Some training companies are still maintaining a now out-dated method of training - classroom lessons. Very often portrayed as a huge benefit, if you talk to a student who has had to attend a few, you'll most likely hear about many or most of the following problems:

- A lot of visits to the training centre - often hundreds of miles.

- Taking constant holidays or time off - typical training companies will only provide availability during weekdays and typically group 2-3 days together. This can be hard for a lot of working people, and this is made worse if travelling time is added into the mix.

- At just twenty days annual leave, sacrificing half of them for training events leaves us with very few opportunities for days off.

- Training classes fill up quickly and will likely end up bigger than you'd hoped.

- Often, tension develops inside the classroom because different students want to work at different paces.

- Quite a lot of attendees speak about the high (and unexpected) costs associated with getting to and from the training centre while covering the cost of accommodation and food gets very expensive.

- Don't risk the possibility of getting overlooked for a lift up the ladder or salary hikes because your employer knows you're retraining.

- Surely, all of us at some time have avoided posing that question we were dying to ask, just because we wanted to look smarter?

- For students working away from home occasionally, it's apparent that events can become impossible to get to - and yet, the money has already been paid.

It really does make more sense to learn at a time that's convenient for you - not the school - and utilise videos of instructors with interactive virtual-lab's. Do them at home on your desktop computer or if you've got a laptop, you can go anywhere. Any questions; then make use of the 24x7 support (that should come with any technical program.) Irrespective of how many times you feel you need to repeat something, on-screen instructors can never get frustrated with you! And don't forget, in this situation, note-taking becomes a thing of the past. It's already there for you. Although this can't completely avoid every little difficulty, it unquestionably reduces stress and eases things. Plus you've got less hassle, travel and costs.

Kick out the typical salesman who just tells you what course you should do without performing a 'fact-find' so as to understand your abilities and level of experience. Make sure they can draw from a generous choice of training products so they're actually equipped to give you an appropriate solution. With a bit of real-world experience or base qualifications, it may be that your starting point of study is now at a different level to a new student. Where this will be your opening attempt at IT study then you might also want to start out with some basic user skills first.

Don't get hung-up, as a lot of students can, on the certification itself. Training is not an end in itself; you're training to become commercially employable. You need to remain focused on where you want to go. You could be training for only a year and end up doing the actual job for 10-20 years. Don't make the error of finding what seems like a program of interest to you and then put 10-20 years into something you don't even enjoy!

You'll want to understand the exact expectations industry will have. What particular certifications they'll want you to gain and how you'll go about getting some commercial experience. You should also spend a little time assessing how far you think you'll want to get as it will often present a very specific set of accreditations. Our recommendation would be to take guidance from an experienced industry advisor before settling on some particular training program, so you're sure from the outset that a program provides the appropriate skill-set.