Sea-change for the training marketÖ

Key Note Market Report

The training market appears to be undergoing a sea-change. Training, a new market report from market intelligence providers Key Note, reveals that training budgets are under increasing pressure, attitudes towards training are shifting, and the nature and delivery of training are also changing.

The pressure on training budgets appears to be threefold. Firstly, budgets are tighter than they were in 2005 ñ and in many cases are being reduced ñ leading to companies seeking more for their money in terms of training and learning opportunities or the cutting of training expenditure. Secondly, time pressures have led to an increased popularity in ëbite-sizeí training and other types of short courses. Lastly, there is a level of dissatisfaction with some of todayís training providers and with some forms of training.

Dissatisfaction with training and its providers can make it difficult for companiesí training personnel to justify buying a new training programme. In particular, there is some scepticism about of many of todayís management development programmes and personal development programmes. A common complaint is that some types of training are not company-specific or individually-specific enough.

Martyn Sloman, Training Adviser at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), told Key Note that there is less demand for the generic type of training course and increasing demand for courses ëthat bring people to competenceí. He argues that there is a shift towards individual learning: individuals are expected to take more responsibility for their own learning, but in an organisational context of ësupport and challengeí, that is, where people are challenged to take on new skills and are supported in doing so.

Through its research, Key Note perceives that clients want a whole lot more from their training, yet with sometimes confused objectives, they are often unclear how to achieve this. On many occasions, training is conducted as a response to a problem as apposed to a way of preparing for the future.

Between 2006/2007 and 2010/2011, Key Note forecasts that employer expenditure on off-the-job training will grow by 4.1%, to 19.28bn. Having grown very slowly since 2000, this trend in the market is unlikely to be quickly reversed. With companies being more cautious with their spending on training, the outlook for the market will certainly not be rosy.