Staff training can help your employees to handle their daily responsibilities better. It also helps give them the skills required to take on additional duties if the nature of their work changes.
You might want to include upskilling or reskilling in your staff training, so that your team has the competencies required for work in the modern world. Below are six considerations for staff training, to help you get the most out of your talent.
Why are you training your staff?
One of the first considerations you might want to make is why you are looking to train and develop your employees or workers. As part of your HR’s performance management strategy, outlining the key reasons for skills training can help you to develop clear objectives.
The skills that your staff need may change as your industry modernises. As this 2021 study shows, over 70% of respondents thought that digital transformation and organisational agility were two of the main drivers of skills change. Consider conducting a learning needs assessment to help you work out which employee skills need developing.
Furthermore, by providing your employees with staff skills training, you can help to reduce staff turnover by keeping them interested in the role.
Adequate staff training may lead to career progression for talented staff, too. This is because they may be looking to advance their responsibilities to the next level.
When you train and develop employees, they are less likely to require additional support during tasks. This means they can become more self-sufficient within their team.
Training your staff can also save you time and money searching for employees to cover new responsibilities as they arise. Depending on the volume and nature of these duties, it may not be worth recruiting a new employee. Instead, a pre-existing staff member may be able to efficiently cover those duties with some additional training behind them.
When staff skills training isn’t the best course of action, and a new recruit might be necessary
You might find that by training your employees in a new skill, they are quickly able to take on new responsibilities. However, for skills that require a qualification or years of training, you might find it easier to cover this with a new recruit.
Outsourcing might also be worth considering if you are only planning on using those skills for a one-off project. A good idea would be to weigh up the pros and cons of a new hire over training your staff.
This might factor in budgeting, time and whether the training necessary is achievable within a given time frame. If you think that a lot of training is required to complete a new task, then recruiting a new employee or temporary worker might be more time and cost effective.
Are your staff working remotely, in the office or on a hybrid basis?
If you are looking to train and develop your staff, there are multiple ways to do so. Some staff training options may be more accessible to you and your employees if working in an office environment. However, if your employees or workers are working remotely, then you may choose to conduct your training online instead.
If your employee works remotely for your IT department, for example, there may be a step-by-step learning app or website that can help them to learn a new package. There are many online learning apps available for this, and they can include helpful visualisations such as presentation slides and graphs.
Many online training tools include a quiz or test at the end. This allows you to monitor and assess your staff’s learning trajectory on an individual basis.
As an alternative option for remote staff training, you could consider video conferencing team meetings, which can also include visualisations such as slides and diagrams. You could follow these with e-learning modules, so you can assess your employee’s learning progress on a more detailed level.
Assessing your staff’s learning trajectory
In order to find out whether your current staff training models are effective, you might want to assess your employee’s learning curve. An employee’s learning curve might develop incrementally, and they are likely to develop some skills faster than others, depending on their personal capabilities.
If you are testing an employee via online learning tools, you might be able to assess them via built-in quizzes. There are also software tools for testing an employee’s typing speed, spelling capabilities and use of software packages. This way, you can look at how well an employee is picking up certain skills, and whether they have any particular weaknesses that could be improved on.
Personalised targets can be helpful when setting challenges for employees so that you are not constantly testing skills that they are already comfortable with, instead of helping them to strengthen areas that they might be weaker in.
Taking on board when an employee has mastered a skill
As your employee becomes increasingly familiar with a skill, you might find that they have mastered it to a certain level. You might want to consider monitoring your employee’s development via a tiered system, whereby once they have mastered a certain level, they move up to more advanced challenges.
A skill mastery framework can help you to specify a set of skills based on your business requirements. That way, your employees are only learning what is necessary to do their job effectively.
This way, you can test your employees consistently, while showing them how far they have progressed in their learning. Consider rewarding employees who have mastered their skills with perks, bonuses or even a promotion if they are ready to take on more advanced responsibilities.
Training your employees over time to become experts in their field might save you time and money on recruiting candidates for specialist roles. This is because you can promote a top candidate internally, rather than headhunting for the role, which may require the assistance of a recruiter.
Staff training can help keep employees safe at your workplace
Staff training does not always involve training your staff to become more productive in their role. Sometimes, training is necessary for them to work safely in your workplace. You might look to educate your staff about handling hazards and risks in the workplace. You could assign the role of safety manager to a responsible member of staff with the appropriate skills, who then trains your entire team in the safety measures necessary. Another possibility is to arrange a fire safety training day, explaining emergency procedures and outlining the nearest fire exits in your workplace. During this time, you could also explain to them the relevant parts of UK health and safety legislation, so that they are clear about the guidelines they need to follow.
For new recruits who are unfamiliar with your current safety procedures, you could set up a safety induction day. If you make any changes to safety procedures in the workplace, it is a good idea to revisit safety training with your entire team. To identify which hazards and risks you need to educate your staff in, consider conducting a risk assessment first.
