Training your employees to do the best possible job they can as well as help them polish their skill sets to remain competitive members of the workforce is important to any company that wishes to see booming success. In house training provides an avenue for businesses to help show their employees that their continual growth is important to them while also building a stronger and greater team. But where do you even begin when you start to design your training program?

Training for In-house Managers

Addressing the “W”s

Before any tactics or methods of training can be discussed, you must sit down and write down (this is not mandatory but highly recommended) what you want to reap from the in house training. What is your goal? It can range from developing new management skills or teaching new means of completing old skills to team building. Next, think about who the training will be tailored to. New employees? Current employees? Just a particular department? It is important to recognize who will benefit from the training you have in mind in order to save yourself from wasting your time and money, but also your employees’. Third, when? This doesn’t necessarily mean nailing down permanent dates, but thinking of timing and frequency. How much time are you going to allocate for training? What time frame would you like it to be completed in? Keep in mind that more frequent and shorter training sessions tend to be more effective.

Finding the Right Training for You and Your Company

Much like any teaching, there are a multitude of different ways to approach in house training. These methods include traditional classroom, interactive, hands-on, and computer based training. In designing your program, tailor it to play to the best learning aptitudes of the audience and what your goals are. For example, if you are training your IT department, you may lean towards a computer based method of training in order to provide a certain sense of familiarity to help grow skills. However, on the flip side, if you have older employees who may not be well versed in technology and you would also like to develop another skill, computer-based training such as virtual simulations may be ideal for you in order to take two birds with one stone. In the end it is up to what you would like to do.

However, it is recommended to take bits and pieces of each of the different methods and blend them together in order to engage a comprehensive spectrum of learners that most likely make up the student group. Additionally, keep in mind your own budget and what different facets of each method requires moneywise.

External training provider vs. in-house training

There are a number of benefits gained from using an external training provider compared with using an in-house “expert”.

For example, external providers often offer a greater breadth of experience, as they come from outside and hence have experience of other ways of thinking and doing. So, they will be better equipped to challenge any entrenched attitudes that may be present in your staff.

What’s more, external training companies may have a greater depth of knowledge in particular specialisms. This makes them able to offer a more detailed and nuanced training experience compared with in-house training.

Also, training providers are usually more flexible in scaling up or down the volume of delivery, with a variety of training packages available. These range from short one-off training days for smaller groups, to training courses designed for spanning multiple sessions with larger groups.

Notably, the most important benefit in hiring an external training provider is that the person(s) delivering the training will possess the relevant set of skills required to deliver training effectively. It’s important to remember that leading a training course requires a special set of skills that in-house staff may not have: just because someone is a great manager or an in-house expert does not mean that they are necessarily a good training facilitator.

How Much Do External Training Companies Cost?

While there can be many benefits to using external training providers, it should be noted that doing so is not always cost effective. External trainers typically cost more than internal trainers, and while this may be a worthwhile investment, costs will nonetheless factor into any decision about training.

For example, some external trainers want their travel expenses and accommodation paid for, particularly if they are travelling from farther away. Furthermore, costs vary depending upon the length of the course. Benchmark costs for one-day short courses can be upwards of £500, although certain institutions that provide courses (such as the Chartered Institute of Marketing and the Charted Institute of Personnel & Development) may offer discounts.

Collect Training Feedback

Your training program should not be inflexible, rather it should be able to be moulded and improved upon based on the feedback you receive from the group you are training. The training is, after all, provided in order to help your employees grow and in turn, help your company grow as well. Take into strong consideration what your employees have to say to further optimise your in house training.