People need maintenance and improvement just like machines. Retraining is maintenance and learning activities are improvement. Could you use a million dollar machine without any maintenance or upgrades? Of course not! It is the same with people. – Cliff Fadiman
As the quote already indicated, continuous education is an important step not only in the life of a person, but also in the life of a company. The fact that the training and development of employees contributes to the competitiveness of the organization is already fairly well known to experts, although there are still representatives of business entities who understand it more as a cost item. And that is a mistake.
Education is an investment and not an expense.
Investments are intended for businesses and organizations that expect to be on the market for a long time, so investments are a means of staying in the race for the long haul.
“If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.” – Derek Bok
The fact that the level and quality of education determines the success of any business is one of the reasons why employees should be guided to further development and education. This continuous and purposeful process of developing employees from the lowest to the leading positions differs in scope and form, and, of course, from allocated financial resources and human resource planning.
The education and development of employees aims to increase their qualifications and the potential to learn skills and knowledge that relate to responsibility, competences and work activities carried out in accordance with the company’s business plan.
In addition to the qualification of employees, education also offers other benefits, such as increasing work productivity, as well as the attractiveness of the company, improving work and interpersonal relationships, and the motivation of employees is also not negligible. The form and type of training is most often based on internal evaluations, and in the vast majority of companies it is a planned and long-term process. Forms of education include training, coaching, consultations, mentoring, internships in foreign companies, employee rotation, and the like.
As mentioned above, employee training is a planned process and any plan must include goals that must be measurable. Therefore, the objectives of the training should clearly and comprehensibly describe what the employee should be able to achieve after completing the given training.
After the completion of the educational activity, it is important to evaluate whether the investments made by the company have brought or will bring the desired results. For the relevance of the results, it is also recommended to pay attention to the results with a certain time interval.