Fruit 'n' veg cases

FEEL the need to boost your skills? Keen on "learning to say no" in junior management? If so, you're almost certain to be one of the increasing number of people to have undergone an experience every week in a room with a person called Geoff or Pam, several hundred magic markers and an overhead projector.

Love them or leave them (and many of us would prefer to do just that), you can't ignore corporate training courses.

There are some excellent courses around but few of us ever seem to experience the good ones. What we get instead is either a size- disadvantaged room in an "executive" hotel or a training centre's Portakabin (usually for public service employees as this makes them feel at home). And there's no point hanging around the hotel foyer - you can't escape your fate. Geoff or Pam is waiting for you. A warm-up exercise is, of course, de rigueur. One current favourite is to ask members which vegetable or fruit they would most like to identify with - and why. Soon nervous executives are introducing themselves as oranges and beet-roots. Something years of British reserve has kept at bay is destroyed in seconds as Val from Welwyn Garden City reveals she has definite banana tendencies. Then, all barriers safely down, you sit in a post-embarrassment situation wondering if anything worse can happen. It can. Once your course leaders have explained how to break out of the huddled group at the other side of the room, you're finally ready for business. Your trainer now spends an inordinate amount of time on "framesetting" or, in layman's terms, explaining what comes next. Already some jargon has been introduced and more will follow. Your company has, after all, paid a small fortune for you to attend and you might as well feel you've got something out of it. Get ready for an endless barrage of cluster groups and multi- skilling. If you don't already feel totally intimidated, you will. Newcomers sit in a state of high anxiety lest they're asked to reveal anything further about their potato identity. Old lags know that this is their last chance to daydream as the day has been carefully arranged so that no one can remain inactive. Geoff or Pam now tell you to "enjoy" - a coded way of saying there is no escape from the brainstorming session that now follows. Imagine your most illogical and embarrassing ideas exposed to a roomful of total strangers. That's brainstorming for you. Time stands still as you offer your random thoughts on "developing throughput in a team situation". The uninitiated might feel flattered at the Einsteinian connotations of the exercise but soon come to realise the profound truth of the term "a pool of ignorance". The over-enthusiastic ask if they can keep mementoes (the use of two or more felt-tip colours is always a giveaway). Other people's "ideas" are collected up for recycling. Post-lunch, the uninitiated wonder what can possibly happen next. The experienced try to keep the dreaded word role-play from them. Don't even think about what happens when two dozen participants who have just "learnt to say no" meet each other to test their assertiveness. Most role players are split down the middle - those who don't mind pretending they're four years old and those who suddenly remember they watch Channel 4 News. But at least it keeps Geoff and Pam safely out of the community. The plenary session over, everyone is given a certificate and feels well and truly certified. But it's rare for us to admit publicly our dissatisfaction. Who, after all, wants to be seen as incapable of working in groups who spend four hours on "making the most of meetings" and then decide the most important thing is to communicate?

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