When you’re launching a new service or business, one of the key things to get right is training.
A key aspect of building a successful service business is achieving professional results that gain positive reviews and referrals.
And the best way to ensure this happens is to undertake training that gives you confidence and sets your business off on the right foot.
Which type of training course is right for you?
Prior to launching a leather restoration business, I owned a successful carpet and upholstery cleaning business.
Before even buying a single piece of equipment, the first thing I did was to book myself on some training courses.
One of the courses was an industry accredited course that carried some weight with regards to credibility. While it was a thorough course covering everything that was needed to know from a technical point of view, it was purely classroom based.
Two other training courses that I enrolled in were one day manufacturer specific courses that taught the cleaning processes to be used with their own machines and products.
Although all three courses were positive, there were some key things missing for my development.
Practical experience
The issue I found is that most courses are structured the same way.
It’s a numbers game.
Get as many people into a room as possible and teach them in a rigid format whilst allocating a short amount of time to practice what they’ve learned in the classroom evironment.
Running a course in this way is a tried and tested process that allows a training company to be time-efficient and maximise profit.
But there are many issues with this approach.
The first is that there is not enough one to one attention.
This is important because everybody learns at a different rate. Some students will struggle on a particular task and need more time and attention on it, while others will fly ahead.
There is also the fact that carrying out a repair or clean in a classroom is very different to doing so in a customer’s home.
I can clearly remember my confidence drain on my first week out on my own on a live job without a support system in place.
Which is why our courses include the option of carrying out jobs on furniture in the homes of our clients.
The disconnect between building a business and providing a service
There are two sides to running a successful service business.
Sure, you need to be competent and professional in order to achieve excellent results and provide a great service.
But before this can happen, you need to find and attract customers.
Most courses don’t even skim the surface of what’s needed to generate leads and enquiries.
It’s something I had to learn the hard way myself.
How we structure our courses
My own experiences have informed the way I choose to run our leather repair training courses.
I believe the best way to achieve success is to get what you need out of a training course.
On most courses, people are at different stages of the learning curve.
Some will already have knowledge of how to clean leather (this is often the case if they already run a carpet cleaning business) and need to focus purely on learning the repair side of leather restoration. In this case, they will often already have a website ready to add a leather repair service page to bring in additional business.
Others will have no knowledge or experience of leather restoration and would benefit from moving through the process at a slower pace. They might not have a website or even know where to start with marketing a new business. In which case, they would benefit from spending a day learning about website and marketing strategies (we also build websites for our members).
This is why I choose to run bespoke training courses.
While the courses on our training page serve as a guide to what will be covered, we are able to tailor our courses to suit your specific needs.
There are never more than three students on a course, which means you get the individual attention you need.
Each course also includes undertaking real leather repair jobs. You get to work with me repairing leather furniture in the homes of our customers.
Choosing your course
We believe that by offering the choice of a 2 day, 3 day or 4 day leather repair training course, we cover the requirements of all students.
However, we’re happy to tailor shorter or longer courses depending on your goals.
If you’d like to discuss anything about our training courses and find out how we can tailor a course that is right for you, please don’t hesitate to get in touch today.
