Introduction
This proposal is basically going to demonstrate the need for training and development in an organization. Training and development is a very important aspect of an organization because it helps in solving the problem of high employee turnover. This proposal will look into details ways that will be used by the organization to solve the problem of employee turnover.
The proposed ways include: training and professional development, knowledge transfer, recognition and rewards, recruitment and orientation, employee participation and communication, innovative compensation systems, job design and work teams, and work life balance.
Executive Summary
The increasing turnover has caused a large amount of lost time and energy. The escalated need for training and developing presents a challenge for employees to be comfortable in their job role. Employees are faced with the difficult task of finding quality students to help the company grow, and our organization seeks to decrease the stress of having to achieve their quota of students for the month.
A Brief History
According to Ongori (2007 p.87), employee turnover is commonly used in various business units. Employers use a lot of money on employees’ training and development.
Therefore, they have to make sure that employees’ turnover rates are minimized. Employee turnover is referred to as the number of employees who leave a company after a given period of time due to high levels of dissatisfactions of various kinds in their workplace (Firth et al. 2007, p. 170)
The major purpose of this proposal is to provide a solution to the problem of employee turnover facing the organization. This problem will be solved through the development and training of employees. Controlling the problem of employee turnover will be associated with several benefits.
For instance, it can improve the working morale of the employees. The manager assessed the rate of employee turnover and found out that development and training of the employees on work-related skills will help them solve the problem.
For any business organization to run smoothly there is a need for departmentalization. This means that the activities of the organization must be coordinated by organizing it into departments. All the departments of the organization must coordinate through communication. This research proposal mainly deals with the training of employees to help solve the problem of employee turnover.
Through the manager who is the overall boss of the organization, employee stress can be reduced drastically and thus come up with a solution to the problem in the organization. For this case, the manager will also be trained in good managerial aspects.
Kaplan University will offer an employer-sponsored training on-site to all the employees in the company in order to improve on their productivity at the workplace (Rehman et al. 2011, p. 89)
The training will begin by training members of the production department. This department deals with the creation of goods and services. It is an important department of any company because the major reason for setting up a company is to deal in the production of a particular good or provide a service.
Members of the department will be trained on how to make sure that the products being produced are produced on time, and the products are of the right quality. The training session will continue as stated in the memo.
Potential Problem
Kaplan University employs thousands of employees. Most of these employees have a difficulty in finding their groove within their careers. Failure to obtain adequate training can conflict with their job role. For instance, the stress level of employees has risen and derailing them from their goals.
Consequently, these employees may be taking personal time off, using their family medical leave absence or use their sick time. In addition, it has even caused them to look for work elsewhere. Hence, lack of training in developing can cause a significant turnover ratio for the company.
Potential Solution
On-site training and developing course will increase employee loyalty and morale. Employees will look at our organization as a company that genuinely cares about its employees’ future with the company. This will help employees to develop an emotional connection with the organization and become more efficient, as well as productive.
This will increase employee morale because they will not see the drastic turnover anymore and will feel more comfortable about their future within the company. Kaplan University will benefit from doing continued training and development in several ways. It will attract new skilled employees, reduce its turnover and absenteeism, and improve its student enrollments.
Kaplan University has set out to attract the most talented individuals in the industry. Providing a workplace that has a competitive advantage over its rivals in the industry will bring in a quality employee.
Furthermore, many employees would not have to miss work due to stress problems if they have the adequate training to be successful in their jobs. Productivity will increase because employees will spend more time at work being productive. An effective employer-sponsored training on-site is cost effective because the benefits outweigh its costs.
Training and Development
Training will be provided to employees of Kaplan University. Companies that usually invest their resources in training, and development end up being more competitive and productive. This is because all activities in the organization are related to learning. Training and development is a key factor to be considered because it makes employees to be retained at their workplace.
Provision of this training will not only provide appropriate skills required by the company to meet its goals but also to develop skills that may help them in doing other businesses. Studies carried out by different researchers show that satisfaction of employees is created through the development of their skills. Researchers suggest that there is a correlation between retention and training, especially for the highly skilled employees.
Training and development directly influence socialization of employees within the workplace.
This is because it will contribute to retention through the following ways: it motivates one to continue working in the same company; employees are committed to their work because they feel supported by management, employees are also provided with the skills to use in handling stress in relation to job changes and demands and the caring culture is created.
The training that will be offered to employees will be supported in facing the ongoing challenges in relation to their work and also improving on their work commitment to help them see the future.
Solution to the Problem
Training and Professional Development
Employees will always be motivated to stay where there is money and therefore, the training should be communicated and defined well for the development of the company. Training will be an appropriate retention tool if it will be designed to enable people to grow in the company. For instance, it may be associated with a skill-based pay and career development and planning.
For example, the semi-skilled and unskilled employees can be promoted to higher ranks after offering and better remuneration after providing employer-sponsored training opportunities that improve his professional and personal development.
Knowledge Transfer
The problem of employee turnover can be solved through the transfer of expertise and knowledge of the company to be shared among the employees. Knowledge transfer in a company can also be done through the use of modern technology tools like intranets and databases.
Apart from training and development, the company should find a way of retaining the skills in the company, and this can be done by focusing on individuals who perform best in their field or portray high rates of growth to their company. This can be done by giving such employees challenging responsibilities and better pay.
Recognition and Rewards
It includes nonfinancial and financial, formal and informal incentives that employers offer their employees in recognition of the good work done by the employees. They include things like clothing, prizes, social events, etc. If rewards are given to the employees, the rate of employee turnover and absenteeism from work will drastically reduce.
Recruitment and Orientation
When recruiting employees in Kaplan University, the following things should be done to ensure that there are high rates of employee retention. For instance, the personnel department should not only consider academic qualifications of an individual but also the general type of qualifications like character, motivation of the individual towards others and his interest.
If the employees have similar interests, they will have a good interpersonal relationship and through this relationship, the retention level of employees will be high. A warm welcome to the newly employed employees makes them feel welcome and integrate well with others (Gaan 2011, p. 33).
Employee Participation and Communication
Ng and butts (2009, p.289) argue that effective communication between the managers and employees will be a good strategy to use in retaining the employees because the implementation of most of the activities in the company will depend on the level of communication.
Several researchers indicate that good communication channels like personal discussions, formal newsletters and postings, employee surveys, and regularly scheduled committee meetings will be used to retain employees in the company.
Innovative Compensation Systems
This will have a positive impact on retention of employees because members will be encouraged to be committed to their work. This will be done through the use of innovative compensation systems like retirement benefits, benefits associated with medical facilities, vacation and holiday benefits and skill based pay.
A skill-based pay simply refers to a pay system in which employees are paid depending on their level of skills. This will reduce employee turnover because they stand better chances for higher earnings.
Job Design and Work Teams
Work teams and job designs improve on productivity of employees and the quality of the product through activities like job rotation and semi-autonomous and autonomous work teams. Work teams will reduce employee turnover because they will cooperate with each other to make sure that work processes are more effective. Work teams work towards the same organizational goal
Work Life Balance
Employees should be given enough time to have time with their families and meet other obligations. Employees who work in shifts find it difficult work and family life and so employees will come up with strategies that will help employees to balance work and life.
For example, an employer will inform his employees about the changes in shifts, he will limit the split of shifts, and he will allow the employees to change shifts amongst themselves and the most important is that while planning shifts the employer will consult employees about their work life balance needs (Smith, Oczkowski & Smith 2011, p.402).
The table below explains how training and development will produce a better quality
Conclusions and Recommendations
Employee turnover is a major challenge facing most companies. In the cases I studied most companies use their own strategies to retain employees and also come up with programs that are appropriate and suits the needs of employees. Various approaches are used by various firms like training and career development, benefits, compensation levels and systems, the composition of the work force etc.
However, there are no specific strategies that can be used to retain employees. Research indicates that firms, which experience low turnover of employees, pay good salaries.
Training and development are the most used strategy of retaining employees because it improves individuals’ skills thus makes the employee to be committed to his work. In conclusion if these strategies are put into consideration then businesses will operate in the dynamic world.
References
Firth L. et al. (2007). How can managers reduce employee intention to quit? Journal Management Psychology, 19(2), 170-187
Gaan, N. (2011). A Revisit on impact of job attitudes on employee turnover: An empirical study in Indian it industry. Journal of Management, 8(2), 33-42.
Ng, T. H. & Butts, M. (2009). Effectiveness of organizational efforts to lower turnover intentions: The moderating role of employee locus of control. Human Resource Management, 48(2), 289-310.
Ongori, H. (2007). A review of the literature on employee turnover. African Journal of Business Management, 1(3), 49-54.
Rehman, C. et al. (2011). Impact of Attitudes, Organization characteristics and external market on employee turnover intentions in private sector universities of Lahore. European Journal of Social Science, 21(1), 87-93.
Smith, A., Oczkowski, E. & Smith, C. (2011). To have and to hold: Modeling the drivers of employee turnover and skill retention in Australian organizations. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 22(2), 395-416.