Training and development of employees

Orienting and Onboarding New Employees:

Carefully selecting employees doesn’t guarantee they’ll perform
effectively. Even
high-potential employees can’t do their jobs if they don’t know
what to do or how to
do it. Making sure your employees do know what to do and how
to do it is the purpose of orientation and training. The human
resources department usually designs the orientation and
training programs, but the supervisor does most of the day-today
orienting and training. Every manager therefore should know
how to orient and train employees.

The Purposes of Employee Orientation/Onboarding:

Employee orientation (or onboarding) provides new employees with the basic
background
information (such as computer passwords and company rules) they need to
do their jobs; ideally it should also help them start becoming emotionally
attached to
and engaged in the firm. The manager wants to accomplish four things when
orienting
new employees:
1. Make the new employee feel welcome and at home and part of the team.
2. Make sure the new employee has the basic information to function
effectively,
such as e-mail access, personnel policies and benefits, and expectations in
terms
of work behavior.
3. Help the new employee understand the organization in a broad sense (its
past,
present, culture, and strategies and vision of the future).
4. Start socializing the person into the firm’s culture and ways of doing things.
For example, the Mayo Clinic’s “heritage and culture” onboarding program
emphasizes core Mayo Clinic values such as teamwork, personal responsibility,
integrity, customer service, and mutual respect.
The length of orientation process:
The length of the orientation program depends on what you cover. Most
take several
hours. The human resource specialist (or, in smaller firms, the office
manager) performs the first part of the orientation by explaining basic
matters like working hours and benefits. Then the supervisor continues
the orientation by explaining the department’s organization, introducing
the person to his or her new colleagues, familiarizing him or her with the
workplace and reducing first-day jitters. At a minimum, the orientation
should provide information on matters such as employee benefits,
personnel policies, safety measures and regulations, and a facilities tour;
new employees should receive (and sign for) print or Internet-based
employee handbooks covering such matters.

Overview of the Training Process:

Directly after orientation, training should begin. Training means giving new or
current
employees the skills that they need to perform their jobs, such as showing new
salespeople how to sell your product. Training might involve having the current
jobholder
explain the job to the new hire, or multi-week classroom or Internet classes. In
one recent year, employers spent about $1,208 per employee on training.
Training is important. If even high-potential employees don’t know what to do
and how to do it, they will improvise or do nothing useful at all. Furthermore,
by one
estimate, about three-fourths of 30-something-aged high achievers begin
looking for
new positions within a year of starting, often due to dissatisfaction with
inadequate
training. Employers also increasingly capitalize on the fact that training fosters
engagement.
For example, Coca-Cola UK uses employee development plans, training,
and leadership development to attract and retain the best employees and inspire
their engagement.
Important though it is, training can’t work miracles. To paraphrase Google’s
head of “People Operations” (HR), there are two ways to build a great
workforce.
One is to hire top performers (what he calls “90th percentile performers”), and
the
other is to hire average performers and then use training to try to make them
90th
percentiles. He found the former approach worked best for Google.

The ADDIE Five-Step Training Process:

The employer should use a rational training process. The gold standard
here is still the basic analysis-design-develop-implement-evaluate
(ADDIE) training process model that training experts have used for years.
As an example, one training vendor describes its training process as
follows:
 Analyze the training need.
 Design the overall training program.
 Develop the course (assembling/creating the training materials).
 Implement training, by training the targeted employee group using
methods such as on-the-job or online training.
 Evaluate the course’s effectiveness.

Conducting the Training Needs Analysis :

Strategic goals (perhaps to enter new lines of business or to expand
abroad) often mean the firm will have to fill new jobs. Strategic training
needs analysis identifies the training employees will need to fill these
future jobs.

current Training needs analysis Most training efforts aim to improve

current
performance—specifically training new employees, and those whose
performance is
deficient. How you analyze current training needs depends on whether
you’re training new
or current employees. The main task for new employees is to determine
what the job
entails and to break it down into subtasks, each of which you then teach
to the new
employee. Analyzing current employees’ training needs is more complex,
because you must
also ascertain whether training is the solution. For example, performance
may be down due to poor motivation. Managers use task analysis to
identify new employees’ training needs, and performance analysis to
identify current employees’ training needs.

Task analysis for analyzing new employees' Training needs

Particularly with lower-level workers, it’s customary to hire
inexperienced personnel and train them. The aim here is to give these
new employees the skills and knowledge they need to do the job. Task
analysis is a detailed study of the job to determine what specific skills
(like reading spreadsheets for a clerk) the job requires. For task analysis,
job descriptions and job specifications are essential. They list the job’s
specific duties and skills, which are the basic reference points in
determining the training required. Managers also uncover training needs
by reviewing performance standards, performing the job and questioning
current jobholders and their supervisors. Some managers supplement the
job description and specification with a task analysis record form. This
form consolidates information regarding required tasks and skills. As
Table 8-1 illustrates, the form contains six columns of information, such
as “Skills or knowledge required.”
Designing the Training Program:
Armed with the needs analysis results, the manager next designs the
training program. Design means planning the overall training program
including training objectives, delivery methods, and program evaluation.
Sub-steps include setting performance objectives, creating a detailed
training outline (all training program steps from start to finish), choosing
a program delivery method (such as lectures or Web), and verifying the
overall program design with management. The design should include
summaries of how you plan to set a training environment that motivates
your trainees both to learn and to transfer what they learn to the job. It is
also here
that the manager reviews possible training program content (including
workbooks, exercises, and activities), and estimates a budget for the
training program. If the program is to use technology, the manager should
include a review of the technology he or she plans to use as part of the
analysis. We’ll look more closely next at several specific designs' issues.

Developing the Program

Program development means assembling the program’s training content
and materials. It means choosing the specific content the program will
present,
as well as designing/choosing the specific instructional methods (lectures,
cases,
Web-based, and so on) you will use. Training equipment and materials
include
(for example) iPads, workbooks, lectures, PowerPoint slides, Web- and
computer based
activities, course activities, trainer resources (manuals, for instance), and
support materials.

Evaluating the training effort:

With today’s emphasis on measuring results, it is crucial that the manager
evaluate
the training programs. There are several things you can measure:
participants’ reactions to the program, what (if anything) the trainees
learned from the program, and to what extent their on-the-job behavior or
results changed as a result of the program. In one survey of about 500
U.S. organizations, 77% evaluated their training programs by eliciting
reactions, 36% evaluated learning, and about 10% to 15% assessed the
program’s behavior and/or results. Computerization facilitates evaluation.
For example, Bovis Lend Lease uses learning management system
software to monitor which employees are taking which courses, and the
extent to which they’re improving their skills. There are two basic issues
to address when evaluating training programs. One is the design of the
evaluation study and whether to use controlled experimentation. The
second is, “What should we measure?”