Introduction

          Those of us who are active in the field of professional development, whether a buyer or creator of training programs, a classroom facilitator, or a learner are all aware that the critical impediment to learning is time or lack thereof. Indeed, we are starved for time across the board in our busy lives today, whether it's finding time to learn, to balance work and personal lives, to exercise, to read a book, or to cook a real meal and put flowers on the table. In Paula’s case, there is obviously the problem of time. Failure to make time to coordinate with others staffs regarding the new trainees’ upcoming orientation, rest-assuring Mayer that everything would be set right on time. When he failed to do so, conflicts crop up. Though situations like this are inevitable sometimes, Paula could have prevented this from happening if she manages to work on coordinating right on time. If concerns like this comes up, it would be best to address them immediately to the head superior so appropriate action could be considered.

Communication among staffs

          One challenge among companies is the need to find the right balance of information to relay to employees. Almost all companies recognized the importance of information use to minimize anxiety and manage stress within the organization. Companies need to establish and maintain the appropriate level of communication and should continually assess it at any level. There should be the need to provide information through several channels and not to rely on one mode of communication to ensure the fast delivery of whatever important concerns need to address to the staffs.

The Potential of Workflow Learning

          Like atomic energy, workflow learning has the potential to do enormous good or a great deal of harm. On the one hand, we could create dream jobs for the workers of the world: challenging work, tailored to the potential of the individual. By balancing workflow and worker, we can build what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi called psychological flow into the learning and execution of work. We should build dynamic, collaborative learning systems. People remain the most vital ingredient in business. Their skills, knowledge, and beliefs are assets worth developing. With the right perspective and some hard work, the training and development community can make learning a true business process. Our results will become transparent to executives and investors. And we will change the world.

Lack of Alignment With Business Needs

          No surprise here. The payoff of learning comes from the business measures driven by a specific learning solution. If the solution is not aligned or connected to the business measure, there will be little or no improvement linked to the solution. Too often, formal learning solutions are implemented for the wrong reasons because of a trend, desire or perceived need that may not be connected to a business measure. For example, consider a request by a senior executive to develop leadership behaviors. The request may be based on a perceived behavior need and not necessarily a business need. If the executive cannot articulate specifically which business measures should improve as a result of the new leadership behavior, the program may not be connected to a business need. This is not to say that specific leadership behaviors are not important, but they should, at least for the most part, be driven by the need to improve a business measure if the solution is expected to add value.

Failure to Recognize Non-Learning Solutions

          If the wrong solution is implemented, there will be little or no payoff connected to the solution. Too often, learning is perceived as a solution for a variety of performance problems when it is not an issue or it’s only a part of the solution. Attempting to solve job performance issues with learning is a major problem when other factors such as reward systems, job design and motivation are the key issues. To overcome this problem, the learning staff must continue to focus on methods to analyze performance rather than conduct a traditional needs assessment.

Advocate for Training (Staff)

          Even if everyone knows in theory that training is a good idea, it is not always easy to gather management support for actually carrying it out. Persistence and a willingness to speak in terms of management's own priorities are the key factors to success. Here are some general talking points to use when advocating for staff training:

1. Training is essential to using technology effectively. New and old technology alike goes to waste when staff does not know how to use them.

2. Money is going to waste. Estimate for management the number of hours you and other staff lose every week trying to figure things out and making unnecessary mistakes. Calculate the cost to the organization of this wasted time. For example, you might calculate that you spend four hours per week, or $200 worth of staff time maintaining a paper list of client contact information. If you took a Filemaker class and created your own small database, you would spend only one hour per week, or $50 worth of time maintaining that data.

3. 70% of technology spending should go to training and support. Many people think that technology spending should go primarily to concrete technology products like new computers and programs. That kind of spending, however, will not lead to an effective use of technology. The accepted rule of thumb is that only 30% of technology spending should go to hardware and software, and a full 70% should go to training and support.

4. Training is necessary for staff to do their jobs. Relate the skill you need to learn directly to your productivity. Explain what new capacity it will bring to the organization. For example, you might need to learn Excel in order to organize your data from a research project so you can write the report for the funder and use the results in your new media campaign.

Reference

Brown, M.G. (1989) Keeping Score, Quality Resources, New York.

Case, J. (1995) Open Book Management--The Coming Business Revolution, Harper Business School           Press, New York.

Drucker, P.F. (1973) Management Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices, Harper & Row, New York.

Drucker, P. F. (1992) Managing for the Future, Truman Talley Books/Dutton, New York.

Drucker, P. F. (1995) "The Information Executives Truly Need", Harvard Business Review,           January/February 1995.

Hamel, G. and Prahalad, C.K. (1994) Competing for the Future, Harvard Business School Press,           Cambridge, MA.

Kaplan, R. and Norton, D. (1996) The Balanced Scorecard, Harvard Business School Press, Boston.

Maskell, B. (1991) Performance Measurement for World Class Manufacturing, Productivity Press, Inc.,           Cambridge MA.