A fraction of the working population in Great Britain are happy with what they do for a living. Naturally most will just stay there. You’ve reached this paragraph, which at a minimum indicates that you’re considering or may be ready for a change.

It’s advisable to get some help before you start – find an industry expert; an advisor who can discover your ideal job, and then show you the career tracks that will suit you:

* Do you like to work collaborating with people? Would you prefer to work with a small team or with a lot of new people? Maybe working on your own in a task-based situation may be your preference?

* The banks and building sector are facing difficulties today, so it’s important to look very carefully at what sector will answer your needs?

* Is this the final time you imagine you’ll re-train, and if it is, do you suppose your new career will service that need?

* Do you want your retraining to be in a market sector where you believe your chances of gainful employment are high until retirement?

A predominant industry in this country to tick all of the above boxes is the IT sector. There’s a demand for more qualified workers in IT, – take a look at any jobsite and you’ll discover what we mean. Don’t let people tell you it’s all nerdy people staring at theirscreens the whole time – there are many more roles than that. Large numbers of staff in IT are people of average intelligence, with jobs they enjoy and better than average salaries.

Those that are drawn to this type of work are often very practical, and aren’t really suited to the classroom environment, and endless reading of dry academic textbooks. If you’re thinking this sounds like you, try the newer style of interactive study, where learning is video-based.

If we’re able to get all of our senses involved in our learning, then we often see hugely increased memory retention as a result.

Locate a program where you’ll receive a selection of CD and DVD based materials – you’ll begin by watching videos of instructors demonstrating the skills, and then have the opportunity to use virtual lab’s to practice your new skills.

It would be silly not to view examples of the courseware provided before you hand over your cheque. What you want are instructor-led video demonstrations and interactive audio-visual sections with practice modules.

Avoid training that is purely online. You want physical CD/DVD ROM course materials where obtainable, enabling them to be used at your convenience – you don’t want to be reliant on a quality and continuous internet connection.

The area most overlooked by those considering a training program is that of ‘training segmentation’. Essentially, this is how the program is broken down into parts for timed release to you, which can make a dramatic difference to how you end up.

Drop-shipping your training elements one stage at a time, according to your exam schedule is the usual method of releasing your program. This sounds logical, but you should consider these factors:

What if you find the order pushed by the company’s salespeople doesn’t suit all of us. What if you find it hard to complete all the sections within the time limits imposed?

Put simply, the very best answer is to have a copy of their prescribed order of study, but make sure you have all of your learning modules right from the beginning. You then have everything if you don’t manage to finish inside of their required time-scales.

Trainees eager to start an Information Technology career often have no idea of which route to consider, or which area to get qualified in.

Since having no commercial skills in the IT industry, in what way could we be expected to understand what any job actually involves?

The key to answering this dilemma correctly stems from an in-depth conversation around several areas:

* Your personality type and what you’re interested in – the sort of working tasks you enjoy or dislike.

* What length of time can you allocate for retraining?

* Have you thought about job satisfaction vs salary?

* Many students don’t properly consider the amount of work needed to achieve their goals.

* The level of commitment and effort you’ll have available to set aside for getting qualified.

For the average person, considering all these ideas requires a good chat with a professional that has direct industry experience. And we don’t just mean the certifications – but the commercial requirements and expectations of the market as well.

Don’t forget: the course itself or an accreditation is not what you’re looking for; the particular job that you want to end up in is. Far too many training organisations put too much weight in the actual accreditation.

It’s a sad testimony to the sales skills of many companies, but a large percentage of students start out on programs that sound spectacular from the sales literature, but which gets us a career that doesn’t fulfil at all. Try talking to typical college students for a real eye-opener.

Stay focused on what it is you’re trying to achieve, and build your study action-plan from that – don’t do it back-to-front. Keep on track and begin studying for a job you’ll still be enjoying many years from now.

Seek advice from an experienced industry advisor, even if you have to pay a small fee – it’s considerably cheaper and safer to find out at the beginning if your choices are appropriate, rather than find out following two years of study that you’re doing entirely the wrong thing and have to start from the beginning again.

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