What Is The True Cost of Training?
Jean Ventose was doing some shopping at his local Walmart store in Calgary and had picked up a set of headphones from the electronic department. As he continued shopping he noticed that a store employee was following him and not at a discrete distance like you might expect, but rather in a manner that could be construed as a way to harass him...
Jean Ventose was doing some shopping at his local Walmart store in Calgary and had picked up a set of headphones from the electronics department. As he continued shopping he noticed that a store employee was following him and not at a discrete distance like you might expect, but rather in a manner that could be construed as a way to harass him. The employee wore a security uniform. It was at this point that Ventose decided to take out his smartphone and begin recording the incident. Here is his video directly from his Facebook page.
My guess is that Walmart Canada is now in crisis mode, scrambling to come up with solutions to the public relations nightmare that has already begun. Hundreds of thousands have already viewed and commented on this video from across the country. All the major news agencies have covered this story and it has brought the kind of attention on Walmart Canada that I'm sure they didn't want. I suspect that many regular Walmart customers may end up buying their merchandise elsewhere this week. The cost to Walmart Canada could easily be in the millions of dollars.
It would be easy to suggest a training program that would include learning in the areas of preventing discrimination, harassment, creating a respectful workplace, customer service and so on. This would certainly be the week to propose to the higher ups that more and better training is required. Unfortunately, your proposal for such training typically happens when things are going well for your company and there isn't a crisis that needs to be addressed. My advice is to share this story now with the persons in your organization responsible for approving the additional budget for training so that you can remind them what the true cost of training really is.
And don't forget, I have designed training for large corporations that would address all the issues that this video has demonstrated and I am available to hire to design similar learning solutions for your organization as well.
Retaining Your Best Employees
One aspect of a training manager's job is to retain valuable employees. Think about it, as a training manager, part of your job is to manage a budget for training your organization. It's far more cost-effective to train skill gaps than it is to fully train new employees from scratch...
One aspect of a training manager's job is to retain valuable employees. Think about it, as a training manager, part of your job is to manage a budget for training your organization. It's far more cost-effective to train skill gaps than it is to fully train new employees from scratch. Turnover has a direct impact on your department’s ability to deliver truly effective learning opportunities, ones that increase the effectiveness of your employees, rather than helping employees gain the skills to get hired elsewhere.
According to a recent survey conducted by ADP Canada, two-thirds of your employees are ready to leave your organization. Elizabeth Williams, Director of Brand and Communication from ADP Canada recently spoke with CJOB in Winnipeg about this. You can listen to the interview here:
Essentially 33% of your workforce is what ADP calls the Uninspired. These are the folks who are not necessarily looking for work elsewhere but if an opportunity presented itself they would be gone. Another 16% of your employees are what ADP calls the Casual Daters. These folks have not started a full on job hunt but are keeping an eye on places like LinkedIn, and other career related sites to see what's out there. The remaining 16% of the two-thirds of your company are the Dissed. These are people who are completely dissatisfied with working at your workplace and are aggressively looking for their next opportunity.
The reason you need to be concerned is that some of your best employees might be in one of these three groups. Your department has spent thousands of dollars getting these people trained during their tenure with your company. Not only will the costs be higher to train their replacements but you could be losing a valuable training advocate or a subject matter expert that your department could leverage for the next training project.
How can you be sure you don’t lose these folks? You need to make them aware that they are valued by the company. Engage them with learning opportunities that show your department is listening to their needs. Make sure training is designed to be effective and targeted toward business goals. Ensure that training is timely, interesting and addresses your learner's true needs.
If you are interested in learning more about this, please reach out to me and we can discuss how I can help your organization deliver training that is truly effective and not just another boring eLearning session.