In these doom-and-gloom times of credit crunch, how many times have you heard that the first budget to be cut will be training?  A recent report by e-Skills UK found that just 27% of all UK workers received training in the last 13 weeks and that training was most likely to be delivered at the employer’s premises and paid for by the employer.

The IT & telecoms industry invests on average £3300 per person being trained each year (off the job training and associated costs) – just 15% of telecoms training being done by e-learning.  Of the companies who do not invest in training or who do not invest as much, 84% believe their people are adequately trained – but then 92% of these companies believe lack of training is impacting on their business! Source: e-skills Bulletin. Quarter 2, 2008.

So – a lot of numbers but what does it all mean?

Is it that employers send groups of their people on expensive (perhaps vendor-specific) training courses once or twice a year, and consider their training “done”?  Or is it that they expect training to be done by osmosis?

Everyone knows that there is a lack of telecoms trainers, and, as instructor-led training is seen by some as the preferred option, they are willing to pay a premium for quality telecoms training.  But how do you know that you are sending your people on the right courses and that they will benefit from this expensive training method?  Do you know enough about your people’s existing skills before they go on that 2, 3 or 4 day course?  And are you only sending them on that time consuming training course just because the vendor is offering it?

The simple answer is to invest in some e-learning as ‘pre-training’.  In the ever-changing telecoms world, it’s vital that every method of learning is incorporated into your training strategy – and this is where e-learning will give you more “bang for your buck”! 

Before your people attend group training sessions, invest in some e-learning – it will bring them up to speed, familiarise them with the topic and ensure that they get the most out of the course.  Your instructor-led training provider should then be able to reduce the length of the classroom sessions reducing the impact of training on core business activities.

During e-learning you can track their progress and tackle any knowledge gaps.

After the training course, e-learning is there again to act as a revision tool and a reference guide.

Put simply – investing perhaps £100 on an e-learning course can ensure that your people get the most benefit from a £2000 instructor-led training course.

PTT’s e-learning courses start at £60+VAT and cost on average £105+VAT – buying in bulk can reduce this cost by a large margin!

Can you afford NOT to include e-learning in your training strategy?  For more details, ask Elaine.