Just because something doesn't apply to you today doesn't mean it won't apply to you tomorrow.

Today was the second day of my five days worth of learning for work. At this first part of the week, I was especially looking forward to learning about one particular topic, let's call it Landed Cost. It is a concept that is new to us this year. I've read as much as I could about it in the training manuals and thought I understood it and set it up correctly, but it turns out, it wasn't right. We've had a tremendous amount of trouble with it throughout the company because nobody really knows how it works. They (the people who are implementing  the new computer system we have) think they have it figured out now, and they are ready to pass the knowledge on to the people who use it.

We learned lots of good stuff today. The day was chock-full of information, but nothing on Landed Cost.

Around 3:30, the guy I was sitting by sort of mentally checked out. He leaned over to me and said, "Man, I'm beat. I'm here, but I'm not here."

About an hour later, the lady next to me leaned over and said, "My brain has officially shut down. Is it time to go yet?"

I was strong. I stayed in, taking notes, paying attention.

Around 4:50, the presenter said, "OK, now it's time to talk about Landed Cost."

Something snapped inside me. I threw my hands up in the air and said, "Wait a minute!" OK, I might have shrieked a little. I've been told there might have been a little shrillness in my voice. I heard giggling. I continued, "It's ten minutes to five and we're about to talk about Landed Cost. This is a big deal and my brain is not ready to take in. Can we push this back until morning?"

There was a moment of silence until the presenter said, "Ummm..."

Fortunately for me, one of the organizers of the training came to my rescue. He said he understood that Landed Cost is a big deal and it had been a long day and we probably would be better off to move the discussion to tomorrow morning so we could really tackle it and talk it through and figure out how to do it right. YAY!

Maybe I didn't present myself in the most professional way, but I did get a laugh (or maybe just laughed at, but I'm ok with that) and more importantly, the big topic was moved to the morning when I can be alert and focused and ready to learn and participate.

To be continued...

Here's too a big fat happy day of learning tomorrow!

2 comments:

Kteach said...

good for you!

Anonymous said...

It was a highlight of my Tuesday!