Businesses back off staff training

60% of employees have received no form of training through their employers this year, according to a poll by Select Appointments. Of the 600 people polled, 35% of respondents claimed that they found training educational and 15% felt more motivated to carry out their job after training sessions.

However, for employees to gain the most out of training, it must be relevant to their job and enhance their skills set to carry out their jobs more effectively. Unfortunately, 23% of employees who took part in the poll said that the training they had received in the past had been irrelevant to their jobs and a further 26% regarded the training as ’stating the obvious’.

Sue Edwards, HR Director, Select Appointments said: Employeesbenefit from training on a number of levels. On a psychological level, it demonstrates that their employer is willing to invest both time and money in their development and the development of the company overall. On a personal level they can use the skills they have learned to improve their effectiveness in their role and ultimately further their career.

It is clear from the poll that individuals are looking for trainingthat is highly relevant to their role or function in order to benefit the business and them individually. The overall cost of training to businesses, in terms of employees taking time out of their everyday work, potentially finding temporary workers to cover them, and the cost of the course itself, means that businesses should really do their homework about the return on the investment they’re making. The positive outcome of this should be an improvement in staff motivation and retention.

Select Appointments has an online skills assessment facility thatbenchmarks candidates’ competencies and gauges training needs. In addition the software can also be used for improving office administration skills in popular applications such as Word and Excel.