Why Some UK Companies are Reluctant to Invest in Training and Development

1613 Words4 Pages

Explain why some UK companies are reluctant to invest in training and

development. Do you consider these reasons to be valid?

The rapid development of technology and in other areas have led

companies’ ability to replicate products more easily, and the rapidly

expansion of the service sector has led the nature of consumers to

demand high quality at the lowest prices. Both of these highlight the

importance of gaining the competitive advantage through the labour

force.

A method through which a company could obtain this edge, is through

training and development of their various skills. Its implementation

and management concerns many concepts, esoteric and thus hard to

emulate.

Training and development can have many benefits to the organisation

but they may be reluctant to do it as many barriers or factors that

could prove the investment to be uneconomical exist. These factors are

explained below, following a brief description of T&D and its

benefits. How the factors can be tackled are discussed, to reach the

validity of these reasons.

T&D if applied could do well giving consideration to the Bramley

principle 1996 (Torrington, Hall, 1998, pg410). This concept refers to

assessing the current environment, establishing strong criteria for

T&D, planning an implementation strategy and a clear evaluation

checklist. This would determine whether or not the expenditure

provided visible returns or not, upon the successfulness criteria is

based.

Keyboard typing training can be given, to improve speed. Speed is

measured before and after, and an immediate measurement is available.

Sales techniques can be developed and taught, which can be evaluated

based upon the sales figures.

The process of evaluating the initiative should be systematic and

continually. This would help double loop learning, as opposed to

single loop learning. This refers to looking at the past suppositions

and current conditions.

If typing becomes obsolete and voice recognition becomes the norm,

training in typing would not be considered developmental anymore and

training would cease as it would not positively affect the

HRM/business strategy.

T&D potentially has a positive impact upon the employment relations

climate. Signalling employees that they are being valued, training was

positively correlated with job pay, job promotion and future

prospects, a...

... middle of paper ...

...necessary to convey to the management .

The only valid reason may be of competitive pressures and the state of

affairs of the company and the industry within which it is in. But

there should be a continual purveyance of decisions made to the

workforce with a clear understanding of issues. Such an understanding

culture to come into being cannot happen overnight but over a period

of time. This must persist and other advantages will also come about.

It is a must to weigh the pros and cons and balance them as best as

possible- T&D is a long term investment with long term potential

benefits to form a long term competitive advantage. Taking into

consideration the underlying forces present in the environment, some

reasons for not pursuing a training initiative can be considered valid

while others not.

Bibliography

J Heyes, M Stuart Does Training Matter? Employee experiences and

attitudes Human Resource Management Journal, Vol 6 :3

K Sisson, J Storey (2000) The Realities of Human Resource Management:

Managing the employment relationship, Open University Press

D Winstanley, J Woodall (1992) Case Studies in Personnel Institute of

Personnel and Development (IPD)

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