Make sure training is the solution

- No matter what kind of training you're asked to create, it's a big deal. Good training is important and unfortunately, can be expensive. According to the industry trade group, The Association of Talent Development, organizations spend almost $1,300 a year per employee for training. That can add up quickly, not to mention the cost of the time that the employee spends away from actually doing their work. Unfortunately, training is often an immediate response to any problem in an organization. Sales are low? We need more product training. Employees are violating a policy? We need more policy training. In fact, in some organizations, the answer to almost every question is some form of training. Training is only a solution to issues involving lack of knowledge or lack of know-how. Training can't fix poor systems, bad incentives, or faulty memories. So when you're asked to create training, do a little research on the problem and see if it can indeed be solved by training. Sometimes employees know what to do but they just aren't doing it or they think they are doing it correctly but they're not, or the incentives are not aligned with the tasks. I've worked with one company where the manager thought a training program was needed because employees were not following the proper steps for the assembly of an electronic component used in computers. The employees knew the steps, it was just in the haste of production, often a step or two was left out. So we created a simple job aide outlining the steps that needed to be followed. We laminated it, put it on the shop floor, and the problem was solved. In another case, sales representatives seemed reluctant to sell certain high-profit product. The sales leadership was concerned. They demanded training on how to sell this particular item. But before we created training, we did a little analysis. It turns out the reason it wasn't sold was because historically, this product had low commissions which never changed over time. Therefore, it was more profitable for the sales representatives to sell multiple, low-margin items than to spend the time and effort to try to sell the high-profit product. A simple change to the commission structure increased sales. When you're asked to create training, pause and think for a moment and ask yourself, is lack of knowledge really the problem here or is it something else? Is there a better way to solve this organization problem? You might even want to take some time and ask around, conduct a survey, get to the root of the issue, often training is the answer, but not always. Make sure you do your homework before you run off and create a training program that doesn't really solve the underlying problem that needs to be fixed.