Bus 3040 - the Importance of Appropriate Training

BUS3040 U4A1

Instructor: Dr. Chris Rose

August 4, 2016

Julia Cowing, RN

The importance of appropriate training within an organization is vital for all employees. Training supports learning, career succession, and knowledge. While we all have to go through mundane training each year for compliance and such, there are endless options of training delivered in various modes; i.e. eLearning, books, lectures, discussions, etc. Just as we, individually, find what works for us in how we learn, some companies are going the extra mile to provide excellent training for their employees as a whole.

As stated in our reading, “training is more focused on improving performance in the current job, but training programs may support employee development” (Noe, 2016). Hewlett Packard has risen to the occasion in building its own ‘University’ for its employees. “Previously, HP treated training and development as separate functions…now it makes them part of a continuous process” (Noe, 2016). Hewlett-Packard’s Executive Vice President, Tracy Keough, had to identify the learning needs of 300,000 employees handling 19 business functions in more than 100 countries to support this process (Noe, 2016). In creating a one-stop shop for education and learning, Hewlett-Packard is able to monitor, change, and tweak their program to achieve the best results. HP University proved to be a successful training strategy for the organization as shown by the provided information that “during the first week, the site logged nearly 80,000 visits…by year-end, employees had accessed a course 2.7 million times, representing an 8% growth over the previous year” (Noe, 2016). If every company achieved that success rate in their staff development departments, there would be a lot of happy executives.

Employee development requires input from both the employer and employee. Joining forces to link what needs to be learned vs. what is wanted to learn, and combining the two, is a delicate process. Hewlett-Packard’s HP University hired “viaLearning to create games that teach HP’s sales strategy and competencies to its sales force…HP training manager Carol Cohen says the games make learning more interesting, so salespeople are motivated to learn...the metaphor format is readily adaptable into different languages and even different content areas” (Noe, 2016). This exciting training allows the sales force at Hewlett-Packard to achieve new stature in the competitive world of sales and marketing.  The fact that ‘different content areas’ (i.e. Information Technology, Finance, and Compliance) are also able to receive training through viaLearning allows the organization as a whole to achieve an entirely new level of success. I believe it would also help with employee engagement and retention as employees know their employer is taking extra measures for their individual learning paths.

As every company has development-related challenges to overcome, Hewlett-Packard shows us that they are champions in overcoming these challenges. One of the areas of challenge is the glass ceiling. “The glass ceiling is likely caused by a lack of access to training programs, to appropriate developmental job experiences, and to developmental relationships such as mentoring” (Ohlott, Ruderman, & McCauley, 2016) Hewlett-Packard proves each of these to be wrong. There is no ‘lack-of-access’ to training programs, job experiences are very appropriate as detailed in the article, and the developmental relationships are explained in the following “after testing their work on groups of employees, they refined the system…next, they trained the training staff in the use of HP University, so the staffers could train HP’s business managers” (Noe, 2016). It is possible that there is a large amount of companies lacking in two to three of the areas listed, I do not see Hewlett-Packard lacking in any of the three. Again, opportunity and success is an individual want or desire, and while some employees have “emphasized executive aspirations at the expense of family, others family at the expense of career, and still others aimed for career–family balance” (Ezzedeen, S. R., Budworth, M., & Baker, S. D., 2015), some choose success and the responsibilities that go with it over the ‘expense’.

The second challenge is succession planning. “Organizations have always had to prepare for the retirement of their leaders, but the need is more intense than ever” (Noe, 2016). Hewlett-Packard’s “approach is to align training activities that bring employees up to speed in their current jobs with development efforts that prepare employees to fill vacancies expected to arise in the future” (Noe, 2016) shows us that they are ready for the future. We are all aware that the baby-boomers are nearing, or are at retirement age and companies can have a difficult time finding worthy replacements for someone who has been doing a terrific job for twenty to thirty years. Hewlett-Packard gives us hope and promise of a new day.

The final development-related challenge is dysfunctional managers.” When a manager is an otherwise valuable employee and is willing to improve, the organization may try to help him or her change the dysfunctional behavior…the usual ways to provide this type of development include assessment, training, and counseling” (Noe, 2016). Hewlett-Packard’s HP University provides the company a route to work with these types of toxic managers towards a new management style. It is then up to the individual to accept the training or take a deep look into what they are truly providing the employees as a leader. Longenecker and Fink state it well, “organizations need to remove caustic and ineffective leaders as they damage performance and drive off top managerial talent and…to successfully control managerial turnover, organizations must improve their work environments and not allow a dysfunctional culture to develop” (Longenecker & Fink, 2014).  It is difficult to enjoy a work day when you have an unhappy and/or unsupportive leader.