Training Objectives
The development of training objectives should be aligned with the recognized training needs and strategies on three levels: organizational, functional, and individual (Ndulue, 2012). The main training need of XYZ is to increase employee motivation, and the manifestation of such an increase will be the more extensive engagement of employees from different departments, product groups, and regional stores in the centralized processes of strategy development and implementation.
On the organizational level, the objective will be to provide employees with an understanding of communication and feedback channels through which they can learn more about the corporate culture and contribute to it. On the functional level, the objective will be to enhance employees’ understanding of their role in the organization and their contribution to the common goals; this is expected to improve perceived meaningfulness of employees’ work, and raising perceived meaningfulness is crucial in raising motivation. Finally, on the individual level, the objective is to show employees how their performances, quality of work, and initiatives for improving their work can help them achieve promotion or different types of rewards, including monetary.
The second training goal is to promote cooperation, as it is acknowledged that XYZ today experiences a lack of coordination because many decisions are made on the unit level, and there is little consolidated effort. On the organizational level, the objective will be to provide employees with an understanding of how centralized decision-making is carried out in such a large organization as XYZ. On the functional level, employees will be trained to coordinate their work with the organization’s vision, i.e. it will be shown how people in different positions should cooperate. On the individual level, the objective will be to provide employees with communication tools through which they can align their actions and performances with the overall business strategy; moreover, the strategy itself should be explained so that the role of each employee in achieving strategic goals is properly understood.
The third training goal is to promote the efficiency of operation as part of pursuing the strategic goal of decreasing the cost of the products while preserving their quality. On the organizational level, the training objective will be to explain how the entire product cycle is designed so that the employees gain a systematic understanding of work to which each of them contributes in his or her position.
On the functional level, it will be shown what resources are used in each employee’s work based on the position’s job description, and how they use of those resources can be reconsidered so that better outcomes are attained with the same amount of input. On the individual level, employees will be trained on improving their performances and adopting workplace practices that enable higher efficiency, such as better time-management, distribution of efforts, and elimination of activities that do not contribute to achieving strategic goals.
Gagné-Briggs Events 1-5
The Gagné-Briggs nine events of instruction perspective are valuable for developing and evaluating training design because the perspective recognizes different stages of the instructional process, and certain actions should be implemented at each stage to ensure the success of learning outcomes. The first event is gaining attention (Reigeluth, 2013); without it, other events in the training process will be unable to function appropriately. To gain employees’ attention to the issues of motivation, cooperation, and efficiency, it will be necessary to initially ask them a series of questions during the first training session about the organization’s performance and to demonstrate, based on their answers, the relevance of the three issues.
The second event is informing the learner on the objective; upon such informing, a learner will be able to answer the following question: “How will I know when I have learned?” (Reigeluth, 2013, p. 91). In this process, trainers will need to explain to the employees that the objectives are increasing their motivation to work, improving their cooperation with other employees and the central office, and ensuring that they know how to optimize their working processes through time-management and other practices that contribute to higher efficiency.
The third event is a stimulating record of prior learning, i.e. linking the new knowledge that is delivered in training to what employees already know. For this to be successfully implemented, trainers will need to be aware of the employees’ backgrounds; it is expected that the prior learning of a salesperson and a manager will be different, which is why the mechanism of motivation, for example, should be explained differently to them, and the trainers will need to rely on existing knowledge by asking employees about their previous experiences and current conceptual vision.
The fourth event is presenting the stimulus material, i.e. the educational content of the training. To succeed in this process, trainers will need to avoid the use of general statements and conceptual framework only; instead, examples should be constantly provided, and the theoretical materials on raising motivation, promoting cooperation, and increasing efficiency should be explained through actual situations which an employee can encounter in his or her work.
The fifth event is providing learning guidance, i.e. explaining how the information can be comprehended and applied. For this, employees will be encouraged to participate in discussions and simulations in which it will be demonstrated how the conceptual knowledge with which training provides them can be applied to real situations and manifested in them; learning through practice will be an important component of training.
Gagné-Briggs Events 6-9
The sixth event is eliciting the performance; this process is about testing the acquired knowledge. Trainers will provide trainees with examples and ask questions on how the educational materials can be applied to it. For example, a job description can be shown to learners, and they will be asked to determine how time should be distributed among listed responsibilities based on the time management practices that they learn as part of efficiency training.
The seventh event is providing feedback about performance correctness; the difference between evaluation and feedback is that the former is summative (e.g. it can use scoring), while the latter is formative (i.e. it provides recommendations on how performance can be improved). For instance, in the job description example, trainers will discuss time management practices proposed by learners and explain how those practices can be improved based on theoretical educational materials.
The eighth event is assessing the performance; the basis of assessment is the list of training objectives, and evaluation criteria should be developed before the actual implementation of training programs. If criteria are properly developed before training is delivered, trainers will find it easy and convenient to assess the performance of learners.
Finally, the ninth event in enhancing retention and transfer; this process focuses on ensuring that the knowledge is internalized by learners. The employees will be asked to share their perceived effectiveness of knowledge and skills delivered in training and if they believe those knowledge and skills are effective, to provide examples of how they think they can use them in their work. If there is a lack of perceived benefits, trainers will need to repeat previous events and explain training objectives, their relevance, and their connection to the educational materials provided as part of the training.
References
Ndulue, T. I. (2012). Impact of training and development on workers performance in an organisation. In International congress on business and economic research: Book of proceedings (pp. 135-148). Port Harcourt, Nigeria: Ignatius Ajuru University of Education. Web.
Reigeluth, C. M. (Ed.). (2013). Instructional design theories and models: An overview of their current status. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Web.