Why do you need a training and development programme? They can be time consuming to develop, expensive to implement and involve a huge amount of commitment from you and your people. Everyone wants to retain good staff, and one of the best ways to do this is by giving them a clear career path and in order to do this, you will need to implement a training and development plan that will enable your employees to build and grow their business and personal skills.
The right skills
Ensuring your employees have the right skills is crucial to the growth and success of your business. The business case for developing your staff is compelling – research shows that training can:
– increase productivity and quality of work
– increase profits
– reduce staff turnover and absenteeism
– improve customer satisfaction
– improve motivation
– improve staff morale
If you consider the attributes of really effective people, be they leaders, managers, operators, technicians or any role at all, the important qualities, which make good performers special, are likely to be attitudinal. Skills and knowledge, and the processes available to people, are no great advantage. What makes people effective and valuable to any organisation is their attitude.
It is clear that training and development is important, and any business, no matter how big or small can benefit from a training programme. So how do you identify employees training needs and develop an effective programme?
Separate disciplines
Training and development are referred to as two separate disciplines, but what is the difference? Training is any activity that is required to improve the technical competence of your employees right now. For example, if individuals have to work on projects, they may require skills in project management to equip them to be more effective in their role. Or if you are launching a new product, they may need training in some of its uses and benefits. The general rule to apply is to consider training needs as immediate and that any solutions will make an immediate impact on the effectiveness of an individual’s role in the business.
Development differs from training in as much as this is really for those employees who have the long-term potential to take on extra responsibilities and enjoy ongoing career progression. Development can also refer to ‘soft’ and ‘attitudinal’ skills. When considering development opportunities, don’t just think about courses but consider activities such as job shadowing, informal mentoring and working on projects etc, which are all powerful methods of building key skills and personal development.
Identifying needs
In order for a training programme to be successful, it has to match the needs of your team. To make sure that this is the case, you need a process to identify training and development needs. A good place to start is to run a ‘training needs analysis’ (TNA). This is a fairly standard but effective way of identifying any gap between the skills your business needs and those your employees have. It involves gathering information to identify areas where your employees could improve their performance. You can use employee appraisals, general management observations, customer comments, and company meetings to collect this information. A TNA can help you clarify your staff training objectives. This is invaluable for ensuring that money and time is spent on training that will help your business to achieve its overall goals and objectives.
To carry out a TNA, you need to:
– Analyse your business goals and the skills required to meet these
– Determine whether you are changing your products or business processes and what information or training employees will need to be effective in their job
– Evaluate who you want to train and how best to reach them
– Establish how employees will best accept and integrate training and their preferred learning method
– Evaluate the training in-place and decide what your company can and can’t provide in the way of in-house training, funding and time
– Assess which consultants or training providers can fill in these gaps
– Take a decision on which type of training fits your needs best
It is crucial to assess skills gaps at all levels of the business, including senior management. Don’t forget to include yourself in any assessment. For example, if you have a very small business you may need to develop your entrepreneurial and technical skills as the business begins to grow.
Personal development plans
A personal development plan is a tool employees can use to define their career goals and identify steps to achieve these. It can be based around mid-year and annual reviews.
GE Money has an established training academy. The academy is effectively a ‘one-stop-shop’ for all our employees professional development needs. Through the training academy we have been able to create tailored development programmes based on an employees role, experience and potential. These plans comprise a combination of e-learning, on the job training and more traditional classroom based learning.
Employees are encouraged to very much take ownership of their own development plan with the support of their manager. A development plan can include goals, actions, deliverables and timescales to make is measurable and manageable.
A training programme doesn’t have to be this diverse, the important points are to encourage employees to take responsibility for their own development, provide managerial support and access to the most suitable training courses for their needs.
