Training & Development an integrated HRM Challenge With the opening up of various sectors to the market economy during

last 10 years massive technological changes, process simplification, changes in managerial practice and above all delivering of organization has taken place across the industry. Every now and then a company is buying other, thus issues like merger, de-merger, acquisitions etc are no more that much talked about eventualities at corporate corner. Both management and employees representatives started realizing that only bold and agile term to retain the market share are? Internal Capacity Building? To gain further part of pie, the company needs to capture customer confidence and the same is only possible if the company continuously maintain a pool of creative talent. The big Industry houses have their HRD department to conduct much structured? Induction Training? For budding Managers as well as fresh Graduates and Diploma holders. The practice of a small session on? What to do and what not to do? By the recruiter and placing the trainee under a seasoned campaigner to handle daily routine work on behalf of the person concerned is also prevalent in the Industry. The smaller corporate entity focused at Core business however generally resort to outsource the function to some professional trainer. However, one-time short structured? Induction training? for different functional areas like Production, Operation, HR, Marketing, Finance etc is one issue but when it comes to a scheduling a comprehensive programme involving sizeable money, time and effort? Days are gone when people used to prefer a single employer throughout ones career. In the advent of aggressive job advertisement, availability of Job Portals, movement of recruitment consultancy and above all relentless poaching by Head hunters the employee inventory of the organization also became extremely volatile. In fact building a succession plan for departmental head became a nightmare and the Industries are fighting hard to retain ?New Born Baby? of the Organization. Both the big and small Industry house whether operating in Public or Private, are facing the same difficulty irrespective of the sector ? thus have their own T&D challenges to address. While imparting T&D programme the Companies remain in the corridor of uncertainty ? unsure about retaining the person within the Co. fold and get result out of the new skills the person acquired out of the programme. Strategically, no organization can think even to act as nursery for his competitor. At the same time if the organization remain reluctant to acquire new skill through T&D effort, at a later date it will find acute skill gap which will be hard to replenish. So, the million dollar question is what the organization would do ? will it stop train its people with a

presumption that the employee may leave after acquiring new skills or it will take a chance. > Imparting T&D > shared responsibility Traditionally over the years we have experienced the fresh recruitees were subjected for induction training to acquire desired skill for combating the job situation. Also the personnel were placed regularly under development programme to enable them to acquire or to renew their managerial skill. Quite often the company management remains generous to sponsor their men for long term campus programme and also for foreign tour involving considerable money to enable the employee concerned to acquire expertise and competency to meet future objectives of the Company. However, the volatile nature of manpower, raise the much talked about question of ROI (return on Investment) of those employee friendly initiatives. Thus, the HRD department became often skeptical for nominating any person for a course involving considerable time and money on fear of loosing the man after being trained. Well, definitely HRD department saved some money for the organization by such decision but then had it played its role for the organization to reach its larger business objectives? This managerial contradiction is there; across the industries, and could only be handled efficiently if not eradicated completely if the organization have an integrated HRM system having HRD department under its fold. The basic issue here is not the reluctance of nomination for the high value programme but fear of loosing the man due to lack of Organization capabilities to capture the output on return after completion of programme. There are considerable shift in approach for tackling HR ? from ?keep them happy? to ?make them productive?. We have argument and counter argument on ?happy are productive?. But the issue of Productivity road for all-round happiness is probably most relevant for the age. If the man is leaving ? is only leaving out of his value proposition to the competitor of the organization and HRM department should foresee it and get equipped with the retention tool. > Whether Out-source or In-source It is evident that the smaller Company prefers to outsource the T&D process. However, the potential problem is how to align the business process of the concerned Company with the generalized stereo typed training content of the trainer. Obviously due to budget constraint HRD department can not absorb the R&D cost of the trainer to enable them

to learn the complete business process and customize the course content to make it fit to organization requirement. To handle this delicate but important issue one of the strategy may be development of a process for vendor selection. Rather than adopting a casual approach of opting for need based vendor select a dedicated Training Provider having experience in the vertical of the Industry and develop a contract on medium term basis say for 2-3 years. The resultant advantage of adopting such system is Assimilation of In-house system as well as the people with the trainer. These just not only meet traditional training objectives ? rather induce the management to sit down with the trainer to discuss strategic goals & objectives of the organization ? also it specifies the skills and knowledge needed to achieve them. > Macro & Micro level assessment A detail inventory of the available skill sets of the prevailing talents is necessary to analyze the GAP. These finally help the organization to customize training module. The requirements need to be aligned with strategic goals of the organization and need to be assessed at three levels, 1. Organizational level training needs to be congruent with organization?s goals without this consideration, training may be working at cross-purposes to the organization. 2. Departmental level Differentiate between tasks that need to be learned on the job, and ones that require training. 3. Individual level at individual level further micro assessment need to be made to develop a full proof TNA system. ie, initiated by performance problems or change. Assessment done to clarify problem, determine if training is the solution, analyze performance and characteristics and competence of trainees. >Beyond ROI the other metrics Training ROI is a hot topic on the speaking circuits at many of the training conferences. However research findings suggest that not more than 6-10 % of expenditures in training actually result in transfer to the job. Also the concept of measuring any single department for its ROI is offensive to the team concept of an organization. Even if one remains determined to prove the effect training alone has on the profitability of the organization, the outcome unfortunately remains flawed. The Success of training thus preferred by assessment of effective and appropriateness of training that is applicable to the organizations needs in an efficient manner. Instead of chasing the elusive and meaningless

training ROI, other training metrics are better suited to demonstrate trainings impact. 1. Effectiveness: The effectiveness of training is a measurement of learning. It is determined by comparing post-test scores with pre-test scores and then measuring the net change. 2. Efficiency: The efficiency of training shows how much training was delivered per some unit, ie, the number of training hours per year per employee. 3. Applicability: The applicability ratio derived out of feedback of the participants shows how the training is aligned with the business objectives. It is pertinent to decide raising employee skill ratings and putting more employees through a training programme if the organization does not need those skills? 4. Appropriateness: The appropriateness ratio derived out of feedback of the participants ensures that the right learning objects are delivered to the right people. An excellent training turns wasted if not imparted at right end and level. Thus to maintain competitiveness the organization must appreciate the related expenses as investment and continue design professional development programs so that it can build competency of the employee in developing the leadership skills and styles required to deal with job situations under dynamic market situation. Rather than filling pressure out of employee attrition better the management concentrate on introspection on the inherent causes and develop retention strategy otherwise incapability may led to complete collapse of the system and organization, forget about profitability.