Rajiv's tells his story on his KA1 Adult Education in Europe Project...
Our services are aimed at established businesses in the UK interested in tapping into the online social market to boost sales, awareness, brand, customer service, etc. I was introduced to the adult mobility programme by Patrick from Gecko Programmes and have had the opportunity to experience the Train the Trainer course with one of my business partners Theodore Hoffman, in the Czech Republic, Prague this year for a week. Personally, an incredible experience that has benefited me in so many ways:
Due to the nature of our business we felt that this would offered multiple opportunities for me and getting my business known internationally. The team at Gecko Programmes were incredible and made sure our flights were booked as well as providing funding for the course and covering expenses. What new knowledge and skills have you acquired during your placement? I found out so much from the course that I can now apply to my business and how I train new and existing staff. One topic especially is defining the difference between:
Each one of the roles I use within my business already however when delivering workshops, myself or training new members of staff. It’s essential to know which method of training is necessary for effective training. What kind of differences have you noticed with the work practices? During the course, I understood more about doing business in Turkey as there were several attendees from Turkey that worked for the university and they were so engaging and enthusiastic about working together. General impression, feelings, judgement about your experience abroad. First impressions of Prague are it’s a very old country with many similarities to the midlands in the UK including the weather but a little bit colder. Public transport is straight forward to navigate in and around Prague for cheap! Visually they’re very rich in history with most buildings dating back to 12th Century and beautifully preserved. Due to the nature of our business we were contacted via Instagram by a few restaurants requesting that we visit them to sample their dishes and encourage our viewers to visit them. During one of our visits to a restaurant called FatCats in old town we were invited to check out their new project “Gallery 44” a new top end restaurant that’s aiming to bring in talented and renowned chefs from around the world to be an ambassador for their country and cater for the people of Prague. This to me is revealed to me just how serious the people of the Czech Republic are about their food. It’s astonishing even down to how and why they have such an incredible selection of beers and wines. Which skills do you feel have improved significantly and how? I made a real conscious effort to learn the language and felt this was well received and opened a lot of doors “Dekuji!”. Please describe the good and bad elements of the mobility experience... I would say the best part for me is the opportunity to go abroad and the financial support helped to overcome the down time in business to have us out of the office. The bad elements are major however finding the location was difficult as google maps didn’t work that well. This could be overcome with more information from people that’s been before to give clearer directions. The fact that we had to arrange our own accommodation is bad and good as it’s tricky to figure out where exactly to stay however we had the opportunity to use AirBnB which for the 2 of us we found an apartment 8 minutes from the venue 10 minutes from the nearest metro station and tramline. Our apartment was lovely and we got it for a 2/3 of the cost in comparison to a hotel for the same time. Therefore, I would recommend anyone going on mobility to use Airbnb.co.uk to find accommodation. Has this experience helped you in improving your business? This experience has opened many doors for doing business in Prague with several restaurants and a college in Turkey. The skills gained the course has given me huge confidence to deliver my workshops more effectively. Check out their Youtube channel “ClickTime agency” for more on their Prague travels.
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