Richard Collins – Getting to Know You

Richard is one of our team of trainers. When he’s not delivering courses at our classroom in Leeds, he’ll be found travelling far and wide to clients all over the UK and beyond, upskilling planners and schedulers in the art of Primavera P6. 

Tell us a bit about yourself

I was brought up in Dudley, in the West Midlands, where my parents had settled from Jamaica. When I was 10 my parents sent me to music school, where I learned to play the piano and study and enter at the Royal School of Music College. As I approached my teens, I began to discover chart music and when I was at college I formed a Rolling Stones tribute band. We did the rounds of clubs and pubs of an evening, then my auntie started getting us to play at the clubs she promoted in London. 

I played badminton, rugby and football growing up and was offered trials at Stoke Football Club – an offer I didn’t take up because of lack of encouragement from my parents.  

Where are you based now?

I’m based on the Wirrel where I live with my partner, although I also have a flat in Cricklewood, North London, and I’m away a lot travelling to clients all over the place, delivering training courses at their own offices. 

How has your career path brought you to RPC? 

I trained in Technical Drawing, but soon after I got my first job I broke my ankle and went down to London to stay with my auntie to recuperate. It was there I enrolled at Southgate College to learn about programming in Cobol. The tutor at college had a natural manner and demeanour and he inspired me to go into training. 

I was employed by a company to teach Computers and Administration to NVQ level 3 then moved to Network Rail in a project controls capacity, where I was introduced to Primavera P3 and started to work with other colleagues delivering classroom training to end users. 

What attracted you to RPC?

Peter Gable. I knew him at Network Rail, where I was already delivering P3 courses, and when he started at RPC and said he needed a trainer, I jumped at the chance. 

What are you working on right now? 

I am currently working with the defence industry delivering P6 Client and Web Training. The training is either covered over 3 or 2 days, depending on the content, and this is driven by the customer. With each training delivery I aim to ensure that I strike the right balance of instruction, exercises and conversation with the users, making sure that each delegate can ask questions confidently and understanding that each set of delegates comes with their own levels of differing expertise – and personalities.  

Preparation of each topic is important so the client can view the important topics and possibly reject ones their team isn’t concentrating on at this moment in time. Some courses follow a set curriculum, but if we’re working with a single client, we can tailor the content to meet their specific needs so that the course may well have bespoke elements to it.  

Feedback is really important here from a trainer’s perspective. The user is the person that drives the content, so we need to know what they need to know.  

What do you like best about your job? 

I love an audience and I really enjoy meeting people. I like passing on my knowledge of expertise on my favourite topics and talking about it. I’ve also loved travelling to places which I wouldn’t have thought of if it wasn’t for RPC scheduling me to deliver training there: Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Libya, Algeria, Italy, Berlin and India … 

What do you do in your spare time? 

I enjoy reading autobiographies and I still like to tinkle away at the piano. 

When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

As I child I wasn’t so sure. All I knew at the time was I wanted to learn as much as I could in anything I tried my hand at. 

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve been given? 

If you don’t enjoy what you’re doing. Try something else! 

What’s on your desk?

Just my laptop and a notepad. My desk can be somewhere different every few days, so I travel light … 

If your house was on fire, what 3 things would you save?

Myself, my partner and my smartphone – which has everything on it. 

What would your super power be? 

To predict what is going to happen. 

Last, but most important: How do you like your tea?

Earl Grey, please. No milk.