Training and development constitute an ongoing process in any organization. This chapter is devoted to a detailed discussion on the nature and process of training and development in a typical industrial establishment.
Training could be compared to this metaphor - if I miss one meal in a day, then I will starve to death. The survival of the organization requires development throughout the ranks in order to survive, while training makes the organization more effective and efficient in its day-to-day operations.
As a brief review of terms, training involves an expert working with learners to transfer to them certain areas of knowledge or skills to improve in their current jobs. Development is a broad, ongoing multi-faceted set of activities (training activities among them) to bring someone or an organization up to another threshold of performance, often to perform some job or new role in the future.
‘Training is the formal and systematic modification of behaviour through learning which occurs as a result of education, instruction, development and planned experience.”
(Armstrong, 2001: 543)
Development is any learning activity, which is directed towards future, needs rather than present needs, and which is concerned more with career growth than immediate performance.
Nature of Training and Development:
In simple terms, training and development refer to the imparting of specific skills,
abilities and knowledge to an employee. A formal definition of training and development is - it is any attempt to improve current or future employee performance by increasing an employee’s ability to perform through learning, usually by changing the employee’s attitude or increasing his her skills and knowledge.
The need for training and development is determined by the employee’s performance deficiency, computed as follows:
Training and development need= standard performance - actual performance
Training, Development, and Education
HRD programs are divided into three main categories: Training, Development, and Education. Although some organizations lump all learning under "Training" or "Training and Development," dividing it into three distinct categories makes the desired goals and objects more meaningful and precise.
As discussed earlier - Training is the acquisition of technology, which permits employees to perform their present job to standards. It improves human performance on the job the employee is presently doing or is being hired to do. Also, it is given when new technology in introduced into the workplace.
Education is training people to do a different job. It is often given to people who have been identified as being promotable, being considered for a new job either lateral or upward, or to increase their potential. Unlike training, which can be fully evaluated immediately upon the learners returning to work, education can only be completely evaluated when the learners move on to their future jobs or tasks. We can test them on what they learned while in training, but we cannot be fully satisfied with the evaluation until we see how well they perform their new jobs.
Development is training people to acquire new horizons, technologies, or viewpoints. It enables leaders to guide their organizations onto new expectations by being proactive rather than reactive. It enables workers to create better products, faster services, and more competitive organizations. It is learning for growth of the individual, but not related to a specific present or future job. Unlike training and education, which can be completely evaluated, development cannot always be fully evaluated. This does not mean that we should abandon development programs, as helping people to grow and develop is what keeps an organization in the cutting edge of competitive environments.
Development can be considered the forefront of what many now call the Learning Organization. Development involves changes in an organism that are systematic, organized, and successive and are thought to serve an adaptive function.
We can make a distinction among training, education and development. Such distinction enables us to acquire a better perspective about the meaning of the terms. Training, as was stated earlier, refers to the process of imparting specific skills. Education, on the other hand, is confined to theoretical learning in classroom.
Though training and education differ in nature and orientation, they are complementary. An employee, for example, who undergoes training, is presumed to have had some formal education. Furthermore, no training program is complete without an element of education. In fact, the distinction between training and education is getting increasingly blurred nowadays. As more and more employees are called upon to exercise judgment and to choose alternative solutions to the job problem, training programmes seek to broaden and develop the individual through education.
Development refers to those learning opportunities designed to help employees grow. Development is not primarily skills-oriented. Instead, it provides general knowledge and attitudes, which will be helpful to employees in higher positions. Efforts towards development often depend on personal drive and ambition. Development activities, such as those supplied by management developmental programmes are generally voluntary.
Importance of Training and Development:
Training and development programmes, as was pointed out earlier, help remove performance deficiencies in employees. This is particularly true when –
I) The deficiency is caused by a lack of ability rather than a lack of motivation to perform,
II) The individuals involved have the aptitude and motivation need to learn to do the job better, and
III) Supervisors and peers are supportive of the desired behaviors.
There is greater stability, flexibility and capacity for growth in an organization. Training contributes to employs contribute to the stay with the organization. Growth renders stability to the workforce. Further, trained employees tend to stay with the organization. They seldom leave the company. Training makes the employees versatile in operations. All rounder can be transferred to any job. Flexibility is therefore ensured. Growth indicates prosperity, which is reflected in increased profits form year to year. Who else but well-trained employees can contribute to the prosperity of an enterprise?
Accidents, scrap and damage to machinery and equipment can be avoided or minimised through training. Even dissatisfaction, complaints, absenteeism, and turnover can be reduced if employees are trained well.
Future needs of employees will be met through training and development programmes. Oganisations take fresh diploma holders or graduates as apprentices or management trainees. They are absorbed after course completion.
Training serves as an effective source of recruitment. Training is an investment in HR with a promise of better returns in future.
The purpose of training
The aim of training is to help the organisation achieve its purpose by adding value to its key resource – the people it employs. The purpose of training is to:
To increase productivity and quality
To promote versatility and adaptability to new methods
To reduce the number of accidents
To reduce labour turnover
To increase job satisfaction displaying itself in lower labour turn-over and less absenteeism
To increase efficiency
Analysing training needs
For training to be effective, it is important to not only discern the training needs of the individual/group but also how their needs fit the overall objectives of the organisation.
Many organisations invest considerable resources in training and development but never really examine how training and development can most effectively promote organisational objectives, or how developmental activities should be altered in the light of business plans.
(Beardwell et al, 2001: 329)
When does the need for training arise?
The installation of new equipment or techniques
A change in working methods or products produced
A realisation that performance is inadequate
Labour shortage, necessitating the upgrading of some employees
A desire to reduce the amount of scrap and to improve quality
An increase in the number of accidents
Promotion or transfer of individual employees.
Ensures availability of necessary skills and there could be a pool of talent from which to promote from.
Advantages of training
1. Leads to improved profitability and/or more positive attitudes toward profits orientation.
2. Improves the job knowledge and skills at all levels of the organization.
3. Improves the morale of the workforce.
4. Helps people identify with organizational goals.
5. Helps create a better corporate image.
6. Fasters authentically, openness and trust.
7. Improves the relationship between boss and subordinate.
8. Aids in organizational development.
9. Learns from the trainee.
10. Helps prepare guidelines for work.
11. Aids in understanding and carrying out organizational policies.
12. Provides information for future needs in all areas of the organization.
13. Organization gets more effective decision-making and problem solving.
14. Aids in development for promotion from within.
15. Aids in developing leadership skill, motivation, loyalty, better attitudes, and other aspects that successful workers and mangers usually display.
16. Aids in increasing productivity and/or quality of work.
17. Helps keep costs down in many areas, e.g. production, personnel. Administration, etc.
18. Develops a sense of responsibility to the organization for being competent and knowledgeable.
19. Improves labor-management relations.
20. Reduces outside consulting costs by utilizing competent internal consulting.
Disadvantages of training
1. Can be a financial drain on resources; expensive development and testing, expensive to operate?
2. Often takes people away from their job for varying periods of time;
3. Equips staff to leave for a better job
4. Bad habits passed on
5. Narrow experience
Development
Hamlin observed development as training of future jobs. According to Nadler: development is concerned with providing learning experiences to employees so that they may be ready to move in new directions that organisational change may require.
A limitation of training needs based solely on needs analysis that it fails to address the development issue
Development is the need to enhance competencies beyond those required by the immediate job, for example:
- Values & ethics of organisation & professional group
- Sources of enthusiasm
Conclusion
Training and development opportunities must meet the dual aim of satisfying and developing the organisation's growth and meeting the individual's needs.
Training programmes should be modified to incorporate the needs of individual disciplines that avail of the training function.
It can be argued that training is provided to individuals in an organisation to test and maintain the individual's programming, to ensure cultural norms and expectations of the individual, within the organisation, are still in place and further, that the individual knows their place.
Training is the provision of guided experience to change behaviour, attitudes or opinions.
Training needs analysis identifies specific gaps which training is designed to fill.
Benefits of training:
- Enhanced confidence, commitment & motivation
- Recognition, greater responsibility & pay improvements
- Personal satisfaction, achievement and enhanced career prospects
- Improved availability & quality of staff
- Enhanced mobility - from the trainee’s perspective!
- Training takes place either on or off-the-job
