Industry needs training in technical skills that is:

  • On-the-job
    • TechNoon is primarily for people already in technical jobs, not people trying to enter the workforce. There are lots of good training options for students seeking to be work-ready in technical careers - TechNoon is to upskill people already working.
  • In-person
    • Learning technical skills is easier when it is done in a face-to-face community. There will usually be an on-line component of TechNoon but in-person sessions are central. People helping people is part of the TechNoon ethos.
  • Small weekly commitment
    • People already in jobs are busy and can’t usually devote long periods of time to skills training. TechNoon courses will usually have four sessions of 2-3 hours each (including homework) depending on the topic. That seems to be the practical maximum commitment we can expect. Given the practical emphasis of TechNoon, it should be possible to split longer topics into smaller courses, each with its own practical focus.
  • With multiple sessions
    • Unlike one-day workshops, TechNoon courses are delivered as multiple sessions interspersed with work so that learning can be applied between sessions. This makes it possible for learners to bring practical questions and issues to subsequent sessions and avoid getting “stuck”. It is also more motivating to learn something in sessions if there are regular attempts to apply that learning in practice. This is one of the main benefits of on-the-job training compared with academic training.
    • Learning technical skills takes time - spaced repetition and time between learning sessions helps new skills stick.
  • Around lunch-time
    • TechNoon occurs around lunchtime to make it easier to fit into the work week and to build community.
  • At accessible locations
    • Because TechNoon is a lunchtime activity, it is important that it is delivered in locations that are as close as possible to where people work. Industry support in the form of training venues is very important.
  • Practical and hands-on
    • Teaching and homework will typically have a substantial hands-on component where learners are actually making something useful - for example: programming code, configuration, or documentation.
  • Industry-led
    • Teachers will be people in industry with skills to share. TechNoon is about learning so it is crucial that teachers have good communication skills. This doesn’t mean TechNoon can only be delivered by superstars. Although there will be individuals who are unicorns with great technical, communication, and administrative skills, a more common pattern is to deliver training as a small team. There needs to be technical expertise in the room but the person actually delivering the bulk of the teaching should have good communication skills and an orientation to teaching.
  • Free
    • Because courses are by industry, for industry, the courses are free. Having said this, before people sign up to a course it is expected will be able to commit to the entire course, and meet the homework requirements.
    • Free means that managers don’t need to get budget approval to send people to a paid course. Managers can just approve the time for their staff.
    • Furthermore, the overheads of running a paid course (managing payment, tax obligations, implication of some kind of certification) mean that TechNoon would be practical if it wasn’t free.
  • With custom courses
    • The flexibility of TechNoon encourages delivery of specialist courses for smaller numbers of learners. Some courses will be larger and more general (for example, an introduction to the Python programming language); but others might be less ambitious, (for example, a course on how to write readable, maintainable SQL); or more advanced, (for example, containerisation best practice).
  • Focused on practical results, not credentials
    • At the end of a course the question to ask is not what certification was gained but what specific skills were actually put to use in the existing work context. Did the training make a practical, tangible difference? Is something different as a result?
    • This is arguably the key question that the trainer needs to keep front of mind while developing a course.
  • With open sourced content
    • Teaching resources should be shared to reduce the effort required to increase technical skills in industry. TechNoon follows the open source ethos of “give a brick, get a building”.
    • Less of an industry need, but more of a practicality to make this training actually happen.
    • Releasing teaching resources, including code, under a Creative Commons licence that ensures attribution will ensure companies that make successful training resources get the appropriate credit and recognition in return.