72% of employers are suffering from skills shortages.
70% of employers say skills shortages are having a detrimental effect on their business.
38% of employers said they need to target their training spend more effectively.
Those are some pretty scary statistics. How on earth are you expected to have a responsive, improving business in the face of constraints like that? They certainly point to a need for effective training. But who is responsible for this training?
The phrasing of the statements – from HR Magazine – seems to suggest that it is an "employer" issue. After all, if employers have the problem it is employers' responsibility to sort them out. Isn't it? Yet …
34% of employers will either reduce investment in training or keep it at the level of the previous year.
That final statistic certainly suggests the challenge is not being taken up. So the problem is likely to get worse not better. This means that, however you look at it, you need to do something. The question is, "What?" Whether or not you think it is your place to address your national educational shortcomings, your organisation's survival is going to depend on how you answer this.
That means, whether you are one of the 38% described above or not, you need to:-
- Be prepared to spend more on your training; and
- Be able to measure and improve the return on your training investment.
As a first step you need to recognise a basic subtle nicety. Skills are personal; they are something that the person develops and uses. Training is a process; consequently it is something that is done to a person. Learning is active and training is passive. You may already have recognised this and created a "Learning and Development" function but, in order to benefit fully from this semantic nicety, you need to go further and create a learning partnership. Both you and your employee need to understand why any programme is necessary and what the outcomes will be. When the person doing the learning has a clearer stake in the outcome of the learning, they will be more motivated to learn and to apply what they learn and thus your investment in their learning will result in greater mutual benefit and yield a greater return.
Every learning programme or assignment should be subject to the same discipline as any other business project. There should be clear upfront understanding of:-
- Why the programme is necessary;
- What the programme entails;
- What the expected outcomes will be.
With employee ownership the employee has a vested interest in the benefits of the training. Create this and you will add a new dimension to your employee engagement and inspire them to be better learners who use what they learn more effectively for the greater benefit of the business.