Many organizations invest in training their employees in order to improve their performances. The training activities would only become useful to the organization if the learned skills and knowledge were transferred to the workplace. The support of the peer and supervisor on the transfer process can be highlighted in three levels; pre-training, during training, and post-training.
Peer support to the learning of new skills is important because it motivates the peers through informing them that what they learn will be accepted by their co-workers and supervisors (Bhatti & Hoe, 2012). The peers will be motivated to get prepared for the learning activities before the training begins. During the training, they will also put more effort into acquiring skills from the activities. Finally, peer support motivates the trainees to display the skills learned at work.
Support from the supervisors entails how the managers reinforce the training activities. It is important in training transfer because it depicts that the materials and resources required in the process will be provided since the management and supervisors provide support. The supervisors also play an essential role in setting goals for the trainees (Bhatti & Hoe, 2012).
Role Play
This is a training method where the trainees have characters assigned to them in a bid to resolve the situation (Pant, 2011). The trainees become performers and attain the understanding of their duties and circumstances. There are various types of role plays depending on the arrangement offered to the performers and the number of trainees taking part in the activity.
Structured Role-Play
This avail the information about the circumstances that triggered the trainees in joining hands during the training practices. The structured role-play also gives detailed information on the opinions, attitudes, and requirements of every character. Skills that are interpersonal are developed through this role play. These skills include communication and resolving conflicts.
Spontaneous Role Play
This is where the situation leading to the training is constructed in a loose way without many details. One trainee acts as a real self while the others perform as people whom he or she interacts with while working. It is used to develop insight into the trainee’s behavior.
Single Role Play
In this category, a group of the trainees engages in their task as the others watch and choose learning tips from the relations. In this regard, it is one group that is used to enhance the training activity. One of its greatest limitations is that it does not give the performers in the role-play an opportunity to watch as others act in order to learn.
Multiple Role Plays
In this case, the trainees first get into groups where they will go through the training activities. People from one group will discuss and highlight the points they learn from the other groups after going through the activities. This would be about exchanging ideas among the many groups that were formed to participate in the role play. The groups discuss what they learn from each other to attain the exact points and skills.
Role-rotation Role Play
This is where either the single or multiple role-play is used and followed with trainees’ interactions to facilitate learning. The play then restarts with different trainees taking the roles.
Coaching and Mentoring
Coaching is a process that involves learning and development in a bid to release one’s potentials and improve performance. On the other hand, mentoring is a process where a person makes significant changes to his or her knowledge and thinking. Coaching and mentoring are associated in various instances (Mcgraw-hill 2010).
First, the two are learning processes to show that it takes some time for both coaching and mentoring to be effective. Coaching seeks to make an individual release the potentials towards achieving the results he/she values. In the same way, mentoring involves making transitions in knowledge and thinking so that personal goals can be attained (Mcgraw-hill, 2010).
The relationship between these two terms is also illustrated by the assumptions they hold. Coaching is a transformation process believing that people have the ability to change from one character to another. This also applies to mentoring, where it is assumed that humans are capable of transforming. Therefore, an individual has to go through mentoring before being coached.
Finally, the relationship between coaching and mentoring is stressed by the fact that both take humans as the best choice makers. Mentoring is all about improving a person’s standards. As a person goes through coaching, he or she aims at attaining the best skills, which brings the aspect of mentoring (Mcgraw-hill, 2010).
Active Listening
This is a type of communication that involves both the listener and the speaker. The listener is expected to give feedback and prove that he or she has understood what was being communicated through paraphrasing the ideas. Active listening is vital in many ways when communicating with trainees.
Creation of Room for Response
This is one reason why active listening is necessary. The learners are allowed to ask for clarification and also give their responses about what they learn. This is important because it makes training transfer effective as the learners will be fully informed about the skills taught (Tasha & Maniac, 2014).
Minimization of Distractions
When engaging in active listening, one is expected to pay attention to the speaker by maintaining eye contact and reading the body language. This is important because it ensures that the listener, who may be a trainee, gets all the information and instruction given by the trainer (Tasha & Maniac, 2014).
Three Techniques for Maintaining Interest in Training
While conducting training, the trainer needs to carry out the training in an organized manner to ensure that the set goals are achieved by maintaining the interest of the trainees all through the session.
Asking Open Questions
The trainer must phrase the questions in such a way as not to limit the answers on ‘no’ or ‘yes.’ When the questions are phrased as open-ended questions, the trainees are not limited to the set of answers expected from them. This helps them to think of the main meaning of the words and think deeper. This tends to improve the length and depth of the discussion (Kirkpatrick & Kirkpatrick, 2008).
Prepare Questions in Advance
It is advisable that the trainer prepares the questions on separate cards before the actual training day. This will help to avoid improvising while they watch. When the participants get the questions in advance, there will be no time wasted for them to think about answers.
Be Prepared to Answer Group Questions
When the trainees ask questions, it is always vital to make sure that a person passes through the question severally to understand them. In cases where the answers are known, the question should be re-directed to any group in order to facilitate full participation. It is important for a person not to argue the answers since this can waste time. Finally, it is best if questions are answered after the training if they are personal or private (Kirkpatrick & Kirkpatrick, 2008).
Knowledge Evaluated in Training
Declarative Knowledge
Declarative knowledge is assessed by just word of mouth. There were no important notes to be taken inquiring on declarative knowledge of any participant in training (Oosterhof, 2011). An example is when a participant is asked the number of cars they saw on the road, but not the type of cars seen. It is measured by asking questions verbally to trainees.
Procedural Knowledge
This type of knowledge is evaluated by checking if one has an idea of how processes are to be carried out. The trainees are asked specific questions on functionality of random things. An example is classifying animals into vertebrates and invertebrates. Another example is predicting whether a solid will float on water or not. This type of knowledge is examined critically in its measurement (Oosterhof, 2011).
General Knowledge
General knowledge is measured by asking the trainees common questions that ought to be answered with ease. An example of such a question is asking a participant to state the number of continents in the world or the number of presidents in the United States of America. This type of knowledge can easily be assessed by the trainer without a lot of research from the training.
Cost-Benefit and Cost-Effectiveness Evaluation
After the training session, it is important to evaluate the cost-benefit and effectiveness of the whole process.
Cost-Benefit Evaluation
A cost-benefit evaluation of a training session is done to gauge the financial over-view of the firm after the whole period is complete. What is looked at is how much monetary value was used in the training period and the benefits that accrued to the whole process. An improved production increased business, and reduced supply cost may be used to evaluate the cost-benefit of the training session (Zeiger, 2014).
Cost-Effectiveness Evaluation
The cost-effectiveness evaluation of a training session is more complicated than the cost-benefit evaluation of the same training session. It leaves out a lot of such factors as the amount of money to be paid to new recruits.
The evaluation is done on the cost of the training and how effective the cost was to the whole process. In most instances, trainers tend to wish that the amount of money used in the training process does not go to waste. The cost of training is evaluated to be effective when the process is successful, and all the cash is accounted for (Zeiger, 2014).
Importance of Management Development
Organizations should invest in management development for effective results from the business. The following subtitles contain the importance of management development:
Effective Work
Management development training in an organization helps in doing effective work in the management. The rapport created between the managers under training ensures that they engage each other in decision making and sharing of ideas. This will make their duties be done the right way and effectively (Lipman, 2012).
Support
Management development training brings together many intelligent brains with different ideas that when put in one room may come up with great ideas. Some of the ideas are improved while others are invented. The training helps a lot in the management of the business. The support created between the managers is important to the company.
Organization Improvement and Change
The focus on management development is important for organization improvement and change. The training for the managers improves their management skills as they exchange a lot of ideas and structures that enhance better and more qualified ways of management (Lipman, 2012).
Technical Knowledge and Skills and Interpersonal Knowledge and Skills
Technical Knowledge and Skills
Technical knowledge is the full understanding of anything that can be used or applied in various forms for any duties at work or home. On the other hand, technical skill is when someone can do a duty skillfully whilst applying their knowledge. The growth for the need for technical skills is at a high rate, as the world technological advancement is rising faster. The networking system of many organizations relies on the technical knowledge and skills of these individuals (Investopedia, 2014).
Interpersonal Knowledge and Skills
Interpersonal knowledge is a good communication skill that an individual has attained and the ability to use it. On the other hand, interpersonal skill is the daily use of life proficiencies to engage in useful and important communication between people. In the market, most employees seek to employ or hire staff members with high interpersonal skills. Examples of interpersonal skills include verbal and non-verbal communication, listening skills, negotiation skills, problem-solving, decision-making skills, and assertiveness (Skills You Need, 2014).
References
Bhatti, M. A., & Hoe, C. H. (2012). Resolving the Past Conflict: Role of Peer and Supervisor Support in Training Effectiveness. International Journal of Business and Behavioral Sciences , 32-38.
Investopedia. (2014). Technical Skills. Web.
Kirkpatrick, D. L., & Kirkpatrick, J. D. (2008). Evaluating Training Programs. New York: Berrett-Koehler Publishers.
Lipman, V. (2012). 10 Reasons Why Companies Should Invest More In Management Training. Web.
Mcgraw-hill. (2010). What is effective coaching and mentoring at work? Coaching and mentoring at work , 5-13.
Oosterhof, A. (2011). How Different Types of Knowledge Are Assessed. Effectively assessing different types of knowledge , 3-9.
Pant, M. (2011). Methodology and Materials. Participatory Training , 157-172.
Skills You Need. (2014). Web.
Tasha, P., & Maniac, D. (2014). How to Actively Listen. Web.
Zeiger, S. (2014). The Cost Benefit Evaluation and Cost Effectiveness Evaluation Methods.Web.