Why to invest in Training? Why training programs fail?

Why to invest in Training? Why training programs fail?

Training can be defined as a planned effort to facilitate the learning of job related knowledge, skills, and behavior by employees. Companies consider training as a practice which will improve the output of the employees which, in turn improves the company’s performance. Training can be of two types, in terms of skills – Hard skills training and Soft skills training. Hard skills training is meant for training the employees in job related technologies which ensure that employees have the basic skills to work with new technologies and mastering them according to business needs. Soft skills is meant for training the employees in terms of behavior and personality, which ensure that employees have the ability to work as an individual and how to work effectively in teams to contribute to the organization’s goals.

In present day scenario companies are supposed to invest more time and more money in training activities. Day to day updating technologies, new product markets, globalization, expanding diverse work force, and changing business trends make the organizations to demand more from the employees to stay in competition. If an organization fails to make changes according to the changes in the market, it can’t exist. That’s where training comes in and plays a vital role. Today, training is being evaluated not on the basis of the number of programs offered to the employees and training activity in the company, but on how training addresses business needs related to learning, behavior change, and performance improvement. In fact, training is becoming more performance based. That is, training is used to improve employee performance, which leads to improved business results. Training is seen as one of several possible solutions to improve performance. Other solutions can include such actions as changing the job or increasing employee motivation through pay and incentives. Today there is a greater emphasis on

• Providing training opportunities for all the employees
• Ongoing process of performance improvement that is directly measurable
• Need to demonstrate the benefits of training to the top management
• Training being used to help attain strategic business objectives, which help companies gain a competitive advantage over others

Almost all the companies have one or the other training programs for their employees. But only few companies’ training programs work properly and yield proper results. At that point itself the ultimate goal of a training program fails. Companies have been investing money into training simply because of beliefs that it is a good thing to do. Of course, it’s really a good thing to do, but if and only if it is properly designed. Companies have lost money on training because it is poorly designed, because it is not linked to a performance problem or business strategy, or because its outcomes are not properly evaluated. The perspective that the training function exists to deliver programs to employees without a compelling business reason for doing so is being abandoned. Companies are thinking that training is only for the employees at ground level. Most of the time mid level and top level people are just organizing the training programs with little participation. Most of the managers think that organizing and evaluating are their only assigned duties. As it goes on and on, training becomes a meaningless ritual instead of an organized practice. So in order to make training as a meaningful one, it should be aligned with the organizational goal. The planning part should come from the top. Each and every part of training should be aligned with organizational goal and the organizational goal should be linked with the training process and individual employee’s performance. It is termed as “High Leverage training” and defined as “a training practice that links training to strategic business goals, has top management support, relies on instructional design model, and is benchmarked to programs in other organizations”. The emphasis on high leverage training has been accompanied by a movement to link training to performance improvement or business strategy.

To conclude, instead of wasting time and money on ineffective, unorganized training programs, we have to concentrate more on the planning part before implementing it. Future training programs would be high leverage ones, so let’s start practicing it.