A person is consistently undergoing training, whether in terms of gaining new skills in a corporate setting or acquiring a professional qualification. Usually, a good company will offer career development opportunities through training sessions. They help employees to stay up-to-date on corporate trends and set a consistent standard in doing things in the workplace. This article will elaborate on the importance of training and development for employees.
What Exactly Amounts To Training and Development?
Training and development can amount to so many different things. For example, with how competitive the world is right now, companies can only stand out by demonstrating that they have been endorsed or accredited as a standardised corporation that offers recognised services. Hence, companies often send their employees to training centres to learn and acquire those certifications or licenses. Since such training is generally carried out in addition to their day-to-day responsibilities, employees can learn and do the required assessments where needed. Other times, training and development could mean engaging in a training course on how to use specific software, for instance. As a company may depend on their employees to be familiar with such platforms, training and development sessions are conducted to help them with gaining certain skills.
Five Reasons Why Your Company Should Focus On Providing Training and Development Opportunities for Your Employees
Multiple studies have published research articles on the benefits of offering training and development opportunities in corporates. Here are five of the most important reasons that have proven to be effective:
Develop Employee Loyalty
You know you are doing something right when employees choose to stay in the company for longer. Most of the time, one of the key things an employee looks at in a corporate workplace is whether they are learning new things. As a company invests an enormous amount of time and finances in training and improving an employee, it is natural for the employee to gain a sense of appreciation and respect towards the workplace. As a result, the organisation can increase loyalty within the corporation. In the event the employee does leave, the employee would carry a sense of responsibility to ensure that someone similar to them will fill in their shoes. Hence, whether they stay or not, the loyalty one has towards the company will influence them to take action that helps the organisation.
Find the Right People to Fill in Future Managerial Positions
Providing training and development sessions is one thing, and ensuring the individual uses them in practice is another. While the company can do everything in its power to provide standardised training for its employees, if the employee does not use it for the company’s benefit, all the hours and work put into those sessions would be a waste. Hence, considering how fast a person can catch up with the training and improve their skills is a great way to spot future leaders of the corporation. In addition to their quality of work, their ability to help out their team by teaching those who are finding it difficult are other great qualities which will help them to stand out from the crowd. The effort an employee takes during the sessions is also other ways they can be judged for their leadership potential.
Empower Your Employees
It is well known that accumulating more knowledge is equivalent to gaining more power. As the popular saying goes, no one can take your knowledge away. Hence, in the long term, training and development sessions widely help employees to empower themself. This is especially important for trainees or interns. Many entry-level jobs attract individuals who do not have any prior experience. At times, they would not even have the requisite educational background in the field. The latter generally depend on their soft skills and character to enter and strive up the business ladder. Hence, when training and development opportunities are provided, such individuals gain knowledge most relevant to the field, which may not at times even be covered in a bachelor’s programme. This will subsequently reflect well on the company, as many fresh graduates consider it to be the ideal company to work in.
Build a Spirit of Engagement and Team Spirit
It is very rare for all departments in a company to engage with one another more actively. However, where training and development sessions are provided, all departments can intersect and get to know each other. Hence, from interns and trainees to executives and managers, training provides your employees with the opportunity to know who else works outside their department. Providing training also helps the new employer to mingle with co-workers. This is because training welcomes employees to ask questions where anything is unclear and forces them to communicate to avoid confusion. Hence, training encourages engagement and influences one to speak up. Ultimately, the team spirit within the company strengthens. Some company conduct sessions in a fun manner, thereby making it a positive experience for employees to bond with each other. A company that has a close-knit team is bound to make strides and become a powerful organisation in the sector.
Improves Overall Company Performance
Companies sometimes use training and development as a hiring tactic and to establish their reputation as a great workplace. Hence, while some people will be attracted to your company to work at a place that offers opportunities to grow and learn, others may consider a past employee to be a valuable candidate simply because they worked in your organisation. The latter speaks to the amount of demand your employees have gained due to the high performance and return the company has experienced. The more training you provide, the more you value your employee’s growth. This subsequently leads to everyone doing their work in the best manner. The great thing about offering training to everyone is that it establishes a certain standard expected of employees. Hence, there would be more consistency in terms of the quality of work of all employees.
Three Things to Keep in Mind When Offering Training Services
When discussing training and development in a professional context, companies must take time to curate sessions that would maximise the employee’s potential. Here are three points in this respect:
Conduct Evaluations After the Training Period
It is not enough for a company to simply pack employees off to a training session and expect them to improve overnight. What if the training instructor was not the best, or the course content was too advanced? In other words, did the training sessions really help the employee is an important aspect of training. Instead of expecting them to understand, ask them directly did it help. Whether that is through surveys that allow one to answer anonymously or asking it directly from each person privately would be beneficial. It also encourages employees to reflect and consider whether they have, in fact, improved.
Focus on Developing Their Soft Skills
More than teaching employees heavy content, the emphasis should be on developing their skills, especially those known as ‘soft skills’. Soft skills refer to a set of skills that remain relevant regardless of the company or industry you work for. Hence, while technical skills are needed to execute industry or company-specific tasks, soft skills are essential when working in a company. Taken in another way, soft skills particularly look at building an employee’s character. Hence, helping employees to develop traits such as teamwork, time management, problem-solving, and organisation is widely beneficial. Here the focus is not on doing the job but on doing it well.
Communicate What is Expected
You must inform your employees at the outset what is expected of them at the end of the training session. Some companies often send their staff for sessions with the vague belief that it would help them improve. However, specifying what exactly is expected of them once they are done with the session has proven employees to take the training more seriously. Since the expectations are clearly set, ambitious and interested employees would strive to meet them. It also helps employees pay more attention to how what is being taught can be used to fulfil their day-to-day much better.
The Company Reaps the Rewards at the End
Offering training at a workplace is not very cheap from the point of view of the company. Many standardised training sessions are conducted by training professionals, who can be quite expensive. Add to this the extra fees that will be paid for the course content, the salary that is paid to the employee and other benefits they receive from working at your company. The culmination of all this leads to a company investing a large sum of money in an individual. Due to these reasons, some companies do not see the value of offering training and development. However, if a company looks at the complete picture, ultimately, it is the company that does reap the reward. It moulds its team to be better in their performance when at work, and their reputation soars higher, thereby establishing the company name as a leading business leader.
