Get me the training team...
Why bother training? It's not a bad question. There's a certain disruptive charm to it but it really shouldn't be a hard one to answer. Every successful footballer, musician, chef and cat manicurist (probably) will tell you that they got where they are today because they trained. They practised. They were taught. Someone got hold of them when they were young and impressionable and changed their life. Why bother training? Because it works.
And yet training is an under-done thing. Across whole swathes of the economy there are organisations that simply don't invest in training in any meaningful way. A little minimum standards here, some basic skills there, but by and large learning is on-the-job. Mentoring and reflective practice are preferred - seen as superior even. Even if the indifferent quality of some training is part of that, it seems strange for training to be such a small part of our organisational life.
To give you an idea of what I mean, look at an organisation where failing to deliver on the frontline is not an option - the military. I have a few acquaintances in uniform and one thing they all have in common is that in between active duty they are sent off to do nothing for months except train. Train in custom-built environments, train with trainers who come from the most experienced and decorated ranks of the organisation and train with purpose. Not for weeks, not for days, months! And this is on top of the massive front-loading that all their 'basic' training provides. Compared to that how does your organisation match up?
Does your L&D department let you do this?
I can see why training is not top of the list. People can be fickle. They take your training and leave. They go to your competitor or they see training as a chance to take a rest. For many organisations it feels easier to turn to the job market and hire the skills rather than teach them. And training can be bad. It can be done badly and have a horrible, staid feel to it that doesn't reflect the dynamism of working life. But here's what you're missing if you don't invest in training...
1. Learning that's specific to your organisation
When you turn to the job market for a new cat manicurist to join the team there is no guarantee that their method, skill-set or cat manicuring philosophy will be the same as their new colleagues. No guarantee that you won't get a disjointed team who can't agree on what they're doing. And while that may lead to some really interesting discussions, boy are you going to waste some time 'aligning' people to the organisational approach.2. Hooking people on the drug of learning
Worried about staff retention? Let them learn! Study after study shows that people want to work for organisations that invest in them through learning. And learning is addictive. Really addictive. Think of making new neural pathways as a good version of smoking - easy to get into and makes you look cool only it costs less and doesn't kill you.3. Space to think
Training is a chance to really think about how theory and practice intersect. And through that to sharpen the whole organisation's thinking about what it is and what it does and how to do it better. Just that.And on top of all that, consider this. Training is about the biggest compliment you can pay the people in an organisation. It says, 'We think you're bright. We think you want to learn. We think you can learn and more than that we think you'll do outstanding things when you do." Give them that level of validation and they will love the organisation right back.
"Brains are like hearts, they go where they are appreciated."
Robert McNamara