| Q |
Hi again
Al, It's been three or four years since we put you in the ajarn hot seat and
I think it's fair to say that a lot of water has gone under the bridge since
then. Back in 2004 you were selling corporate training programs for one of
Thailand's biggest training providers but decided that it was time to go it
alone. Were you confident right from the start that you would make a go of
it? |
| A |
A lack of confidence has
never been one of my shortcomings, Phil. And I had reason to be confident,
since I did have lots of relationships and already knew there was a demand
for corporate training programs that were tailored to client's goals and
needs and that met the standards of training programs in the US and Europe.
After all, some of the clients that I dealt with had been bringing trainers
from the US to do training. The market was there. |
| Q |
I suppose
one huge advantage was that you already had plenty of contacts. You'd
already forged good relationships with many of the HR / training people.
Have those people generally stayed loyal to you? |
| A |
Loyal to me? No. Loyal to
the provider who gives them what they need? Yes. That may sound like a minor
difference, but for all that people talk about Thailand being about
relationships (and it is, in many ways), as a training provider, you have to
deliver. No matter how good of friends you are won't matter if you don't
deliver quality programs that meet the client's expectations. Those friends
who I had relationships with and who were in corporations that fit our
client profile have pretty much all continued doing business with NLI. |
| Q |
What was
NLI's basic philosophy at the very beginning? |
| A |
Initially, we were focused
on providing language training that was tailored to specific job tasks for
our clients, providing great quality training with outstanding teachers, and
a measurable Return on Investment. |
| Q |
And over
the three years you've been in business, has that philosophy changed at all? |
| A |
Some. Now, we aren't about
language training. We are about communication training in English (and that
is different than language training) and behavioral change in Thai or
English. We've moved to an active training model, based on the model that is
necessary to produce behavioral change, and applied it to all of our
programs. We still provide great active training with outstanding
facilitators and a measurable Return on Investment. |
| Q |
You'll
forgive me for saying so Al but NLI programs are not cheap. Are there
companies out there who truly recognise that a good program costs money? |
| A |
Nothing to forgive, Phil.
From the point of view of many companies out there (and many providers), we
are expensive. But for the clients who have taken the time to use us,
they've found out that our programs deliver a return on investment far in
excess of what they can achieve with a cheap program. So, yes, there are
companies out there who truly recognize that a good program costs money. Our
client list demonstrates that. |
| Q |
And I
suppose at the other end of the spectrum, there are still the companies who
want to pack twenty bodies in a classroom for a thousand baht an hour?
Presumably you don't bother with those clients any more? |
| A |
Oh, there are still lots
of those, I'm sure. If that is what they want, I suggest other vendors. It's
certainly not what we do. |
| Q |
One of
your small band of consultants is a very highly-qualified pyschologist. How
does Dr Weinstein fit into the scheme of things? |
| A |
Actually, three of our
small band of consultants are psychologists. Dr. Weinstein is just the most
visible and probably has the biggest impact on NLI. Ben is the lead
consultant on most of our behavioral change programs run in English, and
also my primary source for working out how to make training more effective
by focusing on an experiential approach. |
| Q |
Bangkok
companies often spend huge amounts of money flying in training experts from
abroad. What sort of money does that cost and isn't the talent pool
available locally? |
| A |
Well, programs run
anywhere from US $1000 a day up to as much as US $15,000 a day or even
more...plus the expenses involved (flights, hotels, etc.).
Sometimes, the programs could be delivered by local vendors (like NLI), but
often the clients don't know about the local vendors who can do these
programs, or are fed up with local vendors and promises and claims that
aren't filled. Other programs simply can't be done by anyone locally,
usually because they are very specific to a certain industry and skill set. |
| Q |
Most if
not all of your consultants are people you've worked with before. Does that
mean it's impossible to get a job with NLI if they don't know you
personally? |
| A |
Most, but not all. We've
had a few (and have two currently) consultants who came to us through the
application process. I'm a tough sell, because my clients are demanding. I
want people who can work within our team, are fantastic facilitators, have a
training/teaching background and a business background and are absolutely
reliable. It's not the easiest mix to find... but it is part of the reason
that I pay more than just about anyone else. |
| Q |
Running
the ajarn jobs board as I do, I've noticed that the companies paying
teachers less than 500 baht an hour for corporate work have all but
disappeared. Any comments on that? |
| A |
Anyone doing corporate
work for 500 baht an hour is selling themselves cheap...assuming they
actually understand what corporate language work is. Of course, there have
been lots of teachers who have done corporate work and don't know anything
about business or adult learning, and while they might be worth 700 baht an
hour to a school teaching kids, they are wasting the client's time and
money, and those teachers are among the primary reasons for corporate
clients changing vendors these days. |
| Q |
On the
other hand, we're seeing a few new names emerging with teacher rates pegged
at around 700 baht. Have I missed something? Has corporate training suddenly
become fashionable again? |
| A |
I don't think it ever went
out of fashion. There is just a new group of HRD (Human Resource
Development) managers who don't have a in place solution and so lots of
vendors are getting a chance to provide cheap solutions. It's a normal
cycle. The young HRD managers will learn their lessons after they waste some
money with some of these vendors, or when they find an appropriate vendor,
and the market (from the Ajarn.com ad point of view) will settle down again. |
| Q |
In a brief
chat that you and I had before this hot seat interview, you had some strong
views on the materials available for training consultants or rather the lack
of good training materials. Go on - get it off your chest. |
| A |
In my opinion, with a few
exceptions, one of the biggest problem facing teachers doing corporate ESL
training is the general lack of good training materials. Most books are very
obviously written by people who don't have a strong business background and
don't actually know what happens in businesses day to day, what people talk
about, what they write about, or how business people actually communicate.
It's really evident in the writing and business conversation materials, as
well as the special purpose materials. Of course, another part of that
problem is that business communications evolve rapidly...the way someone in
business communicates next year is highly likely to be different from how
they communicate this year. And even the newest business ESL materials are
badly out-of-date. |
| Q |
How do you
make sure that your consultants go into a training room armed with the very
best material available? |
| A |
We build our own
materials, drawing on ideas from the newest materials and literature
available in the business community. The internet, via blogs and newsletters
has made a tremendous amount of current information available, if you put in
the time to find it... and then take the ideas and concepts and turn them
into training materials for the specific set of program participants. Of
course, this requires a full-time materials developer. |
| Q |
At NLI,
how exactly do you measure the client's satisfaction? |
| A |
We survey participants in
program and maintain an open dialog with the management. We are rather open
about wanting honest feedback, not "Kriang Jai" and have clients who agree
with that concept. We post the results from every program in our office.
Every consultant, my materials developer, staff and myself can see how a
program went and how it compares to other programs. For those who want to
improve, it's a pretty good system. |
| Q |
It's
impossible to keep every client happy of course? And finally Al, how do you
see the future trends in corporate training? |
| A |
Nothing's impossible. We
have done pretty well maintaining long-term clients, but a big part of that
is making sure that expectations are not unrealistic before the start of a
program. I don't accept clients who are looking for a magic wand solution.
As for the future, clients are going to continue to become more and more
demanding. Most of the new players in the corporate market are going to fall
away as they find that coping with the demands of corporate clients is more
than they counted on. The rates charged, and pay-rates, will increase (and I
will continue to pay more for the best trainers than the rest) because of
those demands. I expect that the use of e-learning as a quick and easy
solution will reduce as corporations become more aware of the short-comings
of e-learning solutions. |
