mainly medical writing
Tim Albert Training 1990-2007
.jpg)
A personal account
I set up Tim Albert Training in 1990 and closed it down in 2007. In the intervening years I personally ran about 1,000 courses (most of them teaching editing and writing skills to health professionals). I also learnt as much as I taught, causing me to develop quite considerably my views, and these courses.
The original idea for the business, inspired by my previous job as editor for the British Medical Association's membership magazine, had been to show doctors the delights – and advantages – of writing simply. This was not a success. I quickly realised that doctors hadn’t the slightest interest in learning this skill, usually because they worked in a culture that rated clear writing as childish.
So the courses developed to take a less head-on (remedial?) view, offering to teach writing skills to meet certain purposes – publish annual reports of public health, answer complaints letters, write press releases, edit newsletters and journals - and how to write and publish the journal articles on which career advances depended. The courses themselves developed, spending less time on looking at words and sentences, and more at the actual process of writing. In other words, the course evolved to being about writing, rather than how to improve something already written, which is not quite the same at all.
What else did I learn? That writing in the health professions is characterised by a peculiarly negative culture, in which junior members of a team are handed vague briefs, and then, once they have finally worked out what to do, find their writing set upon by the red pens of their colleagues.
I also found that writing is seen as an add-on, ...and that though doctors may need training for almost all of their medical tasks, the one thing not seen as necessary is any training to edit a medical journal.
I also found that writing is seen as an add-on, ...and that though doctors may need training for almost all of their medical tasks, the one thing not seen as necessary is any training to edit a medical journal.
But the rewards were great. I experienced the pleasure of helping someone over a case of writer’s block, of encouraging them to have a go and submit an article, or of seeing that they have thought through and published a document that has actually contributed, however slightly, to public health.
It ended because I reached the age of 60, and I kept to the promise I had made to go once I got there. Part of it was the feeling that there were other things to do (and there are). But another part was a fear of outliving my shelf life. Hence this part of the website, which gives details of the books I have written and the courses I have developed, some of which are now being run by accredited trainers. I have also included some advice on writing, much of which has come from the newsletter Short Words that for most of my training life I published twice a year.
Tim Albert CV:
After a degree in psychology and sociology from the University of Surrey he had formal training as a journalist on the IPC training scheme on local newspapers in Devon. He worked for national and medical newspapers and magazines, and was education correspondent of the New Statesman, assistant editor (training) of the Nassau Tribune, executive editor of World Medicine and editor of BMA News Review..In 1990 he set up Tim Albert & Associates which became Tim Albert Training. Posts included deputy chairman of the Medical Journalists Association,Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Training and Development, editorial training adviser for the BMJ, visiting fellow in medical writing at Southampton University and council member of the Committee on Publication Ethics. He has written four books on medical writing and many articles.
He closed down the training business in 2007. Currently he is a judge for the BUPA Foundation Communications Award, does some consultancy work, and is working on a writing project (not to do with medical writing). He also follows cricket, takes photos and cultivates his garden.
Range of clients:
British Medical Journal,
Battersea Research Group,
Fujisawa Scandinavia,
Health Protection Agency,
London Deanery,
Macmillan Cancer Relief,
National University Hospital Singapore,
NW Public Health Team,
Postgrade (Netherlands),
Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh,
ScHARR/ University of Sheffield
University of Greenwich,
University of Surrey
"I quickly realised that doctors hadn’t the slightest interest in learning the skill of simple writing, usually because they worked in a culture that rated it as childish.
"