“I’d need training on pivot tables please”. “I’d need some help with vlookup please”. “I need to be trained on using system X”.

These are three genuine training requests that I’ve had recently. The third request was so specific that it needed no further action, apart from booking the person on the course as requested. However, for the first two requests, I asked the customer what problem they needed to solve and in both cases it turned out that neither pivot tables nor vlookups would have helped.

That’s not the way I work. My years of experience have taught me that my job is to deliver what people need, not to deliver what they think they need. After all, how many people go to the doctor with a self-diagnosis and a request for specific medication? OK well I guess there are a few!