But to do this successfully, we needed a complete culture change - to move away from a mechanistic approach, in which students had to conform to a standard procedure, to a customer focused approach. Alongside that, we needed a new name, but one with close links to "our roots". The result was the launch of RRC Business Training, on 1 April 1996.

No change is easy, and ours was no exception. We had to overcome many hurdles; some foreseen, some not. Early on, we were faced with our biggest hurdle: a decision by the Chartered Institute of Bankers radically to change their qualifications structure. At a stroke, we lost access to our biggest market place, and faced an immediate drop in income. We had to change direction, and move more quickly and more radically than we had originally intended.

We responded by making a number of key changes:

• We needed to change the company culture, both internally and externally; to move away from the "college" image. The term "student" was replaced with "customer" for both internal and external use. A swift response to customer needs was stressed. Staff briefings and training sessions were introduced, held weekly to relay strategy and company performance promptly, and train staff in key product and servicing requirements as new products were developed.
• We developed and streamlined our administration and IT systems, to keep costs to a minimum and enable us to devote more resources to development of both existing and new products.