TRAINING: THE GESTALT

There is a surfeit of corporate trainers, each claiming rights to a niche. Professional and social platforms “runneth over” with their claims and success stories. Besides process related training and those aimed at technical and technological upgrades, organisations conduct a variety of programmes that are steered by trainers with expertise in “niche” fields that can range from, straight forward aspects like "Soft Skills and Personality Development", "Public Speaking", "Teambuilding", to the more contemporary and "in" stuff like "Hypnosis", "Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP)" etc. (the list goes on…)

Good Trainers.     Organisations “with a name”, normally opt for “good” trainers who have a name, fame and brand image. Mostly these are individuals, who are considered to have “arrived”, by virtue of their omnipresence in training “circuits” . They are likely to have successfully executed one or more projects and command fancy price tags for the associated name and fame. It is a synergic cycle where “name and fame” begets “fees” and fees begets “name and fame”. Since budgetary provisions ensure funds, it is easy to spend it over the “brand value” of the trainer rather than utility of training, since "brands" are seldom questioned. (It is another fact that even such "brands" fade out sooner or later)

Process in Vogue. Training, is the easiest of all tasks for most organisations. Outsourced entirely to the HR department, it “normally”[1] encompasses collating few names of “wannabe” trainees, selecting an “acclaimed” trainer, most likely to be a repeat, and fixing up a date and venue for the get-together. For the department it's most likely, completion of yet another scheduled activity and for most attending the event, a company sponsored vacation. It is so common to see companies wanting to train their employees on public speaking, team building and such other aspects all at once in one long session or “in a day or two” during a company sponsored outing in a remote vacation location. 

Cost Benefit Analysis.    Most “training” activities are undertaken with the premise, that it would improve individual soft skills, give fillip to trainees’ self -esteem, encourage better application of knowledge, enhance organisational loyalty, increase productivity and through all these, improve bottom lines. It is a fact, that organisations expect and trainers claim to transform people over a six-hour “development capsule”, albeit its doubtful utility and longevity. Most organisations would rethink expenditures on training, if cost benefit analysis of the efforts is genuinely undertaken. It would do a great deal of good to organisations, if it carries out an audit of the deliverables achieved in comparison to training objectives and events conducted. The entire process seems to have been taken right out of the “parable of the sower”

Context. Training is not a stand-alone activity. It must flow in coherence and context with organisational objectives. Each training activity is like adding mortar to bricks envisioned to create a structure that towers over others. Training activities conducted devoid of links to organisational aims and objectives are nothing more than pay-outs to trainers and vacation opportunities to employees. It is therefore very important to understand training in the “gestalt[2]” framework of organisational performance and growth. In this context, each individual is an important yet different constituent of a mighty entity under construction where training is the mortar ensuring right fit. It therefore becomes imperative to determine the specific areas where an individual should be trained. Random generalised training comes nowhere near such a defined process.

Recommendations

 (i)         Training Objectives. HR heads responsible for organisational training must draw up the training objectives for the organisation. These must primarily drive all training activities in the organisation and be catalysts to achieving organisational goals. 

 (ii)        Prioritisation. Technical and technological training must take precedence over other forms of individual or collective training. If process related training assumes importance in manufacturing industry, soft skills, aimed at improving interpersonal interactions is primary in hospitality industry where client interaction is the fulcrum. Focus on team-building should gain prominence where “team” is the force applied. 

(iii)      Need Identification. Though seemingly tedious a process, training needs of each individual in relation to the operational position held must be identified. The HR department can do this in consultation with other verticals. The differential between the deliverables expected and actual deliveries would indicate the quantum and quality of intervention required. 

(iv)      Grouping. Once such needs have been identified, individuals with similar needs can be grouped to be trained on that specific aspect. Though team building activities and bonding programs can be generalised and collectively carried out, it may be more beneficial if the grouping is intelligently done.  

(v)       Take-away Audit.    All training activities must be subjected to cost benefit and utility audit.  

(vi)      Intervention Diversity. Change of trainers would benefit the company and employees more through infusion of newer and diversified ideas as against a single trainer’s repeated inputs that may over time become stained by his or her own perceptions. A sense of routine tends to creep in to the process.

 [1] The term "normally" has been used with the intention of preventing accusations of malice.

[2] Though commonly known in the context of “gestalt theory”, gestalt as a term is used here in the sense of defining a whole or seeing the organisation as an entity much different from its individual components

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