At iCONECT we have had very little turn over. I know it is amazing to hear in the eDiscovery software industry but it is true; most of our Support and Training staff have been with iCONECT Development for 8 or more years. We have been told a time or two that iCONECT provides “the best vendor support I have ever received.” So, this puts some added pressure on hiring new team members.
We recently hired a Technical Trainer, and it wasn’t an easy task. We wanted someone who was a ‘go getter,’ liked a challenge and understood our training and support commitments to both our hosting partners and law firm clients. The candidate needed enough training skills and technical knowledge to learn our industry, our language and our iCONECT-XERA product.
Once we found the right person, we had to work on a plan to get her trained, and it had been a while since we had done that… So, we started with the basics, developing material about the litigation document review industry, its history and its purpose. We used our current training classes and our previous support onboarding materials, which of course had to be updated.
The challenge for me was to be sure I was challenging our new person without making her feel overwhelmed or behind. It is a balancing act, I wanted the trainee to stay excited and eager but I also didn’t want to set her up to feel like she is not ‘learning’ fast enough. Plus I wasn’t sure how she learns, so I needed to have things in place to check her progress.
Once the new person is up to speed, that is when the expanding moves on to the rest of the team. Everyone has to be open to learning from the new person and looking at what we currently do objectively, so new ideas are fully considered. This is where the stretch marks come into play: nobody is in pain from trying new ways of doing things, but it isn’t always comfortable right away and the changes can take several iterations to get right.
It is hard to start a new job, it is even harder to start a new job at a new industry. But I think we have the right mix of people with the right attitudes and commitment to expand our comfort zone, to not only include new team members but embrace and encourage them - and that is rare.
Meet our new Technical Trainer, Briana Morris.
After graduating from Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario, CA, Briana joined Bell Canada, a telecommunications company, where she found her niche for communications and documentation.
In 2013, she was promoted to Coach Trainer; in this role she had several responsibilities. Along with scheduling, rolling out, training and supporting thousands of end users, Briana trained all new members to the process team, and created and maintained all documentation and e-learnings for the project. Briana also managed upper level and end user feedback to make optimizations to the tool, and was the main point of contact for any programming changes and UAT testing.
In June of 2017 she joined iCONECT. This position allows Briana to do everything that she loves - teach, develop documentation/e-learning, influence change and immerse herself in a growing technological industry.
Briana is excited about her new position, “I was ecstatic when presented with this opportunity to be the new technical trainer. The iCONECT-XERA eDiscovery software is innovative. It empowered users and it is something I want to be a part of.” She weighed in about her training, “I have very high expectations of myself and the biggest challenge I have faced on being a new hire has been feeling “valuable”. However, Olivia’s training plan has eased all of my fears, reinforced my decision to jump at this opportunity and helped me to realize that being new can add value. Everyone has been super supportive in my training process and my millions of questions. I am so happy to be with iCONECT and can’t wait to meet our partners and clients when I start training!”
Join us in welcoming Briana to the iCONECT team. She is a great addition!
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