Friday, March 12, 2010

Typical Reasons for Employee Training and Development

Training and development can be initiated for a variety of reasons for an employee or group of employees, e.g.,:

* When a performance appraisal indicates performance improvement is needed

* To "benchmark" the status of improvement so far in a performance improvement effort

* As part of an overall professional development program

* As part of succession planning to help an employee be eligible for a planned change in role in the organization

* To "pilot", or test, the operation of a new performance management system

* To train about a specific topic (see below)

Typical Topics of Employee Training

1. Communications: The increasing diversity of today's workforce brings a wide variety of languages and customs.

2. Computer skills: Computer skills are becoming a necessity for conducting administrative and office tasks.

3. Customer service: Increased competition in today's global marketplace makes it critical that employees understand and meet the needs of customers.

4. Diversity: Diversity training usually includes explanation about how people have different perspectives and views, and includes techniques to value diversity

5. Ethics: Today's society has increasing expectations about corporate social responsibility. Also, today's diverse workforce brings a wide variety of values and morals to the workplace.

6. Human relations: The increased stresses of today's workplace can include misunderstandings and conflict. Training can people to get along in the workplace.

7. Quality initiatives: Initiatives such as Total Quality Management, Quality Circles, benchmarking, etc., require basic training about quality concepts, guidelines and standards for quality, etc.

8. Safety: Safety training is critical where working with heavy equipment , hazardous chemicals, repetitive activities, etc., but can also be useful with practical advice for avoiding assaults, etc.

9. Sexual harassment: Sexual harassment training usually includes careful description of the organization's policies about sexual harassment, especially about what are inappropriate behaviors.

1 comment:

  1. Employee training and development is the key to building highly productive workforce. Today’s organizations must invest in developing their people if they want to stay competitive.

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