- Hampton, NJ--Kramer USA began licensing InfoComm classes in October 2006, when the company’s VP of marketing became authorized to teach the Essentials of AV course, which at the time was the class used to prepare for the CTS examination. Subsequently, Kramer hired Max Kopsho as a full-time trainer and expanded its offering of licensed material to include Essentials of AV, CTS Exam Prep and AV/IT Integration for Technical Professionals.
- Kramer has trained more than 1,000 AV professionals using InfoComm-licensed curricula. “We started out training our own people and new hires,” said Dave Bright, Kramer. “Then, when Max Kopsho joined us, we expanded our reach and currently we reach about 30 people a month for licensed training, with the new CTS Exam Prep class being the material most often taught.” Kopsho has trained so many AV professionals that he was named InfoComm International’s 2010 Educator of the Year.
- The biggest benefits to licensing InfoComm curricula from Kramer’s perspective are that the material is excellent, there is tremendous demand for it, and it strengthens the AV industry to develop so many well-educated, trained professionals. Bright noted, “As a company, Kramer feels general industry knowledge should be shared as often as possible. The more educated our customers are, the easier our job is. Plus, it makes everyone better in the eyes of the end users. At Kramer, we are committed deeply to offering education opportunities as often as we can and in as many locations as we can.”
- Offering InfoComm training has helped Kramer build stronger relationships in the industry. “It is a fact that when you teach someone something, they look to you as an expert. And if they look to you as an expert, they form a natural bond with you and sense of loyalty toward you,” added Bright. “They think about you and your products when they are designing a system and putting the things you taught them into practice. Education, and in particular InfoComm’s licensed material, provides the foundation people need to themselves be experts.”
- Of late, Kramer has focused on providing CTS Prep due to the huge demand for the credential in the marketplace. “That has its own unique benefits because you are not only teaching foundational material to help people become better at what they do, you are also helping them toward a tangible goal—a clear mark that tells the world that they are experts in their field,” explains Bright. “This has cascading benefits. Our company benefits from the relationship-building that happens naturally during the education process and everyone benefits from having the people who take our training become the best AV professionals he or she can be. Everyone from the end user, to the dealership that person works at, to the manufacturers, benefits by having people become as learned in their craft as possible.”
- Kramer is strongly committed to the CTS program, and the ability to provide renewal units to staff at a low cost is an important benefit of licensing curricula. “We are a Diamond-level AVSP company, and we plan to keep that designation,” said Bright. “We are firm believers in the CTS program and we practice what we preach with our own people every day.”
- “It is our strong belief that InfoComm’s training provides unparalleled value to our company,” said Bright. “Anyone involved in the industry should expose themselves to as much of the InfoComm training as they can as often as they can. As we say at Kramer you should ‘Learn to Earn’ and ‘AV Knowledge = Success.’”
- Companies interested in licensing InfoComm curricula should contact InfoComm’s Patrick Giambalvo at 800.659.7469. Please visit infocomm.org for information on classes, certification, and more.
