Within every organisation lies a huge range of experience and knowledge. From the receptionist to the IT department to the CEO, each individual has their own unique set of skills, expertise, and qualifications. As a business owner, it is up to you to make the most of this knowledge-base, while also empowering your staff to develop and grow.
No good boss should be complacent with what they have. Even if your business is extremely successful, you can always do better. There is always more knowledge, more training, and more certifications that can benefit you and your staff. There are several ways to enhance the skill sets of you and your staff, through continual training, workshops, and creating a learning-focused culture. The following blog article takes a look at some of the best ways you can enhance your company knowledge base.
Create a Learning-Focused Culture
There are many employers and workers out there who are happy to coast through their careers. As long as they are making money and getting through each day, they don’t see self-development as a priority. But this is such a missed opportunity. The more knowledge you have within your team, the better able you are to achieve results and create a better work environment. Prioritizing learning enables your staff to better themselves and grow as people. You, as the business owner, will benefit from the added productivity and quality of work, and your employees will be constantly bringing new ideas to the table. For this reason, it is in your best interest to cultivate a learning-focused culture within your company.
Encourage your employees to be on the hunt for new ways of doing things, whether it is a change in strategy, an upgraded software package, or an exciting new business opportunity to take hold of. Be the boss you wish you had had before you were working for yourself, and give your staff the space and freedom to spread their wings and grow. Yes, your newly-empowered staff might use their new knowledge to find other opportunities or start their own businesses, but that’s beyond your control. And by creating a positive culture, your employees will be happier and want to stay working for you.
Provide Continual Training Opportunities
Training allows your staff to learn new skills, gain professional certifications, and be better at their job. Training opportunities should be far more prevalent than just the mandatory onboarding process. You should make an effort to keep finding new courses, workshops, and online resources for your employees to make use of. It might be enrolling your marketing team in a webinar about the latest search engine optimization best practices, or even just sending an email update round the office about the benefits of using the Ink block explorer tool. You could enlist the whole team in a workshop designed to build communication or put your new hire through an accountancy qualification.
The opportunities are endless, and you should keep seeking them out. Your staff will thank you, not just for the improved knowledge, but for the variety of work and the chance to get away from their desks for a little while and have a new experience. With every training course or workshop, the knowledge base within your company grows just a little bit.
Take Staff Out of the Office
Your employees don’t have to be sitting at their desks to enhance their skill sets. Sending them to industry events and conferences can be a great way to obtain valuable insight into the latest trends and technologies shaping the business landscape. They will have the chance to get out of their comfort zones and grow their professional networks. Your staff can learn from the people they meet and even find some new and exciting business opportunities. Upon returning to the office they can share all the information and contacts they have picked up, and discuss how it can benefit your business.
External training workshops are also a great way to develop learning. Whether it’s directly related to their work or a way of boosting their soft skills like communication, teamwork, or productivity, these courses can be hugely valuable to your team.
Encourage Collaboration
You don’t want your organisation to be full of islands of knowledge. This is when each person or department within your team has their own skills and expertise, but the knowledge is not shared or communicated throughout the company. Although it may not be necessary for your accounts department to understand the ins and outs of social media marketing, there is very good reason to encourage collaboration and the sharing of skills within the team.
For a start, many seemingly disparate parts of your organization are more closely related than it might appear. As an example, it is good for IT and marketing to work together when it comes to things like SEO and website management. The computer wizards can take care of the technical side of things, while the marketers ensure your company’s digital presence contains the right messaging and aligns with your brand. This whole process is much more efficient if achieved in conjunction.
Secondly, the sharing of skills allows for your team to gain new perspectives and ideas from their colleagues. Just because their job roles may be different, it doesn;t mean they can’t contribute to the conversation. Everyone’s unique skill sets are valuable, and encouraging collaboration makes everyone smarter and better-informed.
Thirdly, in the extreme scenario that a member of your team suddenly becomes absent due to illness or personal emergency, you don’t want their knowledge to disappear along with them. Skills and insight should be shared, so that other team members can take up the slack and keep things running smoothly in the event of a disruption.
Share Feedback
When an employee has learned something new, they should be encouraged to share it with the rest of the team. Perhaps they have read an informative article, or been away on a training workshop. It’s important to discuss how these valuable insights can improve your processes and lead to better results. It may be that such changes are impractical or disadvantageous, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have the conversation. As we have mentioned, encouraging a learning-focused environment in which everyone feels comfortable sharing their ideas is of paramount importance.
In addition, it’s a good idea to hold regular meetings, perhaps once a month, for a general catch up with staff. This provides an opportunity for people to make their own suggestions and brainstorm ideas for new ways of working. People can bring their latest thoughts and learnings to the table, and a culture of collaboration, knowledge acquisition, and mutual respect is encouraged.
Conclusion
In summary, it is your duty as a business owner to help your employees grow. You should empower them to improve their knowledge and progress in their careers. This will have the significant benefits of increasing employee retention and achieving better results, while enhancing the skill set within your organisation. We have looked at a few of the best ways to increase your company knowledge-base, from courses and workshops to more collaborative ways of working. Keep striving for more knowledge, and your business will have great success.
