Basics of a Corporate Training Initiative

By on October 17, 2012

Human resources are indispensable to an organization’s success. In an era of globalization and increasing competition in the marketplace, the experts have proposed that human resources are the most important tool to attain sustainable competitive advantage. Human resources are the assets that make other assets of the company work towards accomplishing organizational objectives. It is therefore a must that the human resources are hired cautiously and trained well to serve the organization’s needs and objectives. Training is a vital management function that is increasingly gaining importance due to increasing dynamics of business environment. The market trends are changing frequently and in order to keep in pace with these changes, employee training is an essence. But training does involve heavy expenditure and thus only the training that proves effective is an investment; rest any kind of training is a wastage of resources. Can there be any basics of corporate training which ensure its effectiveness to some extent? Let’s find out.

  1. Alignment with Corporate Objectives: The alignment of the training initiative with the vision and mission of the corporate is must. The training initiative should be designed keeping in view the long-term objectives of the firm so as to direct the increased employee productivity to contribute to the organizational objectives.
  2. Assessing the Needs of both the Organization and Employees: A common mistake that leads to the failure of most training programs is negligence of the learners’ or the employees’ needs while designing such program. Many times only the organizational objectives and training needs are identified while designing the training initiative. But employees will not learn and training will not be effective unless employees’ needs for the training are also considered.
  3. Blend of Training Methods: Often the firms design a single corporate training initiative without considering the differences in learning abilities and objectives of employees working at different levels in different divisions of the firm. There is no single training method that can be termed as the ideal training method and that can serve the needs of all. So the training initiative should be based on multiple training methods rather than relying on any single method.
  4. Training Budget and Time: Before moving ahead with any training initiative, the training budget and schedule should be well decided. Training involves huge investment both in money and time. As such, there should be no loopholes in the training program which may result into adding the costs. Training budget guides the training methods, venues, kinds of trainers, number and blend of learners, training schedule and the technology usage.
  5. Employee Resistance: Employee resistance is yet another basic of training initiative that firms should take care of. No matter how well the training needs of the employees are assessed and how good the whole training program has been designed, there will always be some degree of employee resistance for training. This resistance can be expressed or implied but there will always be a few who believe training is a waste and they do not need to change and learn anything new. So, the tactics to deal with employee resistance should be well in mind before implementing the training initiative.
  6. Post-training Measurement: Training effectiveness cannot be determined unless there is post-training measurement. The effect of training initiative on employees can be measured both qualitatively as well as quantitatively. The measurement largely depends on the type of training. But unless there is a measurement of effectiveness, it cannot be assessed if the training was a success or a failure. Measurement tools should be decided beforehand and in case the training is found to be ineffective, corrective measures should be taken.

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