What's Online

Whether you are training your staff to utilize a newly implemented technology and the related business process improvements, or training them to more productively use the software you've had for years, there is no better investment than in increasing the skills of the people you are already paying to do a job. If training is effective, it results in a remarkable ROI. You keep paying them the same salary, but they get more work done, and the information produced gives you more insight into your business performance, which then allows you to do a better job as a manager.

The big contingency here is, "if training is effective." What exactly is it that makes the difference between a training that lifts your business's performance and training that just wastes time and money?

Attributes of Successful Staff Training

• Small group training allows each participant time to interact with the instructor and other students.
• Training is delivered using a dynamic format that includes 1) instruction, 2) hands-on practice for each participant, and 3) the Socratic method of questioning to stimulate creative interaction with the material being taught.
• The instructor focuses on making sure students understand both the "how and why" needed to truly master a subject.
• The course syllabus and trainee manual are created specifically for your company, so that staff learn how to use their own system with their own business process, rather than being taught from a boilerplate template and then told to ignore parts of what they see.
• The instructor has a personal style that is upbeat and friendly, with a dash of humor. This will ensure that your employees enjoy learning and have favorable associations with the subject matter. That emotional component is often overlooked, but is vitally important for retention and application ability after class ends.
• Training may be remote or on-site, but the instructor's facilitation of the class makes sure everyone is keeping up and involved. Remote technology is reliable and makes it easy to understand exactly what is being demonstrated, and allows students to take control of the mouse and keyboard to demonstrate their skill acquisition as the class progresses.
  
• The cost of the training is reasonable so that management does not feel they need to ration access to it.

Attributes of Poor Training

The easiest way to describe poor training is to simply note that it is the absence of the attributes describing successful training. Classes are so large that students are forced into a "spectator" role instead of being interactively involved in the training. Course material is generic instead of focusing on how your company actually uses the technology on the job. Presentation is formal and technically "snobbish," with the instructor trying harder to impress with his knowledge than impart knowledge to the students. On-site trainers teach at the students instead of collaborating with them to create a successful class; remote trainers have poor understanding of the cultural background, idioms and conversational style of their students, preventing an entertaining interaction that flows naturally. High training costs lead managers to choose these poor training options to get more staff trained for the same price.

The Bottom Line

Just as training can be the best investment your company ever makes if it is done right (e.g. invest $75 per worker and get enough increased productivity out of 6 of them to no longer need to hire a new worker), it can also be a complete waste of both time and money if done wrong. And the worse result of poor training is that it may lead you to undervalue training in the future, if you relate the lack of productivity increases to the value of training in general rather than correctly attributing it to the poor training you received.

How do I know all of this? Well for one thing I have a MA concentration in Adult Learning Theory. That gives me a strong theoretical understanding of what I'm aiming at when I start a training engagement. But what has really given me the ability to understand and deliver successful trainings is experience.

I've done it wrong and I've done it right, and I've learned to understand what I need to do to spin gold out of hay. I've worked as a full-time computer trainer at a back-to-work program, taking people who had never used a computer before and training them for jobs that relied on software expertise and enough business process competence for them to know when and how to use the right software solution. And I've worked with executives and sales professionals who are leaders in their fields, helping them to apply their expertise through the use of technology that will make them even more successful going forward. I know from experience that no matter what level you are starting at, there are certain attributes the training you receive must have if you are to achieve subject mastery.

These days I focus exclusively on SalesForce.com Training. It is my favorite software, bar none. In fact, I've stopped offering other types of training except when my company implements CMS website systems or QuickBase database applications and I'm teaching the new users and administrators how to master those systems. SalesForce training is the only type of training I offer to clients my company did not do any implementation or redesign work for. But whatever type of training your company needs, be sure to ask the right questions to ascertain whether the trainer you are about to hire is one that delivers effective training.

Minimal Questions to Ask

• How many years of training experience will my trainer have?
• What written materials will participants be given after class and will it be tailored to my business?
• If the training is to be remotely delivered to my dispersed workforce, where will the trainer be located and how much experience will they have with American communication styles?
• What percentage of class time will be devoted to student demonstration of knowledge achievement?
• How will the trainer respond if students stumble upon areas of business process inefficiency during the training?
  

While there are probably other good questions to add to this list, these 5 should never be omitted. The correct answers to these 5 questions will tell you if you are about to waste valuable staff time and money or make a winning investment in worker productivity. Great training can not only teach your staff to be more productive in how they use technology to fulfill their responsibilities within your current business process, but also help you identify areas that can be improved. The more mastery each worker has, the more they can contribute the insights that come from their unique position.

It is also important not to underestimate the value of getting a group of workers together and allowing them to trade information and feedback as they use a system together that they normally use solo. At AspiraTech, we focus on this sort of comprehensiveness. We know when the training is heading in a productive direction that wasn't anticipated, and make space for that; and we know when it is veering into matters that are best left for another time, and make just enough time for managers to note that, before directing the training back on track. Whatever trainer you use, you will benefit from their having a wealth of business knowledge in addition to technical knowledge about the software you are learning.

We know what great staff training can do for any company. Hopefully this article has helped you clarify your next steps, and you are now ready to take them. Here's wishing you the greatest success with your business performance improvement initiatives.

Labels: Training