to have walked out?

[infamousfive]

Started work at 8am this morning. Line manager announced she had booked me onto a complusory training course starting at 1pm. I have to leave work at 5 to get home in time to pick up the dc from nursery and after school club. I asked manager what time course meant to finish she said 5. I said OK but will have to leave at 5 even if course overruns.

At around 4pm it was obvious we were nowhere near finishing. It didn't help that the trainer didn't start the course til 1.15 as he was waiting for 2 people to turn up. We stopped for a coffee break just after 4 and I approached the trainer and told him I would have to leave at 5. He looked at me open mouthed in shock and said 'I will try and finish up by 5.15'. I felt like saying well that's no good to me I just said I need to leave at 5 but didn't.

Anway 5 comes and goes and I get up and say 'I'm really sorry but I'm going to have to leave now'. Cue lots of shocked looks from the other 20 odd people on the course. The trainer throws me a dirty look and thrusts an evaluation form at me on my way out telling me I have to fill it out and return it to him. As I left trainer said 'thank you everyone else for staying when some people have decided to leave early'. .

The thing is that I was in a room with 20 or so people who finish work at 7pm, so for them there's no issue with them about this course overrunning whereas for me it means I would have left two small children stranded at school and nursery. There is literally no-one else who can pick them up.

I just know trainer is going to tell my line manager that I left early. But I don't think IABU as I am paid to work til 5 which is what I did...

YANBU, I would have done the same. You had no advance notice of the training, you notified your line manager and the trainer that you would have to leave exactly on time, you then did as you said you would. What else could you have reasonably done?

The feedback form would have some very pithy remarks on it if it were mine. What Meryl wrote is exactly right.

It was the utter shock and disbelief on everyone's faces I couldn't get over. I mean we'd all been sat in the room for over 4 hours and I had started work at 8am, I hadn't just rocked up at 1pm for the course. The trainer did start by saying the session was a shortened down version of a 6 hour course. I did think possibly they shouldn't be trying to cram it all into one afternoon...

My line manager isn't at all sympathetic, she doesn't have children. Although she does compare her horse to a child. Once when I explained to her that no I couldn't stay for an extra couple of hours that evening she likened it to her having to get home to feed her horse which is fair enough I guess!

YANBU so fucking rude! Complain about his attitude! You really do not need this shit, you have done everythiung you could, what more do they want? Hold your head up high. Bastards Do not worry OK? x

You are not being unreasonable. I work until 3 and only 3 days a week. I get many sarcastic comments about leaving early and 'alright for some' comments. I just smile and remind them I get half the money.

I have been in the same boat before now when I too had to dash for childcare reasons and had to make my exit in front of a roomfull of people to a stony glare. It's embarrassing, and infuriating, particularly when we kept stopping for coffee, and it was apparent we were never going to finish on time when the tutor didn't know how to work the DVD properly. Poorly prepared and unprofessional in my opinion.

I made my feelings clear on the evaluation form...do the same.

YANBU - Give him a crap evaluation and feedback

The 'trainer' is actually a very senior member of staff in the organisation, probably not used to people walking out on him!

YANBU if it was landed on you without any prior warning. I would (and have) done the same thing and left when I needed to go.

Comnment on his poor timekeeping, the fact he over-ran and general unprofessionalism.

Tell them that yoi have to pay extortionate late fees if you get there late. If they're this insensitive I wouldn't bother to explain the obvious I.e. that your children would be upset or that they deserve time with you. Talk money with them.

YANBU. Tell them to cock off. I've never had training yet that wasn't 95% pointless. If she'd been more organised she could have told you the day before and you could have sorted something out. She screwed up. And the colleagues that looked aghast at you - jobsworths!

Make sure the evaluation form slates his (leaders) time keeping, major fault.

Depends on the childcare/school setting. I work in a school (with a nursery) that has catering for busy working parents as part of its aims. So, in the 2-7 year olds section we have children leaving anywhere between 1pm and 6pm and in the 7-13 year olds anywhere between 4.45pm and boarding.

If the school had the capacty to keep your children then I think YWBU, your job should have been the priority. If your children would have been left alone then YWNBU.

Yes, I would definitely raise the late start, and also the coffee-break at 4 - if it could wait until 3 hours through a four-hour course, couldn't it have been shortened/dropped to allow him to get back on schedule?

YANBU. Put it on the evaluation sheet that he started late, overran (both unforgivable on a professional training course) and seemed ill prepared for the fact that you HAD to leave on time - not early, on time -
despite being informed earlier. I've just written a stinker of an evaluation for a course where half the content was left out because of the trainer's poor time management.

I'm a CEO. Yanbu! I would never expect someone to attend a course at such short notice and never - even pre DD - expect someone to stay late at short notice! Your manager sound like an arse!