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Why You Should Invest in Employee Orientation, Training, and Development
Why do some organizations give little attention to employee development?
All too often, organizations take a “sink or swim” attitude toward new (and not so new) employees. The prevailing wisdom is that throwing an employee into a novel situation will show if that employee has the knowledge and skills to do the job. However, a better strategy is to focus on adequate preparation and training of employees from day one onward.
Take new employees. They come into an unfamiliar environment wanting to do a good job, but hampered by lack of knowledge. That creates undue stress. Moreover, new employees are conflicted. They want to demonstrate their competence, but they don’t know what they are supposed to be doing. Investing in a good orientation program pays off handsomely. This ensures that employees are trained in their work tasks, they can learn proper work rules and procedures, ask questions, and get to know the company and the people. As a result, they hit the ground running, with less stress and more positive feelings about the organization.
Leaders should also think of employee training as an ongoing process. A key is to be able to assess employee training needs. Asking supervisors, or the employees themselves, about training needs is one solution. Analysis of performance…
