Where is the best location for media training to take place?

Once you have decided your organisation needs media training, choosing a suitable location can be a bit of a dilemma.

There are ultimately four main options; courses can be held at your offices, at a hired office space, at TV studios around the country, or at our own television and radio studios in Reading.

Deciding which one is best for you will depend on your requirements.

Sometimes organisations prefer to hold training in their own offices or at a hired office nearby. There are clear logistical benefits to this as the participants don't have to travel and are familiar with their surroundings.

However, before opting for this you should consider whether there is sufficient space. Media training courses are highly practical and quite often we will need two rooms to be able to run the training successfully.

Additionally, will those taking part in the training be able to give the course their full attention? We sometimes find that when training is held in offices, participants, particularly the more senior ones, feel they are 'on call' because they are in the work place.

Holding training in offices will also mean that the television or radio studio interviews often do not feel as realistic as if it were in a dedicated studio.

This is fine if the course involves outside broadcasts, print interviews, message development and presentations. However, TV and radio studio interviews can add an element of pressure to the day which can really add to the realism of the training.  

That said, on a crisis communications training course we often encourage our clients to hold the course at their offices. This enables us to make the training as realistic as possible by factoring in doorstep interviews as people come and go from the office.

If we do work off-site we take all the camera equipment with us and provide a camera technician so that that our current working journalist tutor can focus solely on delivering first class media training.

We can run our training courses from studios at locations near you, including London, Manchester and Edinburgh, and because we use these venues regularly the prices are very competitive, which means the costs of the courses are kept down.

These studios are locations you could expect to go to when you are being interviewed for real – in fact our studios at Millbank are in the same building as the BBC Westminster, Sky News and ITV teams. This means it can be a great opportunity for you and your spokesperson to become familiar with the surroundings and start to feel comfortable.

Of course we are also in the very fortunate position of having broadcast quality television and radio studios at our offices in Reading - just a 23 minute train journey from Paddington.

And we don't charge any more to use them, which means the costs are the same as if we came to your offices.

In our experience getting the venue right comes down to understanding your needs. Our account managers will work with you to identify you training requirements and will design a course which will meet your needs, delivered at the most appropriate venue.

So take the first step today and get in touch with one of our account managers on 0118 918 0530 or hello@mediafirst.co.uk.