CAREERS: Training will raise industry standards: Lotherington

What constitutes a good job? The answer is obvious: responsibility, satisfaction, good pay, a clear and upward career path and training. But with the economy the way it is, good wages are hard to find while career path development seems to be a thing of the past. Satisfaction walked out the door a long time ago, when clients started demanding TVCs within a week or less. And responsibility; well, very few are willing to take risks these days for fear of being fired by the client. That just leaves training - a subject which agencies claim to be focusing on a lot more these days. "Training is one of the ways to upgrade people's skills and mindsets to understand and cope with a fast-changing world. It is also one of the best ways to keep staff," said Wayne Lotherington, chief executive officer of Singapore-based Allsorts Habit Creation, a company that specialises in training. However, Lotherington - whose clients include BBDO, Leo Burnett, TBWA, DDB, Lowe Lintas, McDonald's, Ericsson and Motorola - said that some companies were conducting training programmes with inappropriate content. "I frequently hear about training to build up people's negotiation skills but what the trainers do is set up hostage simulations where participants have to try to talk the abductors into freeing their captives and surrendering peacefully." He said there isn't much that agency staffers can take back to their work from this because the content isn't relevant to the marketing communications industry. "The objective is to give people advice, rules and guidelines that help them deal with day-to-day work-related issues, such as negotiating prices, trying to persuade the client to give me three extra days or how to get the art director to attach the greatest priority to my project." Lotherington set up Allsorts in 1999, however, he isn't new to the industry in the region. He spent nine years with DDB in Melbourne, rising to group account director. Between 1989 and 1991, he was the group account director at Batey Ads with responsibility for the Singapore Tourism Board. Before striking out on his own, with his own company, he was the training director at Leo Burnett. Lotherington said that some agencies were reluctant to allocate a budget for training because it would be money wasted if staff left the company seem after completing their training programmes. But he added that ultimately "training benefits the industry" and would help raise standards.

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