You’ve spent a great deal of time, effort and capital on amassing a workforce that you can be proud of. You’ve hand picked the best candidates from round after round of interviews. No matter how laborious and painstaking the recruitment process got, you never relaxed your standards and now you have a sensational team. The veritable cream of the crop. But you recognised that great candidates don’t necessarily make great employees, which is why you carried out a comprehensive onboarding process for each team member, ensuring that they were not only equipped with the skills, knowledge and aptitudes to do their job well but that they also understand your workplace culture and their role in perpetuating it.
But here’s the thing…
There’s so much more to training than onboarding…
All employees, no matter how skilled and experienced, need a little training as part of their onboarding process in order to help them to hit the ground running and feel equipped and empowered when they start working for you. Nonetheless, if you think that employee training stops after this point, you can never hope to get the most out of your workforce.
Employee training is an ongoing process that keeps employees’ skills sharp and continually growing. It should empower your workforce and allow them to deliver an outstanding experience to your customers. It should keep employees feeling reinvigorated and ready to embrace the challenges that come with the dynamic changes in your industry.
Invest in Proper Learning Facilities
Learning is easier to facilitate in a purpose built environment that’s removed from their everyday workspace. A new environment not only helps to aid attention and allows employees to focus on their training (rather than the work they’re missing), it is also equipped to aid in training pedagogy. Even if space or cost are an issue there are plenty of modular classroom building options available. You might be surprised by how affordable and easy to integrate into your existing operations such options are.
Consider Outsourcing Where Appropriate
While it’s understandable that you might want to keep all aspects of your training “in house” (who knows the way you do things better than you, after all) there are many benefits to outsourcing at least some of your training provision. Outsourced training is cost effective and potentially more effective than delivering yourself as trainers are equipped with the specific skills to facilitate learning and development.
Implement a Course of CPD for Each Team Member
Training should be about more than helping employees to do their jobs better. It should also be about helping employees to realize their career goals through your organization, acquiring knowledge and skills that are unique for their ascent up the career ladder. Thus, each employee should have their own course of Continuing Professional Development to help them to achieve their own unique goals. Show your employees that you value them outside of the specific function their job entails and there’s much more chance that they’ll stay with you.
Invest appropriately in workplace training and not only will you get the best out of your employees, you won’t need to worry about the potential headache of employee retention.
