In today’s workforce, training and development systems or programs have become critical features. These systems often have diverse goals. Perhaps, the primary objective is to provide a new employee with the skills necessary to adequately perform his or her job. Even college graduates must generally be taught the specific tasks that will be required in the individual organization. Development issues are also prominent during the course of an employee’s tenure with a company. When new technologies become available the employees must receive training in order to learn additional skills. Given the numerous legal rules by which employees must conduct themselves, training and development in such issues as discrimination and appropriate conduct between the two sexes may prevent expensive lawsuits. Additionally, by training workers to be culturally sensitive, they become better suited to global commerce (Stumpf, Watson, & Rustogi, 1994). Appropriate methods of maintaining safety also becomes vital material in training and development systems in occupational workstations that are potentially hazard. Thus, whether training and development consist of a department or an individual, most organizations will determine such a need existing in their company. Unfortunately, some companies often feel the need to cut back on training programs even though the long-term impact may be disastrous (“Feeling Frugal,?2002). The purpose of this paper is to examine selected training and development programs in various companies, noting positive and negative features. Training and development systems do not always involve the employees of an organization. It may also include the training of vendors or customers. Nowhere is this more clearly necessary then in organizations that sell complicated or technical products. While many items may be purchased with instructional manuals or instructional sheets, other products require more assistance. This is particularly true when it comes to software products for the computer. Lotus Development offers a two-prong approach in their training and development: they train solution providers who will install their software and then provide additional training to the consumer (Carbone, 2001). The solution providers participate in technical training, while also having a web site available that provides solutions to additional problems. Corel simply encourages its customers to utilize their product daily in order to become more familiar with it, while providing limited support in the form of a web site where customers. In comparing these two training programs, there are some difficulties. Of course, for the consumers with regard to training, the Lotus system has more positive features in that they are able to ask questions that the solution providers have ample resources from which to seek answers. Corel’s web site may be very informative. However, if the solution that the customer seeks is not there, he or she will become frustrated. Microsoft provides seminars to its customers to assist in the training of small and medium enterprises. This most likely facilitates the interactive process (“Smart Worker,?2002). However, computer organizations do not simply limit their training to customers. Given that “the average life cycle of a computer product has dropped from the two years in the late 1980s to six or nine months in the 1990s,?many companies must hold regularly scheduled training programs for their employees in order to stay competitive (Keegan & Jacobson, 1995, p. 38). Apple Computer, Inc., is one such organization. In order to facilitate training, they constantly review their process in terms of evaluating the needs of their “internal customers.?They have made the following changes to their system of training in order to facilitate this process: ?Trainers shift from behavioral to experiential training. ?Trainers shortened training sessions from three to three hours. ?Trainers train intact work groups rather than groups of people who don’t work together. ?Trainers moved from generic training to customized training. ?Trainers decreased the training-development cycle from six months to two months. ?Trainers reduced class sizes at Apple from 24 to 12 trainees. ?Trainers moved training from a remote location to the customer’s location. ?Trainers shifted from providing training as a program to providing training as an intervention. (p. 39). Consequently, there are many positive aspects to this training method including specificity, efficiency, and purpose. Perhaps, the only negative aspect of such a program may be that participants see it as too frequent of an endeavor, thinking that having to participate in training every two months might interfere with their work schedule. However, it is likely that Apple requests feedback after each training session to determine the success of each module.
While many organizations provide training for both their internal and external customer, there are some organizations that request local trainings services to do their training for them. For example, the Honda plant in Alabama has contracted with the Alabama Industrial Development Training and the Department of Industrial Relations to perform the training of new employees (Grossman, 2002). The positive feature of this is that it reduces costs for Honda, but at the same time, Honda has no control over the quality of the training, which could be an important negative consideration in the competitive car market.
Other organizations participate in training and development that is external to the company. This example involves professions that must stay current with the industry’s practices and legal issues. Many doctors and other health care professions must participate in continuing education programs to retain their licenses. Insurance agents also must participate in training programs to maintain certain licensures whether they represent a one-person office or a corporation (Koco, 2002). The licensing organization, such as Health Insurance Association of America, holds seminars and examinations before allocating licenses. Students must travel to these seminar locations. The positive aspect of this type of program is that it facilitates standards of quality for an entire industry. The negative aspect is that it may be expensive and difficult to rehabilitate an employee who cannot pass the examinations. Another negative drawback is that just because an organization creates a particular license does not mean that it is a valuable one.
Thus, in comparing four types of training organizations, customer training of Lotus, Corel, and Microsoft, internal customer training of Apple, the external training program of Honda, and the training and licensing programs of the Health Insurance Association of America, there can be seen many positive and negative aspects in training and development. By far, Apple appears to have the most positive features in that it has been developed and redeveloped upon the needs of their employees and is highly customized. The training program that probably has the most negative features is the one that Honda participates in. Ultimately, they have little control over the quality of the employees that come to work for them. The Health Insurance Association of America also has the drawback that once an individual is licensed, there is little opportunity for the individual to ask questions or seek advice. But this system has the positive feature of training numerous individuals from across the country.
In summary, training and development may be aimed at many different individuals within the workforce setting and may have numerous variations in how the goal of training is accomplished. Each training and development system must be created so that it can meet its goal with as few negative features as possible.
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