The late comedienne Linda Smith once joked, “I love Waitrose – it’s that little bit more expensive.�

It seems that until the recent credit crunch, everyone it seems believed the view that �Price is an indicator of quality�, or You get what you pay for�. The marketing boys had it all sewn up – picture the juicy M&S ads, with “This is not ordinary food, this is….� At the other extreme, the stores cheap ranges were devoured by ultra thrifty shoppers but barely noticed by you and me.

In Computer training, high price colleges (surely they’re superior - if you can afford it - why else would they be so well known?) convinced us that colleges exist who’ll train cheaper but be careful, you get what you pay for…. .

Then the world takes a couple of turns, we hover on the brink of financial meltdown, and suddenly value is all the rage! Middle class mummies stop visiting Waitrose, and instead head towards Aldi and Lidl. Investment bankers and their fat cat payouts are frowned upon, and we all think again about our spending habits.

Why were we so impressed by “reassuringly expensive� price tags? Look a little closer into the British Computer training market, and you might be surprised. Just because there’s a great need for greater numbers of skilled networking professionals and programmers, are we really getting a good deal coughing up 5k–8k to get qualified, or are we missing something better? It’s a bit much that many computer training providers are preaching one thing whilst practicing another - supplying a workforce for the digital age using out of date methods. Should we really have to pour over books when any IT material can be downloaded and watched on computers? Is it necessary to drive to training centres, spending more money for our hotel bills to do what we could do at home? 24/7 Interactive learning should be available for me when and where it works best for me – at my convenience, but not at my cost.

With more up-to-date, slicker training options on offer at a fraction of the cost of these prices, maybe it’s time we woke up to the fact that when it comes to electronic learning, value is higher quality for a more reasonable price. Things are changing in Computer training – in supermarket terms, it’s slashed prices for best ever products. In this knowledge hungry world of today, I’d say that’s a step in the right direction.

(C) Scott Edwards - www.learninglolly.com. Scott Edwards has been involved in the IT and Training Industry for 30 years.

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