11.1 The Business Case for Training

Operations Managers know the importance of consistency, quality and compliance in all that they do. Training is undoubtedly one of how an organization achieves these goals. Having an effective training program allows Operations Managers to feel confident about the abilities of the employees they work with. Let’s look at the business case for having a well-defined training program at work.

Compliance

Legislative compliance is one of the most important responsibilities of an organization. Ensuring we provide for the health and safety, human rights, and minimum work standards of our employees is not only mandated but also supports morale and engagement. Failing to comply with legislative requirements can result in serious fines, bad public relations and in some cases, prison time.

Setting Expectations

There is no better way to ensure every worker understands the goal(s) of the organization than by way of training. When every employee completes a set of standard training programs, the organization ensures that each employee understands the expectations set by each leader, department and the company.

Conveying Culture

If you want to ensure an employee knows what the organization stands for and what the organization believes in, train your employees. Training courses reinforce the values and beliefs of the business, and help employees understand the kind of company they work for. For example, if the organization is a strong supporter of attaining zero emissions to the environment, this goal should be shared in a training course that explains how every employee can contribute to this goal in their own role.

Quality

In Operations Management, quality really does matter. Regardless of the product or service you provide, you want to have systems in place that regulate the materials, the specifications and the final product. Organizations need to pass government quality audits, supplier audits, and industry audits and meet the quality expectations of the consumer.

New Hire Orientation

Most would agree that the time and effort an organization puts into a thorough new hire orientation program pays off in dividends. From time-to-time you may hear of an organization that provides a new hire with payroll paperwork to complete and sends them off to begin their new job with no training. This means there is little to no emphasis on safety, policies, employee rights and responsibilities, expectations, quality or engagement. Your new hire orientation program is your opportunity to show a new hire your culture, your goals and your commitment to their success and safety.

Investment in Your People

As a minimum, does your organization train your employees on the legislative requirements in your jurisdiction? Beyond that, does your organization train your employees on health and well-being, pension-benefit-financial planning, advanced computer skills, and project management? Employees that work for an organization that invests in their employees is seen as a successful organization that job candidates want to work for, and employees want to advance with.

Training: Not Like It Used To Be

Imagine this: You have a pile of work on your desk, and as you get started, your Outlook calendar reminds you about a sexual harassment training session in ten minutes. You groan, not looking forward to sitting in a conference room and seeing PowerPoint slide after PowerPoint slide. As you walk to the conference room, you run into a colleague who is taking the same training that day and commiserate on how boring this training is probably going to be. However, when you enter the conference room you see something very different.

Computers are set up at every chair with a video ready to start on the computer. The instructor greets you and asks you to take a seat. When the training starts, you are introduced to “It takes all of us,“ a web-based training developed at Concordia University that introduces the concepts of consent, bystander interventions, and how to deal with sexual harassment using realistic scenarios. The videos stop, and there is a recorded discussion about what the videos portray. Your colleagues in the Vancouver office can see the same training, and via video conferencing, they can participate in the discussions. It is highly interactive and interesting. Once the training is finished, there are assignments to be completed via specific channels set up for this training. You communicate about the material and complete the assignments in teams with members of your Vancouver office. If you want to review the material, you simply click on ‘review’ and the entire session or parts of the training can be reviewed. In fact, on your bus ride home from work, you access the channels on your iPhone, chatting with a colleague in your other office about the sexual harassment training assignment you have due next week. You receive an e-mail from your HR manager asking you to complete a training assessment located in a specific channel in the software, and you happily comply because you have an entirely new perspective on what training can be.

This is the training for today. People no longer sit in hot, stuffy rooms to get training on boring content. Training has become highly interactive, technical, and interesting owing to the number of multimedia we can use—just think of the possibilities offered by Virtual Reality! Due to the high cost of training, managers must develop the right training programs to meet the needs; otherwise, these funds are virtually wasted. This chapter is about assessing, developing, implementing, and measuring an effective training program.