Making of Managers - 9 ::: A day starts @ 1.30 AM !!

Dear
On last sunday, I had been to our Parent's place and it was time for socialising during the whole of the day and watching the TV too as Anniyan was telecast..... The next day at office, I was supposed to deliver my first session on Telephone Handling and I had originally planned the whole day for preparation.... The other set back in addition to the TV watching was the computer at the home was not able to read the pen drive in which I carried the soft files of presentation AND the audio files needed for my training session....
I decided to get up early in the morning on Monday to reach office bit early like 6 AM to have some preparation until 10 AM....The session was at 2 PM in the afternoon but I had few basic things to be taken care of in the forenoon.... I had set the alarm for 4 AM and went off to sleep at 10.30 pm itself...I did not imagine that I am going to get up with fresh eyes at 1.30 Am itself...
I reached out the open space in front of the house and sat cross legged and started my preparation....that is, all those things which I can familiarise with ... without the computer in front....and was deeply involved in going through the course material until 4 AM... It was quite a wonderful time with a nice cool atmosphere....and without any disturbance...Just I had to wave my hand towards the Police man who was having his (perhaps) routine rounds - getting suspicions at me sitting with Lights on....outside the house.....!!
After finishing my breathing practises, I was out of the home sharp at 5 AM and reached the bus stand to get the first bus to a landmark near my office hoping to get an auto from that point...Little did I realize that there was a direct bus until my office which I was lucky to get and reached very close to my office at just 5 Rs.... within next 20 minutes....!!
Then started my intense preparation....correlating the slides and getting ready for the open ended questions to be posed...and time budgeting for the whole of the training session....I was getting more and more confident...
I skipped the lunch (as usual...I had never been able to take lunch until now....as I dont feel any hunger before the session....with the level of excitement AND preparedness) reached the hall and ensured all arrangements were ok and waited for the 22 Gods who are going to make me divine !! Yes.... It is such a training ground for some one like me without any insecurity in mind AND giving a taste of a real profession which I cannot enter immediately....without taking substantial risk...and making lot of compromises....
I was able to put all my efforts in the best possible manner and pulling all the silent persons one by one....and making them involve in the practise sessions.....There was a back up trainee sitting there watching me and taking notes occassionally.....who ensured that I was in full control of myself and if I was not over doing any thing.... I had organised for another peer of mine who had done accent neutralisation classes at our office whom I requested to help me with some tips on accent just when I was talking about Voice and the stress element in voice...
As if things were falling in perfect place, when one of the active participant talked about pronounciation of a particular word, I thanked him and smiled at the group...."just as ..... helped us with the right pronouciationl, some specialist in this area will be joining us shortly to give us much more information in this regard..." which was enough to put every one into some curiousity....My friend just entered the hall in next 5 minutes, and I invited him to give some orientation on pronouciation and the right accent.... It happened very professionally with me getting back to the centre telling people the purpose of this 15 minutes demo is not to make them experts in accent but just to make them aware that this is a big subject which needs a structured training..... and at least they will identify & appreciate people with good accent when they talk over phone... AND over a period of time, can pick up the right pronounciation of at least few of the common words they use....
At the end of the session, I was dead tired but was with great satisfaction distributed the feedback forms to all of the trainees after briefing about the organisations's initiative on such part time trainers and sharing our ambitious targets about our Trainers club.....briefly.... seeking their feedbacks....
In addition to the feedbacks, I got a hand shake from al most every of the boys who came towards me for the purpose which by itself was a great metric for performance.... With heavy eye lids and severe head ache out of the exertion, I read through the feedback forms for any negative feedback but there were none....!!
Delivering a Training session seems to have its own challenges which is much different from the actual subject....It is extremely exciting with a new set of participants every time and a all new time management struggle without showing up the mental clock too openly for them to read..... I particularly felt very happy when I used couple of techniques that I learnt for group involvement and found the effect of the tested ones almost instantaneously.....Was able to freely talk to the participants making them feel easy and respond back....and there was literally no side talks during the 4 hours needing my attention .....
Particularly, the last one hour I was in terrific flow and I was relating the current slide with the various earlier ones throwing open how much can be grasped by ability of connecting things AND taking a total and complete view instead of fragmented approach.... I infact have kept couple of demos in this telehphone session IN RESERVE to be released in the next possible opportunity....based on the exercises given.... Such demos can always be used when the participation is not upto the mark and be catalysts for them to break their inhibitions...
I wish I never have to use such personal demonstrations....!!
Krishnaarpanam...
suchoo