Brenna Demetree and Karen Sistare, Partners.

Photos above: At a recent teambuilding workshop presented by Training Links, participants enjoy hands-on fun and identify ways to increase staff communication and effectiveness. 

Training Links Newsletter
April 2009


How HR and Training Professionals Address Training Needs in a Zero Budget Environment

Survey shows what fellow professionals are doing when training needs surface, and there is no money in
the budget

What contributions can the Training Department make when training is placed on the back burner? Training Links conducted an informal survey of clients and colleagues to find out the real story.  What is happening with Training today, in our economic environment? 

In collecting information, we discovered a few common threads: First, in the absence of structured training, companies are relying more on coaching and one-on-one training; Second,  there is more partnering with managers and other “non-trainers” to provide training resources;  Third, for the most part, technical training continues as non-negotiable.

Read on to help you gain important insights on what others are doing to sustain training:

• A local insurance provider focuses on “mission critical” tasks only.  While required technical training continues, all HR related training has ceased.  In the interim, the HR manager works one-on-one with managers and other employees who need assistance and coaching. 
  
• An educational organization, no longer able to use external training vendors, works hard to foster more in-house facilitators among existing employees.  Also, they partner with area businesses to provide free or low cost seminars directly to employees.  For instance, lunch and learn sessions provided by the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) address helpful employee issues.
  
• Aside from online compliance training that’s required in the banking industry, one local bank uses one-on-one training to address performance gaps in the workplace.  No new employees have been hired in almost a year, so there is less demand for urgent job skills training. 
  
• A financial services company sees the need for more management and leadership training.  Even though overall training is down, they are shifting priorities to make sure managers know how to manage through difficult situations.  In addition to classes, the Training Manager coaches and trains one-on-one with managers. 
  
• The sales manager of a local business with multiple offices stresses the importance of cross training all associates so that there is plenty of flexibility with staff.  Also, they change the staff mix between offices, moving associates around to different offices.  This is helping everyone, even high performers, as they use their strengths in new ways and receive coaching from a different manager.
• A large health care organization reports that clinical education remains their number one training priority, followed by teamwork and safety.  In today’s environment, they offer fewer open classes to employees, and partner more with internal resources, including physicians. 
  
• A large mortgage company finds that employee webinars are great alternatives to conventional training.  The live webinars, hosted either by a trainer or a subject- matter-expert, sometimes supplement classroom training; other webinars stand alone as a training vehicle. 
  
• According to one bank’s representative, they dub 2009 as the year of knowledge, focusing on in-depth product knowledge that goes beyond features and benefits.  Branches receive weekly assignments to study and then compete in an ongoing tournament.  This culminates at year-end with an all employee event.  With the help of regional managers, the HR staff supports the initiative with no external resources.  When business picks up, employees will be ready and knowledgeable. 

If you have some insights to share, we would love to hear from you!  If you have any creative solutions, we would love to share that as well in a future newsletter.
Email us at:Karen@yourtraininglinks.com or Brenna@yourtraininglinks.com.