It is important to educate workers at all levels of an organization of the importance of training and development. Although there are many reasons why training is essential to achieve business strategies, I would like to focus on three reasons in my elevator speech: globalization, diverse workforce, and technology's impact on work structures. Organizations that can link training and development to their strategic goals are the ones that will be best positioned to survive in the rapidly changing business environment that faces all industries today. If you do not believe me, please listen to my elevator pitch for more details.
90SecondElevatorPitch by suejohn
Text for 90 Second Elevator Pitch
Training and development is essential for our company to gain a competitive advantage. After all, workers represent the largest cost to our company. Even slight improvements in productivity can increase return on investment dramatically.
Today, I would like to discuss the following three reasons why training is needed: globalization, diverse workforce, and technology’s impact on work structures.
Globalization means that we have more American managers working overseas with local employees. Often, the culture in these countries differs significantly from ours. Training is essential so these managers know how to attract, motivate, and retain highly qualified workers (Noe, 2010, p. 12).
Also, our workforce at home will continue to become more diverse. Workers will have different work values. Managers must know how to properly motivate and engage all workers. Workers must be provided with training opportunities that will develop their skills, interest them, and give them a balance between work and home life (Noe, 2010, p. 17-19).
Technology impacts the need for training because it changes the work structure. Workers must have the skills and knowledge to work the computers that control the robots that now assemble the goods. Employees must have the skills to use new technology to communicate effectively with customers and provide outstanding service (Noe, 2010, p. 32).
Training definitely supports our organization’s strategy. After determining the competencies needed by our workers to achieve our strategic drivers, we can definitely base our training on programs that will directly support achievement of those competencies and increase performance success. These opportunities will develop a continuous learning environment in which our company will be poised to take advantage of the quickly changing business environment that we face today (Noe, 2010, p. 65).
Reference
Noe, R. A. (2010). Employee training and development (5th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill.
Sue,
ReplyDeleteI think you do a great job of focusing your presentation on Stolovitch’s (n.d.) mantra that training should be “learner-centered and performance-based”. You provide three great reasons for the need to training and give specific examples with each reason that ties it back to the organizational benefits (e.g. “increases in productivity) for a learner-centered, performance-based approach.
You do an effective job of tying training directly to the current and future self-interest of the organization by focusing on high-leverage training. The only thing that occurred to me is that you may need to make the cost of the investment explicit, if only in general terms. The question that occurred to me after listening to you pitch was, “Yes, I’m convinced we need training. But can we afford it?” Mentioning that as a benchmark, an investment of 2.15% on training and development as a percentage of payroll (Noe, 2010, p. 35) would probably be effective to prevent the decision-makers from imagining unrealistic costs for the investment.
- Patrick
References:
Noe, R. A. (2010). Employee training and development (5th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill.
Stolovitch, H. (n.d.). The truth about training. [Video]. Retrieved from http://mym.cdn.laureate-media.com/Walden/EIDT/6501/01/downloads/WAL_EIDT6501_01_A_EN-CC.zip
Hi Sue:
ReplyDeleteYou do an excellent job providing data why training is essential and beneficial. My only recommendation would be to make it more personal to the situation and/or organization. Your stakeholder needs to know from a personal perspective how they will benefit (ROI) and how training will be aligned with their business goals/objectives so they main gain a competitive advantage.
Lisa
Noe R. A. (2010). Employee Training and Development. New York, NY. McGraw-Hill.
Sue,
ReplyDeleteI liked your introductory comment about the employees representing the largest cost to the company. That would definitely catch my attention if I was the CEO. You selected three very critical trends/influences affecting the future of company to address; globalization, diverse workforce and technological advances. You made a very good point regarding the importance of doing a needs assessment and than creating a continuous learning environment.
Dr. Burke