We follow up on last month’s Q&A with the DPF Doctor Darren Darling to find out a little more about his DPF training programme.
As lockdown loomed large, Darren Darling made the decision to move his DPF training programme online, which has proved to be one of the best business decisions he has ever made. Today, technicians in every corner of the globe can benefit from his DPF expertise and knowhow without leaving the country, or even their workshop. The reaction to his live and interactive online training has been incredible with technicians in Australia queuing up to be DPF Doctors and workshops in many countries benefiting from his knowhow and the incredible resources on the Training Portal. Here’s a snapshot on how it works.
The Training Portal
There are three sections to the portal. Every workshop signing up for Darren’s training has unrestricted access to this for 12 months.
‘Live Training’ broadcast in full HD from Darren’s HQ in Ashington. Delegates can ask questions and Darren will answer them live.
‘Training Reruns’ section where every training session is uploaded so it can be viewed 24/7. Members can catch up on training and keep up to date at their own convenience. There are over 90 two-hour training sessions.
‘Video Guides’ section – a searchable series with 100+ short training videos offering ‘just in time’ training. This is useful when a technician has a job in their workshop and they need guidance.
Members can access the portal 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. They can also attend as many live training sessions as often as they like, with no pressure to learn everything to perfection first time around.
Darren’s training is based on real-world experience: real faults, real fixes in his workshop. New faults create new training content. So, if a fix is covered in training it has been proven in the workshop beforehand.
How the training is structured
The initial live and interactive training is presented as a 12-part course delivered over three weeks at the rate of four two-hour sessions per week. For the time-pressed technician this bite-sized learning can be integrated with ease into the working day. The live sessions start at 9 am UK time. Workshops are encouraged to attend refresher training sessions at least once every six months so they can remain up-to-date with everything DPF-related and stay at the top of their game. The Video Guides section helps in this regard. It all adds up to workshops working in an efficient, lean and customer focused way with their first-time fix rate a testament to this.
“Fantastic” feedback
Darren himself is delighted with the progress the training network has made since going digital: “The feedback from our UK and international members has been fantastic with the first annual subscribers signing up for an additional 12 months. They tell us regularly how their business has benefitted from the training. It delivers a genuine ROI in a short space of time, and it keeps on delivering. World class training, available anytime, anywhere. And it puts technicians in the top 5% so they attract even more DPF business.”
