Business 101: Principles of Management

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This lesson discusses the process of assessing the training needs of an organization, which begins with looking at what is presently being done there and comparing that to what needs to be done. New training plans can then be put into place, making it possible for managers to solve problems.

From Here to There: Assessing Training Needs

Assessing training needs means analyzing key factors for performance in an organization in order to bridge the gap between what is currently being done and what needs to be done.

Just in the same way that individuals perform a personal inventory to determine what changes need to be made, like losing weight or getting in shape, organizations also analyze their weak spots and identify areas to improve - but on a much larger scale.

The Process of Assessing Training Needs

Let's visit Happy Cat's Pet Grooming Shop to see how their owner, Freda, assesses the need for training her cat groomers. Cat grooming is not easy. Cats are quite limber, like to jump and can run pretty fast, too. It takes skill and practice to deal with these animals, and proper training is important for cat groomers.

When Freda's clients began complaining about the quality of the grooming and the amount of accidents their cats experienced in her shop, she knew she had to come up with a training plan to address these issues.

The process of assessing training involves the following steps:

• Take an organizational inventory of what is presently being done
• Compare it to what should be done

There are many different things to look at when comparing present operations to what needs to happen in the future. Here are a few questions Freda asked herself as she thought about training needs:

• Do my groomers possess the knowledge, skills and ability (or aptitude) to groom cats?
• Do we have the right technology in place?
• Are my groomers happy grooming only cats?
• Do we have the ability to meet our customers' expectations?

Freda thought long and hard about these questions. She came up with a good plan for finding the information she needed to assess her employees' specific training needs. She dug deep into her business and compiled and defined the following information:

• Company mission and vision
• Business goals
• Job descriptions
• Employee skill levels
• Employee behaviors
• Technology changes

Now that Freda had all of the data she needed, the next thing she did was carefully review each item. Freda found the following gaps:

The company mission and vision stated that Freda's pet grooming shop would be a safe and friendly place for cats. From the looks of things, Happy Cat's Pet Grooming Shop was not very safe and friendly at all. In fact, everyone was miserable at Happy Cat's Pet Grooming Shop.

Freda knew that she had to gather her employees to discuss the mission and vision of the company. This meant training all employees on the culture and the expectations of the business. She did this by providing a copy of the mission and vision statement to all employees. In doing so, Freda gave her employees organizational culture training. She also trained them on how to provide safe service through safety training.

Freda's business goals were to maintain her current clients and even gain a few more from word-of-mouth. Because clients were upset with the treatment of their cats during grooming, nobody was recommending Happy Cat's to their friends.

This meant that quick action needed to be taken to keep current clients and gain more. Freda sent a survey to all of her clients. The information that she received helped her develop a plan for her employees. All of her employees received customer service training that addressed the points raised in the customer survey.

Freda reviewed the job description she wrote for groomers to determine whether it matched the duties expected of her employees. She noticed that the description was written for a dog groomer, not a cat groomer, which is clearly not right for Happy Cat's.

Freda then looked at her employees' skill levels. She noticed that many of her groomers did not know how to bathe a cat properly. This led to cats slipping out of the bathtub. Injuries were on the rise.

Freda re-wrote the job description to include cats. It also included the skills and abilities each groomer would need to properly groom cats. She hired a cat grooming trainer to work with each employee. The employees received skills training to ensure that each employee was performing his or her job properly.

She also observed employee behavior. There were serious morale issues. With all of the client complaints, employees began blaming each other. Arguments were disrupting the workflow. Employees were unhappy. Freda hired a trainer to work with employees on conflict resolution and anger management.

Finally, Freda looked at technology in the shop. She realized that the shop's equipment, tables and bathtubs were designed for dogs, not cats. The groomers (and the cats) had no chance of success if the wrong equipment was being used. Freda replaced all of the equipment with cat-friendly equipment. The company she ordered the equipment from even sent a trainer to the shop, so employees could learn how to use everything properly. The employees received technology training in the use of equipment.

In her initial analysis, the gaps between the work being performed and the work that was expected became quite obvious to Freda. The best way for Freda to correct the problem was to come up with new training plans for all of her employees.

Lesson Summary

In summary, assessing training needs involves analyzing key factors for performance in an organization in order to bridge the gap between what is currently being done to what needs to be done. You can accomplish this by taking an organizational inventory of what is presently being done and comparing it to what is desired.

Once the inventory is taken and the desired outcomes have been established, new training plans can be developed for employees. These plans may include organizational culture training, customer service training, skills training and technology training.