Three reasons why training and development is essential for small businesses

On the job learning is no longer optional for employees. Training and development has become an important aspect to businesses attaining their goals and objectives and moving forward. The world is rapidly changing and the need to invest in training to retain talent is more important now than ever before.

Here are three reasons why learning and development are so important:

Employees lack skills necessary to do their job

Of course when you hired the employee, you knew that they had most of the skills needed to do their job, otherwise you wouldn’t have hired them. There are probably a few checkboxes however that didn’t get checked off and you’ll need to ensure that they get the training that they need in order to be successful in their role and in turn, driving your business towards its goals. The faster that they can get up to speed, the more productive they will be and your organization will be in a better place.

Motivate and retain your talent

People go to work day in and day out and after a while it starts to become monotonous. In fact, burnout and boredom are common when people are no longer motivated in their role. To combat this lack of motivation, it is essential to build in opportunities for employees to learn and take on new challenges and professional development can be an excellent way to do this. Additionally, competition is stiff for quality talent and there is this thing called, "the Great Resignation"! If organizations don’t offer opportunities for training and development, they are at a greater risk of losing valuable employees who will jump ship to a company who offers more.

Change can be tough

There are few jobs today that don’t require the use of technology and at the rate that applications and cloud-based systems change, it is no wonder that people struggle to keep up. Whether it is learning a new social media platform or figuring out the newest version of the in-house expense tracking system, there is a constant need for learning. People struggle with change and there is rarely enough time in the day to complete one’s tasks let alone spend time learning a new software platform. Not to mention, after the past two years, the majority of people have had to figure out how to work entirely virtually!

For small businesses, training and development might not even be on the radar let alone in the budget. There are loads of low-cost, high-value strategies that can provide the training that your team needs without breaking the bank. Check out this article for ideas on how you can invest in learning and development.

Training options are limitless, especially with the rise of anywhere, anytime learning on-demand. Most importantly than access is getting staff on board and engaged with training. If they don’t see the value it for themselves, there is no point in spending the money on it. For most employees, there is nothing worse than being told that you are being sent to a boring workshop or seminar on a topic that isn’t even relevant to your job.

Once your team is on board, you will have to determine what kind of training is needed. Just like in any trade, there are tools better fit for some jobs. Figuring out what would work best takes some investigation and some time. Here is a handy list that describes the type of training options that are out there and in which situations they might be best suited.

If you are still stuck, or simply don’t have the time to evaluate all the training options, connect with me!