•Yon will hear five different people talking about a special training programme for their company. •For each extract there are t

Man: Well, it’s quite interesting, isn’t it? I mean, overall you’re never going to please everyone always. I think one of the main benefits is perhaps something we weren’t really expecting. Earnest, I wasn’t. And that’s the way people with different roles, different jobs are working together here. Sure my responsibility is to go across the departments. Everyone wants a PC, needs help with the software. I am always here in about the problems. Never good things, of course, with the network. Here we’re sharing experiences, different viewpoints, bringing in the ideas which reflect our different roles. Then again that’s maybe a problem in itself’ cause I really don’ t see how I’m gonna hold all this in my head. I’m sure that next week it’ll all have disappeared from my memory.
Woman: Frankly, I wonder if my time would have been better spent hack in the office. Well, I don’t want to sound negative. Maybe it’s just me. I grant you there’s some great theory going around. Amazing ideas really. All these visions of what could really be happening, pictures of the possible future, and more have you. But, at the end of the day, we’ll be back at the same old office, And I’ll be typing and running around, and still be expected to do 10 things at once. So, if I’m honest, I’m not really sure how all these fine speeches are really going to help me in my job. A letter is still a letter, isn’t it? Mind you, I’m not saying it’s not inspirational. In some ways.
Man: I feel very privileged and on top of everything it’s a great way to meet everyone. It’s really helping my confidence. The sessions on technology have been interesting because I know so little about it. They’ve told me I’ll get more on that as time goes by. And actually my problem’s not really that, because, well, what I need at this early stage is some kind of overview, some kind of feeling of the whole picture. You know, how those fix together. I don’t know where I’ll be in five years’ time, you see. So I’m not quite sure what I need to know now. That’s why it’s a hit frustrating that each lecture serum so separate, so single-issue? I’d like a wide range to be covered.
Woman: It’s going pretty smoothly I’d say all in all, we’ve had worse, we’ve had better, and given that we had to put the whole menu together at a pretty short notice. Having said that though, I am not at all sure they see it like that. I don’t know. I think half the problem is people come to something like this with so much hope. I mean they assume the world is going to change overnight. And of course nothing is that simple. I hear them complaining, but not about the food, I’m happy to say, that is not quite what they want, too general, too specific, and soon. Anyway, the snacks and the luncheons seem to have gone down all right. And I suppose that’s all l need to worry about.
Man: Yes, it’s difficult of course balancing the costs and benefits, the time lost from the office compared to what I am investing in, but I’ve al- ways said our staff, our people are our biggest as- set. So anything that brings my people up must be a value in itself. Of course much will depend on the performance reports, which I hope the different departments can draw up to me reason- ably soon. Otherwise I won’ t really be in a position to know if I did make the right choice. My main reservation at this stage is that I don’t see sufficient input on the system, on the IT side of things. And that’s a great pity, because it’s vital that we explore our existing computer system to get the best out of them. I want a company that is right up-to-date.