New Horizons Hamburg, Germany

Всяка година над 300-те учебни центъра на New Horizons по света се оценяват по редица критерии и показалите най-високи резултати се отличават с награда за 5-звезден център (Five Star Center of Excellence Award) за представяне в следните области: Удовлетвореност на клиентите, Представяне на инструкторите, Статус на оторизиран вендор партньор, Учебни материали, Техническа база и учебна среда.

Учебният център на New Horizons в Хамбург, Германия, е носител на наградата Five Star Center of Excellence в две последователни години. Той е един от 17-те центъра на New Horizons, разположени на територията на по-големите германски градове, сред които Берлин, Бремен, Дюселдорф, Дортмунд, Франкфурт, Хамбург, Хановер, Кьолн, Лайпциг, Мюнхен, Щутгарт.

Центърът е създаден през 1989 г. и в момента има 18 учебни зали, в които предоставя богата гама от дневни, вечерни и съботно-неделни обучения от водещи доставчици в ИТ индустрията. По-долу ви представяме интервю с Jörn Oelze, собственик и генерален мениджър на един от най-успешните центрове на New Horizоns Computer Learning Centers.

New Horizons Hamburg, Germany
Web: http://www.newhorizons.de

Awards:
2010-2011 Five Star Center of Excellence Award winner
2009-2010 Five Star Center of Excellence Award winner

Authorized Training: Adobe, AutoCAD, Business English, Business Skills, Check Point, Cisco, Citrix, CompTIA, Corel Draw, Security, GIMP, HTML, PHP, SQL & Java, IBM, ITIL®, PRINCE2®, Linux (LPI), Linux (SUSE), Microsoft, Novell, Oracle, SUN, VMware

General Manager: Jörn Oelze

Mr. Oelze, what were the most popular courses in your center in 2010?
There is still a high demand for Microsoft Office training to increase workforce productivity, but also Microsoft technical courses are of high demand.

Was there a demand for courses on new technologies?
We are currently expanding our Mentored Learning offering by producing VMWare and Cisco in German language.

What were the most popular learning methods in 2010?
Our Mentored Learning delivery method is still the delivery method of choice, because it allows students to only learn what they don´t know at a schedule that fits their demands.

Which of your customers prefer Online Live and why?
Online Live is currently in the very early stages as a delivery method but is a crucial part of many projects upgrading employees in companies to new Microsoft Office versions.

What were your most successful activities in 2010?
We are market leader in a lot of cities for IT training. To continue to grow we decided to go into a different market: Business English Training. There is a growing need for English in a global economy and we decided to offer a blended learning solution (live trainer + video training + e-learning) for language training as well.

What is the key to top performance and utmost customer satisfaction?
There are two components:
1) A good team. It is normal that key employees have worked already 8 or more years with us.
2) Listening to clients. Deliver what they need, when they need it.  

Companies vs. individuals. Was there a change in the percentage rates in 2010?
The biggest change we had was the fast growing demand for government sponsored training for unemployed people to get a job in IT training. Investing in a better educated workforce seems to help Germany to get out of the economical crisis.

Do you communicate with your customers through social media, blogs, etc.?
Yes, we have a regional Facebook page and some Twitter accounts. But we are still learning every day trying to identify what information social media users are looking for.

Is your center involved in any Green activities? Or do you give back to the community in another way?

We are very proud to help a school in Nepal to build a computer room in a small town.  We also gave cameras to the pupils to take shots from their daily lives. Very amazing pictures where taken and we produced a calendar for our clients with the best 12 of them. See New Horizons Kalender 2011 for more details.

In what aspects do you expect 2011 to be different from 2010 for your center?
In the last 7 years we opened 16 new locations in our region – Germany, Austria and Switzerland,  and we will continue to grow in 2011.
We’ve recently added Business English to our range of topics, with already a good start of this program we expect a real break-trough in 2011.

According to you, what IT skills will be in high demand in your region within the next 3-5 years?
I strongly believe that technology changes so fast that it´s hard to predict. For me it´s important to have built a team in our organization that will adopt new technologies very fast.
Besides technical IT skills we see ITIL as a good example of adding behavior skill set to the IT workforce that will continue to grow.

In what ways will IT training change within the next 3-5 years?
In the next years we will see a growing demand of technology based training methods like virtual classrooms and e-learning.

What would you like to say to New Horizons students in Bulgaria?
Invest in something you can trust: yourself!