RPG and DB2 Summit Spring 2010
The folks at System i Developer have graciously invited me again to speak at their conference. You can check out their announcement here: http://www.systemideveloper.com/announce2010Spring.html.
You can check out the sessions here: http://www.systemideveloper.com/sessiongrid.html
Among other sessions, I will be speaking on one of my latest passions: RPGUI
On that note, what are everybody’s projections for getting training this year? Are the purses still tight?
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Hey Aaron – some of your URL’s in your post were not clickable. Easier for us readers to follow if you make them HREF links.
To answer your question: Training budget for this year was set in 4Q last year; not good conditions for requesting training $$ in the budget. This year seminar locations need to be in our backyard (southern California) to avoid travel expenses, and registration fees have to be very reasonable. Lower reg fees = shorter conferences. FYI
Training $ are available but there’s more of a requirement to justify expenses. COMMON is no longer good value with the steep hotel rates, reduced quality with fewer sessions and the absence of key people like Paris, Gantner and Tuohy. So it will be either TUG or NEUGC or iDeveloper.
Susan and I have just finished writing a piece expounding on why cutting back in education makes no sense. Be published in a few days I think.
Of course as an educator I have a vested interest in the topic – but I felt (and acted) on that belief long before I was in the business.
Sadly very few business decisions in this world seem to be made for sensible reasons any more. Unless your definition of “sensible” means “Causing significant pain to employees and customers while lining the pockets of the executives”.
Yes, the budget is still tight. Of course, we are in California, and we are fiscally sliding into the ocean. I could not agree more with Jon Paris’s logical statement about training above. (whether his interests are vested or not.) Training $ have a direct affect on the quality and efficiency of your work, completing projects, etc… Time and dollars spent for improving skills have multiple paybacks for the projects back home, and are easy to calculate. (as Jon has shown before.)
But it is also good to network with people and share ideas.
In tough financial times, one of the best places to start saving money is to use your computer systems more efficiently. I feel powerless to change manangements perspective on this however.