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> Empty paragraphs (in Word) are a sloppy manual method to add spacing
> between paragraphs. It's a habit brought forward from using a
> typewriter, and (IMO) it reflects on poorly structured Word training
> (I've used and taught Word since Word 1.1, mostly in law
> firms and large
> corporations, and am amazed at how much training starts off
> with "Type a
> paragraph. Press Enter. Press Enter again." Geesh!).
Training?
What's that?
Looking back over twenty-some years... well longer, but not as a
TW... I don't think I've _ever_ had training on a tool that I
actually _use_.
I've had plenty of training on corporate system-thingies, that
then didn't get implemented until everybody had forgotten the
training.
In all working situations where I encountered a new tool of
my own trade, I had things to do, on a deadline, so I learned
by the seat of my pants enough to get something out the door
and keep my job. Later I'd pick up tips, tricks and better
practices from the various mailing lists - well, once there
_were_ mailing lists. [dating himself terribly]
On the odd occasions when I could have had company-paid tutelage,
I'd look at the course syllabi and be discouraged.
Or the signing manager would we discouraged:
- "Don't you already know how to do this stuff?"
- "Eighty to ninety percent of what's listed."
- "So why take this?"
- "Pre-requisite for the next-level course."
- "Oh... um... how much of this 'Advanced' stuff might you need
to do in your job?"
- "Maybe 10 percent."
- "So you'd sit for two and a half days being bored by stuff
you already learned the hard way, just to pick up a half-day
or less of new-to-you material, so you could then go sit for
another few days, bored out of your gourd, waiting to learn
the three things that might be useful in your job, if you can
jolt yourself out of the stupor to catch them as they go by?"
- "That's pretty much it."
- "So, why are we even having this conversation?"
- "Because 'Training' is one of my objectives this year - you put
it there, remember?"
- "Ah. Point to you. Well, look, we have the budget, and pretty-well
any official-sounding seminar will fill the bill.... Is STC
gathering in any fun places this year?"
- " :-) "
....
- "So, um, why didn't you ask for this training when you first
got this... FrameMaker thing?"
- "Whoah! That was last fall [1995]. Don't you remember what we
were doing then?"
- "Right. If we could have spared anybody for training, it wouldn't
have been you those three months. Kinda sucks doesn't it?"
The above paraphrased only slightly from much repetition over the
years.
Kevin (all my bad habits are self-taught)
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