The training and training system is like an umbilical chord between an employee and the organisation. Through this chord the employee gets the nourishment of knowledge, skill and attitude as the child in the womb gets food from his mother. Nourishment (knowledge, skill and attitude) is for the development of employee, in fact, the employee’s development ensures the development of the organisation.

Precisely, the ‘Training and Training System’ bridges the yawning gulf between dreams and reality of every organisation. Training, besides, bridging the gulf between the process of employment and day-to-day working, it keeps the employees abreast of the organisation and fosters camaraderie. Basically, the training is a learning process, which modifies the behaviour through experience.

Strategic goals

The training and training system has undergone a sea change. Hence, concentrating merely on traditional training objectives is no longer adequate. Now, the managements collaboratively identify strategic goals and objectives, skills and knowledge, needed to attain along with the training system. Such organisations will have an effective training system to keep the employees engaged and foster their passion for a better tomorrow.
They are governed by three core values - caring, continuous improvement and global recognition and they are fraught with challenges and opportunities.

Nowadays, the training plays a pivotal role in the performance management process, which is integrated in every organisation and is being used to make sure that the employees are working towards the organisational goals.

Key developments

It means, taking an integrated, goal oriented approach to assigning training, assessing and rewarding employees’ performance. Taking a performance management approach to training connotes, making the effort sensible in terms of what the organisation wants from each of its employee to contribute in achieving the organisational goal.  Knowing how the future of learning is going to develop is invaluable for any organisation involved in the provision of training and development. And in order to predict the future of learning, it’s important to look at the key developments so far. There are three significant trends that will influence the future of learning:

*Granularity of training - how it is broken down
*Integration of different training units into a coherent programme
*Individualisation of learning programmes.

Trends like this will help to explain why the training is booming.      
The fiercely competitive organisations require a staunch devotion towards excellence and the ability to see the big picture that affects the changing face of organisation. They move from security to pay for performance in knowledge - intensive work environments that demand adaptability, innovation and flexibility.

Selection procedure

Some organisations use “mock - on the job” training to screen out low-potential trainees. It basically involves using sample tasks from the organisation’s training programme to help, decide, who will and will not move on to training, for an apt usage.

Since the organisations are spending sufficient amount on training, effective employee selection is obviously useful here, which of course, has a fairly impressive record in influencing organisational effectiveness, scoring higher than appraisal and feedback and just below goal setting in its effect on productivity.
Training is a developmental activity; it induces every individual to act physically and mentally. It is one of the best tools to motivate and change the very gambit of organisation and obviously, organisations initiate every step to increase the employees/trainees motivation. They train and provide opportunities for an active practice by letting the trainees to make errors and allow them to explore alternate solution to improve the motivation and learning among trainees.

Verbal critiques

Feedback including periodic performance assessments and more frequent verbal critiques is also important. The organisation should also make the material meaningful. For example, provide an overview of the material, and ensure that the programme uses familiar examples and concepts to illustrate the key points. The motivational points can be summarised as under:

To make the learning meaningful and easier for the trainees to understand, the learning material has to be meaningful. Therefore:
*At the start of training, provide a bird’s eye view of the learning material to be presented to know the overall picture, facilitating easy learning.
*Use a variety of familiar examples.
*Organise the information, so you can present it logically, and in meaningful way.
*Use terms and concepts that are already familiar to trainees.
*Use as many visual aids as possible.

To make the transfer of new skills and behaviours easy from the training site to the job site:
*Maximise the similarity between the training situation and the work situation.
*Provide adequate practice.
*Identify each feature of the job and/or step in the process.
*Direct the trainees’ attention to important aspects of the job. For example, if you’re training customer service representatives in how to handle incoming calls, first explain the different types of calls they will encounter and how to recognise such calls.
*Provide “heads-up” preparatory information. For example, trainees learning to become first-line supervisors often face stressful conditions, high workload and difficult subordinates back on the job. Studies suggest that to reduce the negative impact of such events let the trainees know ‘they might happen’.  

The training module need not be tailored to a set and rigid fashion: it has to be borne in mind that the trainees are adult. Accordingly, the training has to be strewn with a variety of methodologies.

Innovative approach

Finally, employees continue to experience multiple barriers to participate in training. At the same time, organisations find it difficult to resolve some of the more intractable problems confronting the practice of training and training system, such as finding resources for staff development and managing cover and release from work site for training.

If broader development opportunities are to be made available to employees that provide few inherent opportunities for learning and career development, more imaginative and innovative approaches may be required. Therefore, issues like job design, development of occupational progression routes and employees’ entitlements to learning should be assessed. This raises fundamental issues relating to the organisation of work and the management of working time that go to the core of the relationship between management and employees.

A sound training module and a strong healthy environment are the sources, which guarantee for attaining the objectives. These are vital not just to keep an organisation alive and healthy but also agile and efficient.  Today’s world of knowledge based organisation emphasise the ability to forecast and adopt.

The writer can be reached at habeeb_ahamed@hotmail.com