Training and Budgets: Make the Most of Your Limited Training Dollars

Rod Trent at myITforum.com — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 18:13:43 GMT

In this article we'll discuss two alternatives to provide end-user training for your staff. Yes, there...

re: Training and Budgets: Make the Most of Your Limited Training Dollars

jointer — Tue, 18 Jul 2006 20:40:27 GMT

Hi Jacqueline,

I advocated the approach that you mention when I was an IT Manager, particularly the "train the trainer"; retained knowledge is always more cost effective than re-attained knowledge. The problem that I ran into was that the Senior Management liked the cost effectiveness arguements (which included allowance for a portion of the in-house trainer time) and agreed in principal to the in-house trainers having time to do that work, and go on improving their own knowledge. BUT when push came to shove it was still difficult to get use of the in-house trainers' time to the top of the priority list because it wasn't a full time position, and it would have been difficult to make that case! So it came down to the same old arguement, "where does training lie in the priorities of the organization?".

It didn't change my mind about what I considered to be a valid approach but there must be REAL commitment on the behalf of management that a portion of those people's time is truly inviolate when it comes to training. If not, then you wasted your money anyway. It is akin to sending people on outside training and then never giving them the opportunity to consolidate that training on the job.

All too often there is expectation that going on training is like some magic 'injection' which gives you the knowledge and experience to be instantly productive, when in reality there may be a less productive period before the value of the training is realized, if you are lucky. I have long believed that we often overpower people with quantity, on say a 1 day course, rather than quality. I think that the most commonly used minimal subsets of a product taught in depth with lots of practice is most likely to produce the best result. It must be our aim to send people away feeling ready and willing to move forward. Unfortunately, it is a commercially competitive environment and training company clients often want to believe that if they send their employees to company X that they will be 'magically' trained and almost instantly newly productive.

So we have this interesting problem of companies wanting to make the minimum investment but not fully appreciating that if you overwhelm people on a course, give them some very nice material to take home (which many of them probably won't read) that may not be the best investment. It is not possible to 'transform' someone in a day but by studying a limited amount of the 'right' material I believe that their 'start-up' curve on the job will be much faster and more cost effective. Combine that with part-time in-house trainers, who work within the same environment (ie. are trusted) and then you can make good use your dollar.

There are a number of practical problems with this unfortunately. One I have already mentioned regarding part-time in-house trainers. What are the right sub-sets of features for a given product? This may vary from organization to organization. If you want customized training that will increase the cost substantially. By learning in smaller more effective chunks that means more training days and more days absent from work.

In effect you have swapped the time that the worker was supposed to be learning 'on the job' for classroom time. But will they get quality on the job learning time? When looked at this way, very few companies are going to see this as attractive. The important component that is missing from the assessment, of course, is why are they being training anyway? If it isn't to make them more 'productive' in some way, or avoid them being gradually less productive with changes in technology, what is the point? If there is no 'holistic' view of where training fits in then you are highly likely to just spend your money for limited return. Larger companies can often afford Training Officers who consider all aspects of training but the world consists mainly of small to medium sized companies.

Training techniques are changing and a company may invest in something like computer based training, for example. However, employees may still be expected to study on their own time, which may or not be feasible or attractive on an individual by individual basis. The ambitious ones may make the commitment but they may not be your 'best' employees. It won't be the first time, or the last, that companies try to get 'free' time from employees. This is not a managed approach to training, which ultimately is paramount if you are going to get the best bang for your buck.

Cheers
Graham J.