Friday, August 28, 2009

How to Be an Annoying Trainee

Training people how to use Civil 3D can be very satisfying. It's great to see the light bulb go off in people's minds and help them use a tool that will make their jobs easier and possibly more fun. However, there are a few things trainees do that drive me up the freekin' wall.

How to Be an Annoying Trainee:

  • Answer your cell phone in class. This works best if you have a really obnoxious ring tone. Speak loudly and remain in the room for the most irritating effect.
  • Ask questions that are clearly not on topic. When getting a guided tour of the interface the first 20 minutes of class, make sure to raise your hand and ask, "Um, are we going to do cross sections soon?"
  • Ask stupid questions. Yes, Virginia, there is a such thing as a stupid question. Make sure to ask something like, "What happens if I delete everything in my project? Is there a way to compute volumes after that?"
  • Start your own sub-class in the back of the room. You saw a demo once of creating a parking lot with a corridor. The instructor is not getting there fast enough for your taste, so you get the attention of the 3-4 people around you and start your own lesson.
  • Skip the fundamentals. You don't know Autocad? No problem! Surely the instructor has time to go into a lesson on using paperspace just for you. If she doesn't, act indignant.
  • Constantly whine about making the change from your legacy software. The instructor will certainly appreciate your insight on how easy it was to model surfaces with the LISP routine you used in 1997.
  • Bring a laundry list of tech support questions from your coworker. Corner your instructor on these during break, before she has a chance to use the restroom!
  • Don't bother paying attention. After the instructor has just spent the last 10 minutes explaining and demonstrating the uses of frequency lines, get your head out of your email and ask, "Hey, what are theses lines on my road for?"
  • Interrupt. This isn't kindergarten -hell if you're going to raise your hand. Why should you wait for the instructor to pause to make your point?
  • Give up. This is hard. You're tired. You will retire in 5 years, anyway. F it. For full effect act visibly bored or just put your head down on the table for a nap.

Got any more good ones? Leave a comment! I'd love to hear your stories of annoying trainees. :)

4 comments:

Brian Hailey said...

When the instructor comes by you and asks how the exercise is going; don't say a word, just take both hands, palms up, thrust them violently at the monitor, and then cross your arms. We can tell exactly what you did prior to your frustration and will be able to immediately point you in the right direction.

Dana said...

Reminds me of some bad classes i taught about three years ago...
http://civil3drocks.blogspot.com/2006/07/to-all-of-grown-up-students-out-there.html

R.K. McSwain said...

"Skip the fundamentals" is my favorite... This applies to all software, including Windows... "Hmmm, where is the START button...?"

Unknown said...

So we just had three days of training with Lou and I think we hit each one of these. You know because we're awsommmmeeeeee!!!!