My Favourite Training Course

There's no doubt that we all learn in different ways, it's a common topic of conversation whenever we discuss training and development. But what about developing new skills or sharpening your existing skills in such a way that you will enjoy yourself, grow in confidence and actually improve your own performance?

A few years ago I was living alone and my evenings were pretty boring. I went to the gym regularly and that filled some time but I wanted something to do. My friends came up with the usual ideas, golf, fishing (LOL) and even "why not join a book club" but none of those things appealed to me more than sitting at home scrolling through social media posts on my phone.

So I sat down and started to make a note of things I enjoyed and things that might also benefit me from a business perspective. The first and only word I wrote was 'laugh'.

Now most of us love a good laugh but my dry sense of humour has carried me some pretty traumatic times, particularly as a child so I really felt I was on to something. As my work involved me hosting events and talking to the good and great of the health and fitness industry the ability to inject a bit of humour into conversations appealed to me. I thought about the great presenters I had seen and met and I then thought about the greatest speech writers and the most inspirational quotes I had read. Then something hit me - comedians.

Comedians prepare their stand up shows in such a way that not only do they know what they are going to say but they also know how they are going to say something. They know how and when they are going to do a funny walk across the stage and they no when they are going to pause to ensure they have the full attention of the audience.

So I googled 'stand up comedy courses'.

I found a six-week course delivered by the Comedy Trust in Liverpool and enrolled. My fellow funny-folk and I did six weeks of writing and rehearsing together and then on the final week we did a 10 minute solo stand up gig.

I won't go into detail but what I will say is that apart from the education I received during my time with the Chartered Institute of Marketing, this was by far the best thing I have ever done.

Why? Because it helped me to prepare better, made me more accountable for practicing my lines and it reminded me of why I am probably the funniest person on earth.

So I am genuinely interested to know which of the courses you have done is your number one and why?