Final Graduating Class

Before I let you know whether or not I met the request to do the last training, there was actually a few other “final” activities to complete.

I had the incredible opportunity to help create our internal University. I was also given the honor to facilitate this training and the June session was fast approaching.  This would be my last appearance at the University.  There were three other sessions already scheduled for the remainder of 2010 but there would be someone else to fill that space.  I was hoping that whomever was going to take my place would be able to shadow me during the pre-work, the session and the post-work.  After the June session, I would still be working for a few weeks, so this should be an easy request.

As we got closer to the training, there was still no one slated to take my place, however there were many different people that would be able to do a little bit here and a little bit there.  The whole is greater than the sum of all the parts theory?

The preparation for this session was definitely more organized than other sessions and everything was completed prior to the deadlines that we placed on ourselves.

Set up is on Sunday and everything went extremely smooth.  The invitees arrived Sunday afternoon and most everyone was there for the welcome dinner reception.  Of course this is Dallas and the weather does affect air travel so there were a few that were rerouted to other airports but by midnight everyone was here and ready for the week.

Monday morning everyone was at breakfast and you could feel the mood was “Why am I here? I already am a big producer? How can I take a week out of the field?” Just remember those questions for now.  The kickoff session went great and everyone had their expectations and so did we.

We divided everyone into their breakout groups and would see the group at dinner.  I would be around to all the breakout groups and see how it was going throughout the week.

The group started with Advanced Sales Training for 3 days and it was amazing how different the attitudes were by Wednesday evening.  The trainers from our outside vendor surprised me with a beautiful card, book and journal for my next adveture.  I started to read the card but yes you guessed it the tears were flowing so I chose to wait until I was safely in my room that evening.

Thursday we have our Appointment Setting guru in who is not only fabulous but she is my friend and one of my greatest supporters.  Picture me with red hair and we are identical twins from different mothers.  This session is always a favorite and the results are amazing.

Friday is our Life session and is the perfect direction for our field to be gravitating towards.  Again, another hit with the crowd. This ends the official training and no one is asking any longer why they were here or if this was worth being out of the field for the week.

Friday ends with our “graduation” ceremony.  Everyone gets to cross the stage and receive their certificate from me and a gift from our SVP and, there is no Pomp and Circumstance playing.  Benjy, our AV wonder, has very uncommon graduation music playing which definitely encourages dancing across the stage.

Everyone gives me a hug and says something wonderful to me and each person is asking me not to go, to please stay and of course my microphone is picking everything up…

At the end, our SVP closes out the week.  As I am introducing him, I start to see the entire Agency piling in through the back doors.

This can’t be good….