Bu 341 - Advantages and Disadvantages of Cross-Training Employees

Cross Training

Austin Sievers

Frank Whittle

BU-341 Final Paper

20 July 2018

        With the way that companies are operating, and the way the world is constantly changing, new trends and innovations are always needed to stay up to speed with everybody else. The same goes for the Human Resource departments in companies and the Human Resource managers that oversee the departments. Change is always happening, and the trend that I will be discussing throughout this paper is the most important trend happening in HR right now; cross training.

Throughout this paper, I will discuss how Human Resource managers are utilizing cross training, the impacts that cross training is having on HR, and what additions need to be added in order to support cross training in the HR world. I will then give my personal philosophy on how and why I think it is important for HR mangers to look towards the future, and the role HR plays in making sure these trends and emerging innovations are a priority within the company. By the end of this paper, my hopes are that both myself and anyone who reads this will be more familiar with the trends and innovations that are taking the HR world by storm, especially cross training.

The first portion of this paper will be regarding what cross training is and the impacts cross training will have on the human resource managers and the departments themselves. Cross training is something that can be a great benefit to a company, but only if handled correctly. I think that cross training should be implemented by all companies, because I feel like all companies could be a lot better off from utilizing it. Inc. states, “cross training involves teaching an employee who was hired to perform one job function the skills required to perform other job functions” (Cross Training). For those employees that are wanting to expand their skills in order to perform more than what their job has to offer, cross training can help those employees to be able to perform more jobs within the company. For instance, an employee could start the day working one job, and then finish their day working a different job, all within the same company.

In my opinion, a lot of small companies have employees that do more than one job, because maybe the company cannot afford to hire more people. This is where cross training could come in very handy. Training these employees to do multiple jobs within the company cause cost the company less money. While it can benefit small companies, I think that it could very well benefit larger companies even more than the smaller companies. It could be a win-win situation for big companies that utilize cross training. For the employee, it allows them to broaden their horizons as to what they can do and what they can accomplish. It can make the employees feel like they have more power in the company if they can do more than one job. When talking about the benefit to the company, it could drastically cut the costs associated with hiring and train a new employee to perform the job that could be given to a current employee to do on top to their current job. Cutting costs is something that all companies are aspiring towards, and utilizing cross training could help a lot with that aspect.

When talking about the impacts that cross training could have on HR managers, I will discuss the potential pros and cons associated with cross training. I will discuss four advantages of cross training; stability, flexibility, efficiency, and value. Stability is an advantage because if you cross train employees, it allows more than one employee to understand the job if one person is to go on leave or just quit their job. Having more than one person trained for the job will provide that stability of not having to worry about quickly hiring and training a new employee to do the job of the person that left. This will help the HR managers, because they will not have that burden of having to find a replacement. They just need to spend the time cross training the employees that they have to be able to perform more than one job if needed.

The second advantage for the HR managers who utilize cross training is flexibility. If you can prepare with the mindset of “expecting the unexpected”, then you will have the flexibility to get through many tough situations that could occur. Having more than one person trained for a specific job can help companies to be able to rebound from any disaster or problem that could arise. It would also speed up that process because if more than one person can do the job, it will obviously go by much quicker than if just one person was trained to do the job.

The next advantage of cross training is employee efficiency. Chron.com states that “When employees understand what is going on in parts of the business other than where they typically work, they can work together to handle situations and answer questions more effectively” (Gartenstein, 2018). When you are cross training employee to do multiple jobs, the new employees that are being cross trained can see a more efficient and better way of performing the job. They could have different points of view and opinions that could bring new ideas and innovations to the specific job. Without cross training the employees, the company may miss out on better or more efficient ways of performing the job. Performing jobs more efficiently is a benefit to any company, and is something that could take a company to the next level.

The final advantage that I will discuss regarding cross training is value. BFS Capital states that “Cross-training not only adds value to the business, but also to the individual employee. When an employee is given more responsibilities, he or she might see it as a manager putting more time and trust into that person’s personal and professional development” (Barr, 2017). If employees feel like they are more valued within the company, it will ultimately cause them to want to work even harder, which will make the employee feel good about themselves and the job they are doing, and for the company getting the increased production, without having an extra employee. This can really help the HR managers, because if they properly cross trained the employees, they will have benefited both the employee and the company in general, which will look really good on the HR department.

        Everybody loves talking about advantages of anything and everything, but we cannot forget the potential disadvantages that HR managers could face when cross training employees. I will cover four disadvantages of cross training that I feel can hurt the company, and the HR department more than it would help. The first disadvantage I will discuss is the fact that it could be too time consuming to cross train employees. All Things Business and Tech states that “Establishing cross training takes dedication, time and a lot of effort. Depending on the size of the organization, there may be many different areas of business that will need coverage. Ensuring multiple members of the organization are adequately trained takes a significant amount of investment” (Goessl, 2017). Cross training is something that just does not happen overnight, and can be a long, potentially frustrating process for both the HR managers and the employees. HR managers will also have to put together different manuals to follow when cross training employees, which adds even more time to the whole training experience. Time is money, so if you are losing time, you are losing money, which is something that no company wants to experience.