Incredible India - Improving Your Koenig Solutions Experience - Part II

Incubating Part II

Two weeks ago, I wrote a blog titled Incredible India: Improving the Koenig Solutions Brand – Part I, since then, I have thought about what to include in what would become Part II and I have decided it should be about improving your Koenig Solutions experience.

After all that I have written about my experiences in India, I believe given the opportunity again, I would avail myself of Koenig Solutions services if their repertoire of courses extends to include Enterprise Architecture though that would also require getting trainers out of industry rather than just having people with book knowledge of seriously impacting concepts.

Besides, there are other courses that might be of interest too as one tries to keep in line with market developments and establish a niche area of expertise.

Very useful advice

There are however a few key things that will make your experience worthwhile one that I share here comes from someone who is quite conversant with the system and the way things get done in India.

This is what he had to say, “This is India. However much we strive to root out this sort of stuff, ubiquitous chaos, poor English and even carelessness on behalf of some of the lower staff has always been and will always be intrinsically part of the India experience of most of our students.

It takes a while to get used to and find the right mental disposition to tackle. As a rule of thumb, do not take sloppiness from anyone but under all circumstances remain calm and firm about stuff that is not to your liking. Call in the center manager if necessary.

Do not depend on no one. Most staff will never take any initiative whatsoever and will expect you to do so. If people don't understand you, they won't admit to it, thus adding to confusion. When in doubt or unhappy about the answer given or services provided - especially about issues pertaining to hygiene and health, ask to talk to someone else or take it to the reception desk or center manager directly.

Adjust your notion of time. Whereas most of us are punctual on time related issues, the majority of Indian folks are on IFT (Indian Flexible Time) which tends to drive us totally mad on our first India visit.  Never wait till the last minute to make arrangements for something. Anything asked for less than 24 hours before deadline will most probably fail as most people are unfamiliar with concepts like timely resolution or urgency.

These days, I've gotten used to all things you describe and by finding ways to work around them by adjusting my mindset to how things work in India.”

I think this should be on the front page of every tour guide or brochure you get concerning India, it will go a long way to helping you adjust to the severe culture shock you might experience on your visit to India.

Your preparations

In terms of preparations to go to India, these are the things you probably need to note. Whilst most people using Koenig Solutions get a Tourist Visa, be prepared to consider getting a Business Visa and if your stay will be more than 30 days you might have to get an Entry Visa.

If based in Europe obtain information about Koenig Solutions’ bank account in Belgium rather than travelling with thousands of Euros, Pounds or Dollars of Traveller’s cheques.

On arrival in India, if you are unsatisfied with anything, let the management know. Do not be fobbed off with excuses or apologies if you are not satisfied with the proposed resolution. At times, you might be offered compensation which in Indian terms might be huge but in general terms, is paltry if not insulting, be ready to stand your ground and escalate – you paid for a service, get the service you paid for.

Insist on these, all the time

Regarding course material, your books should be shrink-wrapped, if not, they are second-hand books, do not sign the receipts until you have been provided with new books.

For the curriculum delivered from PowerPoint slides, I have found it is quite difficult to take useful and relevant notes – insist on having those PowerPoint slides printed out at no extra cost for you to annotate throughout your training. You cannot annotate electronic copies and to be honest any decent PowerPoint-based training material provides hard copies.

For each test-based curriculum that you take, allow for at least 2 days after the course for study and preparation for the tests. Whilst some might be able to walk into tests and pass immediately after the training, others trying that might find that they will be repeating tests before scoring a pass.

If you have non-lecture days and need to study, the provided accommodations can be quite Spartan; I have however not found out if public libraries are better equipped for this.

Other useful tips

For the cost, I will advise that you hire the mobile Internet dongle because Internet connectivity at both the training centre and the accommodations can be patchy at times.

If you obtain an Indian SIM Card ask that mobile data be enabled as part of the package if you need to use your smartphone to surf the Internet.

Get a TravelCard if you use the New Delhi metro, it means you do not have to join interminably long queues for tokens to travel.

New Delhi of all the Koenig Solutions Training Centres is nearest to Agra some 200 kilometres south this is where the Taj Mahal is located but the road to Agra has Mathura – the birthplace of Krishna with the great statue of goddess Durga, Sikandra where the Tomb of Akbar the Great is – the grandfather of Shah Jahan who built the Taj Mahal, a good deal of the Agra Fort and the Red Fort back in New Delhi.

It is better to get Koenig Solutions to book a train to Agra or arrange with other colleagues to book a more comfortable bus than the Koenig city transit buses which will also allow you to stop at these other places than just the journey to the Taj Mahal where you are also put in the hands of unscrupulous restaurants or persons ready to fleece you. If you have amongst you someone who speaks Hindi you can get much done and if you have to be really assertive, have one amongst you who is articulate, forceful and insistent on getting the results without backing down.

Be streetwise

When it comes to food, be careful, circumspect and wise. Cooked and cooked well is important, keep off cold vegetarian dishes if you have no resistance to the local bugs. Most visitors pick up Traveller’s Diarrhoea, so pack your Imodium take lots of yoghurt/curd and eat lots of bananas. Lassi is a yoghurt drink that can settle your tummy quite well but don’t even venture Bhang Lassi – it contains cannabis, but you might get more than a high, you could end up in hospital paying bills as part of a medical scam.

For lunch you usually have the choice of McDonald's, Subway, Dominoes or Hakka, then you have to decide between vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes – I stuck with rice in most cases. Haldirams which is a purely vegetarian chain has many choices but be careful what you choose and be sure you have the stomach for that choice.

When shopping, only use reputable shops, it is better to see the price tags up front than attempt to haggle and then realise you have just become a victim of daylight robbery. If you don’t know cashmere you might end up with a fine hybrid of polyester and nylon, the real factory markings are not on the edges of the cloth, if the bales were taken off the shelf, that chalk-like factory marking with the true composition of cloth would have been cut off.

Always negotiate up front for services that do not have a clear price tag – in the end, India can be fun, but you have to be aware, smart and really streetwise with a presence, so you do not get taken for granted and end up the worse for it. Be aggressive if you must and walk away if you can. Click on the Koenig Solutions label below this post to see my other related posts.

Incredible India: Improving the Koenig Solutions brand - Part I

Between expansion and improvement

As my training classes draw to an end today, it has literally been 23 days of intensive coaching with just Sundays off. There were days I just could not take in anymore either by reason of fatigue or incapacitation brought on by the different environment I was in.

Koenig Solutions in their training services have become a brand and one can understand that every organisation has to balance the demands of growth and improvement. As I have noticed here and in many places, one always seems to take away from the other; the organisation has to be so utterly unique to manage both expansion and improvement in tandem without falling a victim of its own previously acclaimed success.

The trainers are really good

The core resource pool of Koenig Solutions is their trainers, young, highly educated, probably driven and maybe ambitious. It would appear the minimum academic requirement for acceptance into the training pool is a Masters degree, though I cannot say much for the other areas of their personal and personality development.

From what I have observed of some of them, they need some adventure and this cannot be acquired by just meeting with trainees who come here from all the corners of the globe.

Language proficiency

English with all its complexities, exceptions and nuance is probably one of the most forgiving of international languages, even where the command of the language is nigh on appalling, if the trainer is quite conversant with the material, they can deliver the curriculum well enough to the understanding of a majority of trainees who in some cases have English as a foreign language too.

In my view, I think Koenig Solutions should invest in more English language training for better expression and usage, not necessarily in the format of formal classes but in bonding encounters around debates, discussions, games and team-building. That way, people do not feel too exposed for their poor command of English even though they are brain boxes on the curriculum.

Koenig Solutions recently announced that certain courses will be conducted in French and considering the visitors from other Hispanic, Germanic and Lusophone countries one would expect Spanish, German and Portuguese to follow; it is doubtful that Italian will become one of those languages though Chinese will be an interesting addition.

Employees include others

Koenig Solutions appears to be a good employer when it comes to its trainers but those not the only people in the employ of this organisation; I leave India mortified at the living conditions of the staff of Koenig Inn and those of the people running the various apartments as reported by other trainees.

Beyond the main distinguishing factor of good trainers, the only other basic advantage of training in India is cost and that is hardly a great differentiator anymore. Training organisations in Europe are trimming their costs and offering incentives to attract the locals that will normally trot out to India.

Besides, Malaysia and Thailand which I dare say are somewhat more exotic locations are offering greater competition and it is only a matter of time before experienced Koenig India staff are lured away to train for these fledgling organisations that will be have newer and better equipment whilst offering even better support than Koenig Solutions has dared to attempt.

There are many areas where Koenig Solutions is in need of considerable improvement and it is a task that requires purposeful and immediate attention.

Location

The reason why I decided to take my training in New Delhi rather than at the other 3 centres in India was because I felt there was no way I could visit India without seeing the Taj Mahal. However, New Delhi is under a constant haze of fog and pollution it is really unhealthy at the best of times. The winter months are probably the best months to come here but Dehradun and Goa will be in my list of options the next time.

It is surprising that there are no training centres in Bangalore, Bombay or Chennai (Madras), I do not know if Koenig Solutions plans to open centres there.

Management

Sometimes things happen within this organisation as if lessons are not being learnt. I can chart a trail of management disarray and disorganisation from information I received for getting my visa, through my being picked up at the airport, a poor introduction process, tardy problem resolution from information dissemination, testing facilitation to internet connectivity and many other things that appear inconsequential but are major operational problems that show an organisation that is not being run like a tight ship.

From observation, it is almost impossible to say that Koenig Solutions has been in this activity for over a decade, for all the growth they seemed to have remained a tyro organisation repeating the same mistakes, offering the same excuses and hardly showing characteristics of a learning organisation.

Facilities

To suggest many of the systems are old is to proffer an understatement. I have taken pictures of systems that charities will probably reject. Much of the equipment is out-dated and they are not keeping up with technical advancements in the industry.

For instance, they offer a 3-month after course support but what is required beyond the classes is good access to the labs, even lesser organisations put a lot of stuff on the cloud. As I have noted before, it is amazing that an organisation that trains in current networking trends and systems cannot offer remote labs when we are present in India and for a limited period of time after we have left India.

Koenig Solutions might not be allowed to upload core curriculum material but having been in this business for over a decade, they should still be able to provide generic accessible systems in the cloud for trainees and ex-trainees to use to help reinforce the training they received in India.

Having been in the MN-1 & MN-2 buildings, I cannot vouch for the other buildings but it did cross my mind that fire safety rules did not matter, I could see the one access into the office areas and quite restricted exits if anything happened. In Europe, none of these locations will pass a fire safety test or be granted a fire safety certificate.

Impressions

All that said, I hope that one fundamental piece of information has not been lost by Koenig Solutions, the idea that trainees that attend courses in December are probably quite senior type personnel in a month that is not as busy.

They will form impressions about the whole gamut of services apart from training provided by Koenig Solutions and that could well inform their recommendations in terms of advising others of attending courses here.

To think there is much incentive in the paltry sums offered for recommending others is a fallacy at best, a service will be recommended if it exceeds expectations regardless of commission.

In general and my honest opinion is this – Koenig Solutions offers excellent training in terms of the personnel, uses average equipment in the delivery of the curriculum, can be quite mediocre in addressing issues raised by trainees either at the training centre or at the residences and really does not pass the muster of exceeding expectations.

I might return to India, I am not fully persuaded of a second helping of Koenig Solutions but then, I have only been in New Delhi; things can be different in Dehradun where they have their largest training centre, in Goa or in Shimla – there is much to be desired but the experience has been eye-opening and wonderful.

Incredible India: Up Against the Koenig Imperative

Boot camp revamp

I had a major falling out with my trainer this morning on a number of issues regarding the delivery of the curriculum leading to a certification I am in interested.

When it comes to boot camp training, it can be difficult to balance the issues of time, complete coverage, teaching, explanation and preparation for tests.

Much as I will like to attain my certifications as soon as possible, my learning methodology has never been by rote, accepted views or concepts have to have undergirding logic and I need to know that I am extending my body of knowledge.

The burden of history

For someone who has been in the ICT profession for 23 years, one can safely say a good deal of the concepts we take for granted today have their foundations in fundamentally primitive things we did decades.

People new to the field may have no need for the history of how, why and what things are today, maybe that is an advantage or disadvantage but it is impossible to expect those who have experience to just become sponges of new thinking without referencing knowledge they already have or activities that have practical affinity with the topic under discussion.

Intensive versus effective

Again, the curriculum is delivered in 6 8-hour days and sometimes Sundays, the danger of saturation looms, the trainer wanting to cover the requisite material, the trainee wanting to pace the absorption so that the quality becomes of greater significance than the quality.

In other words, there might be a case for 5 hours of effective training over 8 hours of intensive training, each trainee knows what they can handle before they begin to wilt and that is only just human.

Delivery prowess

Then, there are amazing differences between the two trainers I have had, the Microsoft Official Curriculum is tied to Powerpoint slides that were followed quite closely and made the taking of notes less easy especially in a one-on-one teaching setup.

The better delivery method with regards to the Powerpoint slides should have been having the slides offered as notes to trainees to annotate thereby helping link discussion with concept and reference.

In the case of my CCNA trainer, she is no less than prodigious, in the 4 days of my training already, she has not one referenced a note, she fills the board with point after point with literal total recall, in the probably 500 sentences she has written on the board, she has only once asked if one point had been written and that point was probably the least significant of the lot.

Rhyme without reason

Things began to reach a head yesterday when first certain definitions appeared to challenge the conventional use of language, English being the medium but meanings appearing to indicate the opposite.

I could not absorb the idea that Least Feasible Distance could go on to mean Best Option, regardless of tone, context, syntax or semantics, this was an exceptional anomaly and I felt quite uncomfortable with this.

I dare say English is not really the same between what is spoken and written in America and what the English speak especially when there is a purist determination in one’s mode of expression – that is just a fact.

English usage and meaning

I have worried that I might get caught out with American usage and Americanisms and a typical example I give is our pants are never exposed whilst Americans wear theirs openly. Alright, pants are underwear in England but trousers in America if viewed from an English perspective just as a negative is always a negative on our side of the pond no matter how many you string together whereas in America the mathematical double negative take precedent to yield a positive or the affirmative.

Another usage of Active and Passive which had the implication of opposites in the class seemed to be given a much more acceptable reading when explained in another context from other material I reviewed.

Just as we have English and US English dictionaries, I am beginning to think whilst allowances can be made for similarity and difference, there might be a case for clearly differentiating the material and not assuming English is really the same around the globe.

However, it was when a formula was written on the board that combined two unrelated units that I had had enough. I was not in class to jettison my engineering background and there had to be a reason why that formula was the accepted code.

Oranges and apples

At this point, I was impervious to the illogical and scientifically incorrect; I could not imagine that all the engineering in Cisco had produced a dimensional and mathematical inexactitude without reason.

That reason was not forthcoming, I was to absorb this by law and learn it by rote – for a person who was first precocious, then inquisitive, interrogative, curious, questioning, researching and challenging assumptions no matter how widely held, this was one of those moments where without reason there could be no progress.

Yesterday, I got up, closed my book, slammed the lid of my netbook and was ready to walk out of the course, she was able to placate me but I was far from satisfied.

Now, I know

On returning to my hotel, that was the first topic I researched and then I saw the extensive formula that got condensed to what was written on the board, the engineering and mathematical proof was evident – that for me is what you call the impartation of knowledge and the fulfilment of understanding – the why and how was there to see.

So, in the morning I took my discovery to my trainer and she acknowledged she knew this but it was beyond the scope of the course I was on. Whilst that was appreciated, I felt a conflict brewing because I was not just going to take everything as gospel but will require clear detail where assumptions are made that seem to challenge the concepts of language or science as predicated from my “wealth” of experience.

Fracture!

By the time we had exchanged a few good views about the material it was time for my trainer to say she could no more continue the training and I felt we had reached an irreconcilable impasse.

I then had a meeting with the officials and technical manager where generally what they seemed to be concerned with was the method (The Koenig Imperative – course material delivered within constrained time-frames leading to certification).

In some ways, I acquiesced and we agreed to continue the course because the curriculum is really an abridged version of the more serious engineering concepts that I will find more interesting and aligned to my engineering background.

Patching up

I can understand my trainer’s frustrations though I cannot say she fully appreciates that I cannot extend my knowledge of these concepts just by faith without seeking the fundamental reasons for why and how such conclusions were arrived at – it is just the bane of my kind of background, that I have become a somewhat difficult and impossible trainee after her having delivered this curriculum to well over 500 trainees is unfortunate.

I am not a robot, God help my intellect and we both need a healthy dose of patience with each other.

We appeared to patch things up and continue with the training, an interestingly eventful day. 

Incredible India - We did Christmas and tried to party

Away in a manager

One has to give all kudos to Koenig Solutions for hastily arranging a Christmas party this afternoon considering a good number of us will be in India over the Christmas and New Year holidays.

In a Hindu majority country and possibly Hindu majority city along with the staff of Koenig Solutions, one can appreciate the involvement of everyone to help ease the nostalgia that is accentuated by being away at such a time from family, relations, friends and home.

The roof terrace was carpeted green, with white and pinkish-red curtains as cordons round the entire terrace, no, it was not nightclub ambience.

Good King Wenceslas

The party somewhat started before I got there with my new trainer, the compere who I think is probably one of the senior officials was introducing the main members of his team who were the technical managers and team leaders of the clusters of trainers for the courses the Koenig Solutions runs.

If anything, it was a wonderful showcase of the Indian talent that makes Koenig Solutions a high choice for the many who run the gauntlet of inscrutable visa application processes and endure with little commentary the conditions that yearn for some voices.

As I was opportuned to read on my Twitter time line yesterday; a good man does no good remaining silent when he should be talking – not that I will arrogate to myself any status than to make observations and offer suggestions.

O come all ye faithful

One cannot say the trainers were examples of public speaking nor were their comments representative of the expertise or underlying genius of their ability. If not shy, reticent and somewhat too stiff to join in the fun of the compere who seemed to have a rather good sense of fun and humour that made for some entertainment.

The disk jockey was a confused spell of discs with the music starting and stopping abruptly that it made for irritation that could draw the ire of plugging the plug and asking everyone to do nursery rhymes instead.

Drinks were served and the Santa Claus whose costume could do with a few well directed claws cut the cake with a knife I thought was a camp knife picked up as an afterthought.

God rest ye, merry gentlemen

Then we were invited to play games, at which point, farce was beckoning the farcical – the trainees were in an inner circle walking in a clockwise direction and the trainers on the outer circle walking in an anti-clockwise direction and as the music spluttered to a stop, the trainee and trainer were to give the first impressions of each other – I held my head in my hands.

O, for some inspiration; maybe some wisdom, surely, it could get no worse as a second and third round of walking left the partners misaligned. Maybe I should not forget the observation of another colleague for all he could see were 8 men holding hands – it was a game if you were there but a picture might just convey a different impression.

Once in royal David’s city

Then the floor was opened for dancing, everything from hip-hop through Bollywood music was thrown in with the expected segue of a DJ at hand.

Soon we were spared any more torture, the party ended not really having been a party in a general sense but at least it offered a time for us to let down our hair – What am I talking about? I have none.

So, there was our Christmas party and I would generously not rate it apart from say it gets full marks for good intentions and some cake.

Thank you, Koenig Solutions for bringing Bethlehem to New Delhi.

Incredible India: Seeking Koenig Solutions to Atrocious Conditions

Something of the heart

There are other matters that might appear peripheral but are pertinent and demand urgent and effective action on the part of those who have the power to implement change.

The need for a recognition of the fact that the broad experience of the boot camp training regime means we interface with more of the lower cadre of workers in the Koenig Solutions hierarchy and we cannot be oblivious of certain obvious and worrisome things.

Apart from the trainers who we interact with for about 8 hours a day, it is the young men at our accommodations that cater for our other needs in providing meals, facilitating our laundry, doing the housekeeping and sometimes having to tackle issues and problems they are barely equipped to handle like when the wireless Internet connectivity service fails.

Such appalling conditions

One cannot fail to commend these men either at the main Koenig Inn or at the other apartments dotted around New Delhi.

However, you can imagine my shock when I noticed that in a 24-room inn which is barely of 2-star quality I arrived to see that two of the workers at the inn were sleeping on the floor. It is something I have seen a few times since and you just do not get used to it at all.

For whatever working circumstances exist in India that might differ from those in elsewhere and for whatever satisfaction these men might have with their jobs, the moment these conditions are exposed to those from outside India, the situation is untenable.

It becomes an unbearable stain on our consciences where we dare to be humane and have a basic sense of dignity that people who toil tirelessly for our comfort are housed in conditions so appalling.

Shock does not describe it by half

Beyond that, reports from at least one apartment under the management of the Koenig Solutions entire indicate the workers have no toilet facilities that it is almost a moment of ululation when a guest leaves just because it affords them the opportunity to do things in a more healthy way.

I heard this, days ago; the shock of the news is just wearing off, but it is something that needs writing about and sorting out. The management at Koenig Solutions having received prizes for being one of the best places to work for in India makes one wonder what kind of criteria is used to determine such an accolade.

Fundamentally, if Koenig Solutions provides world-class training services, it is only incumbent on them to make provision of a better class of working and living conditions for their staff at these places.

Perish the thought that Koenig Solutions for all the praise it has gotten the ignominy of being a provider of world-class sweat shop conditions becomes the enduring experience after we have left for the comfort of our homes.

Incredible India: Conditions and Transitions

Silence is not absence

There might be readers of my blog concerning my training in India who might have thought I had already screamed myself hoarse and finally settled down to the scheme of things. Nothing could be further from the truth.

I have been busy and in many cases exhausted but there is so much to write about that the right frame of mind is necessary to be as articulate as possible.

As you would have noticed, I have registered no new comments with regards to my Internet connection that is not because the Internet access problem has been solved properly or that the service is anywhere near acceptable, I simply could not afford to suffer another night of absence of service that the next day I got a mobile Internet dongle that gives me close to unlimited access for the rest of the time I will be in India.

My colleagues at Koenig Inn have endured more frustration than I have the capacity for in terms of that as it were “funny” service. I have on occasion used the wireless Internet service but I suppose because I have contingencies, I am no more as affected.

Acquiring a Microsoft-infused mind

The main tranche of my course finished yesterday. It was a whirlwind tour of the Microsoft Windows enterprise framework strategy. We covered so many topics, I think I was stretched, learning new stuff, relearning interesting stuff and unlearning obsolete stuff – on the latter, there was much to unlearn with experience comes the vagaries of change that compel you to adapt or be face obsolescence.

Koenig Solutions also gave me a birthday present, not a free course but a complete set of all their souvenirs – Thank you.

Much as I seem to have some bravado to face some examinations in order terms I feel I am not as prepared as I should be. It is saturation environment from now on as I do practice tests on my mobile phone, read up on obscure topics and playback videos of the CBT material whilst awake and whilst asleep – my thinking has to become Microsoft(ed) if any such word exists.

Parting with my trainer, I can only commend his knowledge of the material, his understanding of the fundamentals, his confidence in the face of thorny questions and his appreciation of other perspectives that people bring in with regards to the practical experiences they have had. I will hope that I make a friend of him for the invaluable service he has offered.

Feng Shui we need

I received an email yesterday with regards to the next course that I hope to obtain a Cisco certification for. I cannot say much for the attention to detail when the laboratory room number indicated I was to be in a different building from what the email suggested – I am not complaining, just observing.

The training room is in the basement of another building, I would hate to think that I am already suffering the effects of bad Feng Shui and other complications of sick building syndrome – basically, I had basement offices and I have suddenly noticed that I have been in classes without windows, breathing processed air and using artificial light.

The part about breathing processed air is useful because New Delhi is in a constant haze of pollution, there are places you can go that give you serious throat irritation in a matter of minutes.

The same and different all the same

So, after finding my training room, I walked down the length of the corridor noting how clean the whole place looked and could not help but notice that unlike the other building, the sugar bowl had a lid that was used with the notice, to always cover the bowl after use. I still have issues with the spoon being in a cup of water, I would rather they had a proper sugar dispenser or plastic disposable spoons.

In all, many things are the same all around the place, the coffee machines, the water coolers, the serviette boxes, even the microwaves and yet all different – a concept of bulk similarity but varied utility depending on location as regards the training centres and the managed accommodations.

A visit to the gents was a bit more comforting, a lot cleaner in looks than the aging other place but with a façade of the worn, maybe by reason of age, one cannot say.

The lessons have started and this looks like it will be exciting stuff – there is much more to report some of which is almost too incredible to talk about but it will be remiss of me not to cover these matters in the next few blogs I post.

Incredible India: A Close Shave at Koenig Inn

Air ran out of the taps

The backstory to the vivid picture of me in a bathrobe with shaving foam all around my ears and over my head is that as I was shaving I ran out of hot water completely.

This was at just a few minutes past 7:00AM and barely a week after I was told hot water will be available for 24 hours at Koenig Inn.

Things had in the space of just a day moved or generally acceptable to precipitously untenable with no Internet access overnight and then this.

As the water then began to trickle out of the tap I used my hand cloth towel to wipe off all the foam and then had a hand cloth wipe in the place of a shower.

Meanwhile, for whatever reason after the staff came up to see the problem, there was a leak in the bathroom, I went down for breakfast and gave my key to the staff not returning to the room as I left for the training centre.

The new Internet Policy

I could not wait to get out of the Koenig Inn this morning to start at the training centre where I hope no construction firm had inadvertently dug up the cables again like they allegedly did a few days ago.

A new notice had appeared on the wall in addition to the many notices that we have to read, this one might well add insult to injury – whilst I appreciate that the provision of free wireless Internet service comes at a cost for the training centre and the abuse of it for other purposes is not fair, it is one thing to have a poor service and quite another not to have it at all.

Nowadays, we select hotels for the simple reason that wireless Internet is available and free; much as one would expect that a training centre of the calibre of Koenig Solutions will not impose extortionate costs on access for purposes as voice chat (Skype) since being far away from home is partly compensated for with the ability to communicate affordably with friends and family back home this might become a core consideration in choosing this training centre in the future.

If anything, the new Internet Policy is a radical disincentive, a service downgrade and an unfortunate development, especially after last night.

Conversely, I think I am now reading the sign clearly; it reads - "Welcome to India"

Incredible India: Without Internet Access, Koenig Inn is a Prison

My connection was down

When in a distant land, well away from friends and family there is one bond that we take for granted because we have taken it in trust and it factored into all the decisions we made to leave the comfort of our home for the adventure which might well be the one of a lifetime.

Away from those I know, I am four and a half or 5 and a half hours ahead of their own daily timeframe, it means ones bears it in thought that one will not call to speak in the morning because they will be asleep, neither can one during the day because the overlapping times of work mean the pleasantries of interaction are reduced to more business-like conversation.

The window of opportunity between my getting to bed and they having the time to chat is reasonably around 8:00PM their time which is just after midnight here or an hour later.

In terms of cost, we have found that Skype suits us best and that needs the Internet as the carrier, its availability is critically paramount.

A prison of life

The lonely world that is framed within the confines of the little room that is a prison of convenience for a month is opened up into a vast and limitless place through the Internet which serves as the beast of burden for email, social interaction, news retrieval and again a critical research resource that underpins the reason why we have left our homes for this place.

Whatever discomforts, nostalgia, loneliness or isolation is somewhat ameliorated with the feeling that one can through this invisible but tangible medium, touch the world and be in touch – at will and without let or hindrance.

However, this night will count as one of the least comfortable I have had in a long time, the darkness settled in figurative and literal sense at the doors to the world were closed like one were in a maximum security prison.

Freedoms lost

The guards knowing we should be free could not open the prison gates and we were completely constrained, our freedom lost and the silence of the night stilled to the hearing of sounds from outer space if ones ears were so attuned.

From about 9:45PM when I noticed, the wireless connectivity between my netbook and the wireless access point was fine but the wireless access point could not take me beyond itself into the world of the Internet – it was down.

An idea for partnership

The staff could not resolve the problem and there I was, cut off and thinking fast about what other alternatives were available at the loss of this service – none easily came to mind apart from one good idea – the need for a contingency plan which should come at no additional cost.

There are many hotels that are in the vicinity of my hotel, all broadcast the presence of their wireless access points, where the service in one hotel fails, there should be an arrangement between hotels to allow for guests in other hotels to hop on their systems whilst steps are taken to expedite repairs of the service we used to have.

A rotten moment

This must be the lowest point in terms of my sense of comfort; the absence of Internet access, the last resort is to switch the SIM card in my phone back to my home SIM card and roam – not the best but this situation must definitely not happen again, it just must not, again.

No, sooner had I changed my SIM card and began to roam, my 10MB of data was used up without having done much.

Incredible India: Happier with things at Koenig

Concentrating on the detail

The days at training seem to have settled into some sort of routine now though I am yet to kick into serious study mode.

Yesterday started well, I arrived early enough to at least socialise before my class started and soon we got into a topic I am not only keen of covering or learning, I was determined to understand the full detail of the subject.

This was quite pertinent because it was one in which I could find direct application and realise I had not been opportuned to use – my trainer took his time too to ensure I that I got the best grasp of the subject, it ended up being my longest day at the training centre.

Feedback on feeding back

Besides, early in the morning, as I logged into the “Center Automation System” that allows for a whole range of interactive activity with the organisation, I was presented with an “Interim Feedback” survey covering all aspects of my experience in India.

My trainer in my honest opinion obtained full marks other matters bordered from average to good but I did have a good few opinions about things that needed to be improved upon and felt it was best to reference my earlier 3 blogs on my experiences than itemise each issue again.

In terms of the survey, I felt the user experience was poor for the following reasons; it was not intuitive, the design was perfunctory and each of the rating elements lacked imagination in presentation, we were to offer most of our subjective opinions in terms of numbers from 0 to 10 and that was just not how to set up such surveys.

Words convey thoughts better

The redesign, if they so attempt to be so inspired and responsive is to change the answering model to modal words that in some cases will be one or a combination of the following sets of responses, {true, false}, {very satisfactory, satisfactory, unsatisfactory}, {good, neutral, bad}, {strongly agree, agree, disagree, strongly disagree} or {happy, unhappy}.

They could stretch these out to match a range of 10 radio buttons whilst the backend of the survey invisible to us might still use the numerate weighting if they so wish. The simple fact is words and phrases convey thought a lot better than numbers.

I also observed that for a training organisation they did not seem to be eating any of their own dog-food, for instance, if they offered CRM training they should be able to create useful surveys; as one that offered networking training, Internet access downtimes of almost 24 hours were just beyond the pale and most importantly, the labs which could be labour intensive and eat into essential class time to be remotely accessible to students to review and work on after-hours.

One would think that would help the reinforcement process considering most of the training manuals had content of up to 40% labs.

No sleepwalking into food bugs again

After the rite of passage in terms of my Delhi belly, I decided to be less adventurous with regards to food, I will stick to hot rice meals and make curd with honey part of my daily diet.

For my Tuesday class, I struggled to keep awake; the night before for restless and sleepless than I resorted to alarm-patting putting my wake calls into snooze mode every 10 minutes until I had to crawl out of bed and make for the training centre.

My trainer has not mastered the art of teaching into the dreams of nodding students, a skill I think he will do well to acquire.

The virtual prison of Internet down

Meanwhile, Internet access was down for a few hours but the centre proactively had someone bring round a notice to inform us of the problem and why. The road in front of the centre is being repaired and it appears the constructors had dug up the cables – the service was restored just around lunch but informing us ensured we did not end up being frustrated by the inability to access the Internet.

I was able to borrow a mobile dongle for about 15 minutes to check my email and other social networking sites and for short breaks I just go up to the terrace at the top of the building to take in some polluted air and smog, but then, that is New Delhi for you.

All over the world

I am meeting people from many places, as Angola, Tanzania, Cameroon, Eritrea, England, Germany, Iraq, Papua New Guinea, Australia, Nigeria evidently and so on. There is no doubt that the training is excellent; even those who came here with very little Information Technology knowledge, training or career backgrounds are passing their tests at first sitting – it is commendable.

What is also interesting is the number of people who have come here who do not live in their countries of origin, people like me who are in some ways world citizens and those with US military backgrounds; listening to some of the conversations, that setup appears to be an inscrutable bureaucracy rivalling the License Raj in the demotivation of personnel and absurd politics but awash in tax payers’ money expended on atrocious projects – enough said.

Some praise is due

After classes I was on a white-knuckle auto-rickshaw ride to the tailors to consider bespoke suit shopping, you had to be determined, not to be persuaded to buy what you do not want for needs that do not exist.

Dinner is now served as a buffet, the chefs constantly improving the menus and the setup now makes for less waste; that again was a suggestion that was heeded to. It would appear more people are moving from the apartments to our inn; word must have gotten out that things are at a standard that can be appreciated.

Well done to the staff at Koenig Inn and also to the Koenig Solutions team in New Delhi.

Other related blogs

Incredible India: Incredible Dissatisfaction

Incredible India: Honest to Koenig Solutions

Incredible India: We lost power to internet (sic)

Incredible India: The rime, the downtime and what not

Incredible India: Koenig Solutions being responsive

Incredible India: The Rite of Passage

Running for the runs

I am back at the inn just before the midday break at some cost because I needed an unscheduled ride from the training centre.

In serious discomfort just after I barely concentrated enough to cover a few topics because I am going through one of those rites of passage.

The passage is used in every sense of the word as in the experience and the visits to little rooms with closed doors, a rumbling belly, pain that fluctuates gradually from almost unbearable to just within the threshold of tolerable.

What aches much is the belly

I have taken much advice, bananas, yoghurt and curd all to bring some comfort to my somewhat contorted visage, the many quite understanding of what I am going through and sympathetic too.

It is called Delhi Belly and a good few trainees have succumbed especially those from the regions where we have not built resistance to the bugs – it is my first time of having travel diarrhoea in all the times that I have travelled to place far too numerous to mention.

Treating India

So, as I lay in bed hoping to get some rest and recovery, the funniness of it all is interesting as some might think, he is not in that much discomfort, else he will not be blogging – you have no idea; I have blogged in far worse situations before, each situation deserves the journaling a blog provides.

In answering an unusually phrased question yesterday, I found that good humour has therapeutic quality too.

Q: How are you treating India?

A: With Imodium.

It is, I suppose a rite of passage to India.

Incredible India: Koenig Solutions being responsive

Shut-eye in class

I could barely keep my eyes open for most of today, I hadn’t slept that well and the passivity of listening and the occasional question or discussion makes for a rather dull man.

Even after the infusion of 2 cans of Red Bull, neither the caffeine nor the taurine appeared to produce the desired effect, most stimulants rarely ever get to engage my physiology to any level of stimulation, it is a matter of the will and the prop of a placebo, even a stinging slap at times that seems to do the job but not today.

Besides, there was a bit of discomfort that had me visiting the lavatories a few more times than necessary; not good at all.

Changes apace

Well after lunch, our centre manager came over for a chat to see how I was getting on, apparently, my blog had been read and a number of changes had been set in motion.

I had already noticed that the meals at dinner time had improved considerably in quality, I received an apology for the pick-up mishap and I have been promised some compensation, the hot water at the inn will now run 24/7 rather than just early in the mornings and in the evenings, all days of the week, the hand-wash bottles in the toilet appear to have been cleaned.

There is some progress, especially in the silly little things that Western histrionics take for granted; I would suppose the other matters raised are having a review too for the purposes of improvement.

Koenig Solutions making it happen

As I observe or learn of other things, my blogs will be duly updated. Let’s just say Koenig Solutions as I said before has the potential to offer a world class service and there are people able to facilitate that to acceptable expectations.

A responsive organisation has every prospect of earning confidence and that is worthy of commendation.

Incredible India: The rime, the downtime and what may apply

There is more to this place

Sometimes I wonder about being in such a beautiful country and finding oneself preoccupied with other priorities until that one free day that is a Sunday.

The daily narrative tends to be concerned with where I am staying and where I am receiving training, but there is definitely much more to India than what I have experienced or New Delhi at that.

Stickier than plain dust

I did not get too much sleep last night before I had to get up at 7:00AM and after the morning ablutions I made for breakfast. Having been told the milk served at breakfast was whole milk, I picked up a bowl for cornflakes.

Then I saw the bag from which the cornflakes had been poured into a bigger bowl, it did not look like Kelloggs, so I reached for it out of curiosity only to feel greasy grime all over the bag as if it had been kept in some unmentionably dirty place for an indeterminate time. I probably should have bothered more about the content of the bag but after the difficulty in getting the grime off my fingers with about 5 wipes, my appetite for cornflakes had disappeared.

Once again, I had pawpaw and pineapple slices for breakfast and just got out in time to catch the bus to the training centre on seats in the back that were not made for any comfort at all.

Still down for an email frown

The wireless internet connection issue that had not been resolved since 11:30AM the day before was still a problem, the only word I had to mention to the receptionist was “apparently” it summed up the matter.

At about 10:30AM, I asked the reception for her USB mobile internet dongle and had about 30 minutes online to read my email, respond to another and submit a complaint about the wireless internet problem to Koenig Solutions Customer Care and copying in my original contacts.

I basically stressed the importance of having the connection, the fact that the service was to be expected, the need for an immediate resolution and the demand for an alternative solution at no additional cost to myself.

Within 10 minutes of my sending the email, the receptionist popped in to say the wireless internet service had been restored. Since I did not receive a response to my email, I cannot really take credit for the notion that my email might have expedited things, I have no cause to complain if the service is restored.

Keeping up with the train

The training today was fast-paced and interesting, much of the material was familiar and at the same time the misunderstood areas were so succinctly explained for my enlightenment.

I downed 3 cans of Red Bull almost to no avail but was alert enough to catch things and raise questions about unclear topics, time just flew and it was almost 5:00PM by the time we covered the proposed topics for discussion.

Another cock-up

Back at the hotel, though tired, I learnt a trainee colleague was to embark on a long journey overnight to another training centre; the personnel having failed to contact him by email when they could not get him via a telephone call to alert him to the fact that no trainer for his scheduled course was available in New Delhi – an unfortunate lack of initiative and a gross administrative cock-up.

I exerted myself and broke sweat on the cross-trainer gym equipment and the abdominal exercise machine before a shower and dinner which was rice and cutlets of lamb, the chef having excelled himself once again.

For the rest

I did not have the presence of mind to realise the internet connection at the inn was also down but after dinner, I was informed the problem had been resolved – I was introduced to all the inn staff who I warmly greeted with a firm handshake and settled for a cup of sweet milky coffee as it is made in these parts courtesy of the concierge.

The day closes with an early night, a stirring in about 2 hours for my pills and hopes for a restful night in readiness for another day.

Incredible India: We lost power to internet (sic)

To the higher ups

There must come a day when I will have nothing to moan about but give effusive praise and I expect it to come soon.

I took the liberty of sending links to my last two blogs to the main contacts I had before I visited India. I received a short and a lengthy response but the long and short of it all was my concerns were acknowledged and passed up to those that matter, then some advice as to how to manage the situation and the clear support to be calm, insistent and acquire whatever remediation I require even if it involves escalation to whoever has the ways and means to right the situation.

I am well advised and will take heed to that view.

Books, lights and global disconnect

The day started early as we were picked and drove straight to the training centre. I arrived before my trainer and saw that the systems had been changed to cater to the next course on my schedule.

Soon afterwards, the manuals for that course arrived, all probably weighing 5 kilogrammes and constituting a spot of bother as to how one will cart them home without ending up in the cargo bay.

Just after 11:00AM the lights went out, there was a power cut but the systems in central uninterrupted power supply kept running; within 5 minutes the lights were restored with generator power. I cannot remember when last I experienced a power cut like that but it was interesting.

However, with the power cut went our internet connection, we could connect to the access point but not beyond the router. I patiently waited for this to be resolved and it was two hours before I went to reception to ask about the issue.

If it’s free, I ain’t paying more

Meanwhile, I had considered getting a mobile data card but the costs of acquiring one compared to the locals was basically a rip-off apart from the fact that there was no reason for me to seek alternative internet access, you could not miss the fact that free wireless access was touted to distraction on every page that that concerned the training centres, it was a service to be expected, period.

The less complimentary side to this matter was once again, no one thought it proper to inform us of the problem and the estimated time to recovery of the service. Besides, this is an organisation that specialises in training that pertains to networks and connectivity, one’s confidence is not helped if an internet outrage suddenly extends beyond the competence of the personnel to fix within a reasonable time frame.

Respite yes, solution, not yet

Four hours and fifteen minutes after the internet outrage and long after mains power was restored we still had excuses with no resolution in sight. The receptionist then kindly offered me a mobile data dongle that I got to use for about 25 minutes before I had to give it back.

For the sake of all that is good and wholesome, it is expected that this essential service will have been restored when we return to the centre tomorrow morning – here is to wishing and hoping that tomorrow brings contentment, praise and worthy accolades, but honestly, I will not be holding my breath.

By the way, I really enjoyed training today, it seems to be the only mercy of comfort left to praise.