I repeatedly get to read that the organizations today are very keen on being tagged as a "learning organization" and that they are spending and still willing to spend exorbitant amounts on training and developing its' employees. But, is it so in reality?
This is what a friend told me about the state of so-called training and development section of the HR department in her company. I just couldn't believe when she told me that the training programs in her company are conducted only for the sake of filling the mandatory man-hours and when I asked her as to what purpose do these "mandatory man-hours" serve. She was prompt in saying that they need those hours to clear the audit. Isn't this just appalling? She went on to say that neither the employees nor the management sound enthusiastic about the training activities in the organization. In fact the managers have to be coerced to nominate the employees for a particular training program and the employees too need to be coerced to participate in it.
If you think the scenario I just related is restricted to that organization alone, then you are mistaken. This is not the question of the practice in that organization alone, in fact this is what we get to see in most of the organizations, especially in the small and mid-sized companies.
What do you think should be the intent behind exposing employees to training and development activities in the organization? Is it not to improve the employability of the employees in terms of enhanced knowledge and skills? Is it not so that the employees can put to use the newly acquired knowledge and skills to enhance their contributions to the tasks at hand? Is it not to see to it that the organization benefits in terms of increased productivity and profits? Is it ultimately not for the benefit of the individuals and the organizations? There is no doubt in the fact that both employees and the management (organization) look forward to welcoming the benefits associated with training, with open arms, but usually ignore the efforts needed to aspire the benefits.
See if you can relate to any of the below statements
The same kind of training is provided to all the employees. They view their training programs as 'should be applicable to all the employees in the organization'. Training is simply thrust about the individuals without proper needs analysis being carried out. Without this, how will the managers and the HR of the organization be able to recognize tha gap which exists between what is being provided and what is being expected? When you fail to acknowledge the initial narrow gap, it just widens and continues to widen.Most of the organizations expect the ROI (return on investment) to be quick and high. They just do not have the patience and perseverance to give it the time it takes to bear fruit. When the results are not quick and magical as expected, the training programs are seen as wasteful extravaganza.
Also, it is of utmost importance to evaluate the effectiveness of a training program. It is not even evaluated as to whether the employees have been putting the knowledge and skills acquired in their training to make their work more effective and productive. For them imparting training ends with collecting the feedback forms from the participants and it is not exaggeration to say that the feedback forms in most of the cases are not appropriately designed to capture the true and required information.
Ideas for effective training programs should stem from performance appraisal. Forget about relating performance appraisal with training programs, we do not even assign significant importance to performance appraisal either.
Attitude change should be brought in the employees too. Its' perhaps the culture of the organization which creeps into the employees' attitude too. They do not take the training and development sessions seriously and instead view them as an opportunity to take a break from their work. In my opinion with such a culture and attitude towards training persisting in the organization, the real motive of training and development gets killed even before the movie starts. Of what use are such sessions which do not add value neither to the employees' skills nor to the organization?
With organizations becoming more cost cutting oriented training and development section is the one which faces the maximum brunt in the form of reduced budgets towards delivering training programs.
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