The word ‘training’ makes them think of faster growth and overall positive vibes. For others images of endless PowerPoint slides, interesting lectures, and a sense of time that could have been spent more productively. It’s time to take a look in the mirror!

Today we’re exploring why does training fails and how to transform it into an interesting, impactful and valuable experience for your learners.

Reasons Why Does Training Fails:

1. Giving The Right Training For The Wrong Cause:

Most organizations do a lot of training and development programs for the wrong cause, as these programs lack a sense of alignment with the organizational needs. That’s why employee training fails. What does this mean? Well, if a workforce training program doesn’t connect to a business need, you should expect little to no improvement from the employees’ part. 

Using a training trend to solve the issue of job performance might not be as beneficial as tackling systemic problems within the company such as lack of reward systems, job design, and motivation. 

What To Do

Make sure to review your non-training solution strategic issues and link your training needs to the objectives and evaluation of your organization. If your organizational issues circle job performances (a business goal), you should know that the training shouldn’t have to do with learning new skills (a learning goal). So, recognize your organization’s needs, the end goal, and the training evaluation that matches up with the goal. Sometimes, a little motivation is all your employees might need instead of taking up new courses. 

2. Lack Of Specific Direction And Focus:

Another reason why training doesn’t work fails is due to the lack of a defined focus and end goal of what the training program should achieve. A typical employee would normally go through the training program and think “now that this is done, what’s next?”. This illustrates how important the “why” of the training is. Ideally, training and development programs should be a focused process that allows employees or leaders to concentrate on desired results. 

What To Do:

Design the training program to have a specific direction and end goal. For example, say you’re doing a business impact training, your end goal can state “decrease error rate on reports by 30% and increase the external customer satisfaction index by 35% in 2 months” These defined goals can help you know what you need to focus on during your training. Sometimes, general training covers a lot but makes less impact.

3. Not Giving Your Employees The Reason For The Training:

People need to understand why they should be a part of something because we prioritize our engagements based on personal benefits. As a manager, not knowing the reason, blindly following trends, thinking your employees don’t deserve to know the reason, or having no time to explain, is bad practice. Taking the time to explain “why” will convince a greater buy-in and commitment to the training program.

What to do:

Your employees need to know what advantages they could require from the training on a personal and professional level. Additionally, you can talk about the impact it would have on the organization’s growth. Let’s be honest, training costs time and commitment on the learners’ end. It also costs the company an investment of resources— both parties must be fully aware of what they’re getting into so it’s not a complete waste. 

4. Seeing Training And Development As A One-Time Event:

Changes as a result of training and development don’t come overnight, especially if you see your training as a one-time event or a three-day workshop. This is another reason why training and development programs fail.

Holding a one-time training and workshop session for your employees has a low odds of changing behavior into a long-term habit. At best, it informs them what the training is about— it won’t generate lasting business results. 

What to do:

Have a series of programs, with a pre-work syllabus and follow-up that can help the training process and habits to stick. Imagine going to the gym every day for 2 hours, with a continuous process of working out, along with the proper motivation and support to build your muscles, you bet you’ll start to notice positive changes as opposed to going to the gym once in 3 months.

What Happens When You Fail To Train Your Employees?

Failure to train your employees will result in low productivity and in turn, poor quality of work and reduced profitability of your organization. As you know, employees are important to every organization, and sometimes staff investment can be challenging. So, employee training and development are important to organizational success.

Why Does A Company Need Training And Development For Their Employees?

With training and development, you get to upskill and even multi-skill your employees. You also provide career pathways for them within the organization and achieve greater consistency, productivity, and efficiency in completing daily tasks, meeting organizational goals, and sealing projects. 

Honing your employees’ industry-specific practices can also help to strengthen your reputation and give your competitors a run for their money. Training your employees greatly contributes to the all-round success of your organization. 

The two most important outcomes of a training and development program are:

1:  Enhanced Employee Performance: 

Effective training improves employees’ skills and knowledge, leading to increased productivity, efficiency, and overall job performance. This not only benefits individuals but also contributes to the organization’s success.If your training only focuses on basic communication skills,  it won’t resonate and will be seen as a waste of time.

2:  Employee Engagement And Retention:

Training and development programs are most important for a culture of growth and learning, which can boost employee skills and job satisfaction. When employees feel comfortable and see opportunities for advancement, they are more likely to stay with the organization, reducing turnover rates.

Why Is Training And Development Affected?

With an effective training plan that meets the business need, and comprehensive involvement and commitment from people at multiple levels in the company, you’ll be able to meet training goals, organizational goals, and ultimately an effective level of business impact and return on investment. So, It’s time to step up, rethink, and re-energize your approach to Learning and Development. 

Conclusion

And there we have it – a blueprint for turning your training sessions from horrible into a findable learning experience. All you need to do is ensure the training is the right solution, that it’s relevant, people know about it and is engaging but also fits into the trainees’ schedules.

So, It’s time to step up, rethink, and re-energize your approach to Learning and Development. 

Your trainees will thank you for it, and you’ll see the results in their performance and engagement. Let’s make training a journey of discovery and growth for everyone involved. If you’re interested in learning more about what your company can achieve with the right approach, encouragement, and mindset, head on over to our website. Happy training!