In today’s work environment, employee training is crucial for organizations that want to create a positive work experience for their workforce. Hence, the need to know what employee training is all about.
Employees have the talent needed for growth in organizations. Therefore, employers have to create a workplace environment that fosters good culture by constantly engaging and empowering employees.
Furthermore, employee training is vital to clone your employees to think, act, perform, and execute their deliverables in line with the vision and mission of the organization.
In other words, if a company trains well enough, employees realize different ways to grease the company’s wheel to increase profit.
That said, let us delve deeper by taking a holistic look into the concept of employee training, types of employee training, employee training methods, importance and benefits of employee training.
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What Is Employee Training?
Employee training improves employees’ ability, skills, and competence on the job through different training methods.
Generally, the training adds to the employee’s existing knowledge on the job or prepares them for future roles. Furthermore, the goal of training is to increase employees’ efficiency, performance, and ultimately revenue.
In addition, knowledge is inexhaustible; as such, every employee needs training regardless of their level of expertise.
Also, with the development of new problems, methods, knowledge, and technology, employers must be deliberate about the training and development of their workforce.
Importance Of Employee Training
Employee training is beneficial not only to the employees but to the organization as a whole. Through training, employees remain relevant and committed to the organization.
As a result, there is a positive impact on the organization’s productivity.
In light of this, here are some of the importance or benefits of employee training:
1. Boost Employee Performance and Productivity
The overall purpose of employee training is to boost employees’ performance and productivity.
Today’s business world is fast-growing, and business methods, products, technology, and problems are constantly evolving.
Employees’ skills may become outdated if they are not exposed to regular training and business trends.
Therefore, failure to train your employees will result in less competent employees and reduced revenue.
But, training employees impact them with the skills, ability, and experience they need to become more skilled, leading to increased performance and productivity in the organization.
2. Increase Engagement
From research, workers say lack of engagement is one of the top reasons they leave their job.
With training, you constantly engage your employees and keep them abreast with the developments in the workplace. In the same vein, you get feedback and opinions from employees.
Through this, employees feel valued and feel like they are an integral part of the organization. Furthermore, they are happy about their work environment and would commit better to doing their job.
3. Increased Talent Retention
Employees will always gravitate towards better work experience and treatment, and one of the tools to drive this is employee training.
Also, most employees want managers that can help them improve their careers and help them stay relevant in the fast-paced business world.
Interestingly, today’s workforce has options, and people want to work with organizations that invest in their growth. So, most employees tend to quit if they feel stuck in the same position.
Therefore, constant training is essential for employees’ career growth and retention.
4. Increase Job Satisfaction
The new business thinking is to give employees a fantastic work experience. And training is a critical element of job satisfaction.
In other words, motivation is a product of growth and result. Moreso, employees, feel unmotivated when they are not growing and cannot continually make an impact.
As such, training helps employees to grow and achieve even more excellent results.
As a result, employees are satisfied with their job and motivated to give their best in the organization.
5. Encourage Innovation
Employee training allows employees to bring out the innate ideas they never knew they had and allow for creativity. Also, training helps them understand new approaches to solving problems.
Complex topics become simple, and they become more proficient in their job. These individuals become specialists in their fields, and they can easily develop better ways to do their job and reduce time wastage.
6. Address Employee’s Weakness
An organization is a community of individuals with diverse personalities, each with its strengths and weaknesses. Through training, employees are educated on how best to handle their weaknesses.
As a result, employees can avoid recurring mistakes and become more competent and productive.
7. Solidify Organization’s Vision and Mission
Through training, employers can enshrine their visions and mission in the hearts of their employees.
In other words, training serves as a means to remind employees of the company’s vision and what it seeks to achieve. The result of this is that they would be able to serve better with the organization’s goal in mind.
8. Reduce Hiring Costs and Wastage
Due to the high employee turnover rate, companies waste thousands of dollars spent on hiring costs leading to poor productivity and revenue.
In addition, the primary cause of high employee turnover is a lack of career growth. But constant training leads to employee growth and motivates them to stay. Furthermore, the organization would experience growth in its revenue and cut costs on hiring new staff.
Types Of Employee Training
There are basically two types of employee training, which are;
1. On-the-job Training
Organizations carry out on-the-job training within the office premises. Some on-the-job training includes:
Coaching
In this case, a senior staff member assigned to a junior employee provides step-by-step instructions on a task or job function.
The senior staff teaches, monitors, and ensures that the trained employee is competent in the job function. Also, the trained staff attend to assignments and report back to the coach for assessment and evaluation.
It is a very common and viable way of employee training.
Job-rotation
Job rotation involves training employees by rotating them through a series of job positions within the same organization to gain skills across various job functions.
Each individual holds a particular position for a specific time before taking over another. Furthermore, rotation is done mainly for individuals that perform related tasks or are within the same departments in an organization.
The aim is to make every individual vast in knowledge and well informed about the processes of a business operation to reduce functions monopoly. Moreso, it is to ensure that business operation is not affected in the absence of an individual.
Induction Training
Induction training is a type of training for newly hired staff. In every organization, newly hired staff go through a form of orientation about several things, which include:
- Training on the duties and requirements of the assumed job
- Exposure to company policies and employee handbook
- Introduction to colleagues
- Health and safety information
- Tour around the premises
Refresher Training
Due to rapid technological advances, organizations may seek to train their staff. The aim is to keep employees abreast of technological innovation and the latest developments within their field.
Often, the training is conducted by consultants who are specialists in their disciplines.
Apprenticeship
Historically, this is the oldest form or method of training. Back in the day, young lads would learn from their bosses, gain mastery and serve them for a period of years before eventually gaining their freedom to stand on their own.
The apprentice is usually given practical and theoretical knowledge and is thoroughly bred until he is competent enough. It is a form of training that takes months or years to complete and is common with semi-skilled and technical labor.
2. Off-the-job
Opposed to on-the-job training, this method of training takes place outside the organization or office. Some Off-the-job training includes:
Conferences
Conferences are events done to broaden an employee’s knowledge regarding his discipline. Often, speakers who are specialists are invited to speak on diverse keynote areas. Attendees also have the opportunity to ask questions relating to their jobs.
Also, it is a group-based training that is open to people from various organizations. Furthermore, it is a common type of training for managers and high-level employees.
Boards, mockups, and slides are used for training. Sometimes audio or videos are used to facilitate the conference.
Lectures
Like conferences, lectures also broaden the knowledge of employees. It is a form of training that involves talking and the use of instructional materials.
Role Play
Here, employees are asked to address an acted scenario that may possibly occur in the workplace.
This is done to examine how the employee would handle such situations in the workplace. Furthermore, it is to train employees on how to address such situations in the workplace.
Role play is a practical and highly effective way of training employees.
Vestibule Training
This is a form of training specific to semi-skilled jobs. Here, trainees apply theoretical knowledge in practice.
The training happens in a simulated classroom where pieces of equipment and materials are made available for practicals. Students are then evaluated based on the results of the practicals.
This form of training takes days, sometimes weeks to complete.
Modern Day Methods Of Employee Training
The influx of technology has influenced the way organizations carry out employee training. Most organizations have absorbed newer and more technologically inclined methods of training their staff, they include:
Online courses
Online courses are becoming more and more popular, and organizations are also taking advantage of them. Rather than incurring costs for human training over and over again, organizations prefer to buy pre-recorded video courses for their employees.
Lastly, online courses are shareable; therefore, training cost is reduced to the barest minimum.
In-app digital training solutions
For most organizations, time-saving is very crucial. Also, for organizations with a broad team across different world locations, building an application that serves as an e-learning platform is an ideal tool.
With this, employees can access relevant information that can help them grow in real time at their convenience.
FAQs
What is the purpose of employee training?
The purpose of employee training is to boost employees’ performance and productivity and improve engagement, leading to greater employee retention.
What are the types of employee training?
The types of employee training are on-the-job and off-the-job training.
What should employee training include?
Employee training should include, the goal of the training, the type of method for the training, the stipulated time of the training, and the people involved.
Is employee training important?
Yes. Employee training is an integral aspect of creating a positive workplace experience and environment for your employees.
Summary
The quality of your employees determines the success of your organization. Well-grounded and skillful employees perform better than those employed in firms without an employee training plan.
In other words, employers should take employees’ growth a priority so as to improve the organization’s productivity.
Therefore, the onus is on employers to create a work environment that caters to the growth and development of their human resources.
When employees constantly derive satisfaction from their job, they will commit more to them. Even if they would leave, they would leave as fulfilled individuals and become brand ambassadors.
Lastly, as an employer, how can you improve learning within your enterprise? Check the post on enterprise learning management to gain adept knowledge of the subject matter.
I hope you got value.
Thanks for reading.