In connection to previous post that highlights the differences between an ordinary and executive training program, this post identifies different approaches to train executives. These innovative ways have been adopted by some of the world’s leading companies that continuously invest in developing their human resource, and get the best out of it.

1. Action Learning

This is the most widely used method for executive learning program. Action learning method has following attributes:

• The CEO selects the challenge faced by business. The chosen challenge may be a strategic issue, a hard nut to crack even for senior management.
• The training program consists of teams of participants. They are responsible to learn about the challenge and come up with recommendations to resolve it.
• Participants are company’s executives or high potential employees. They are chosen by means of success planning process.
• There is an executive coach who may be a senior executive sponsor responsible to conduct the training.

Benefits

• Participants have a great opportunity to broaden their knowledge, enhance leadership capabilities, and get valuable exposure.
• Organizations can get high ROI by resolving a potential business challenge through its executive team.

Action learning is harder to design and implement. You may want to hire someone experienced. Not to mention that your training space or rented  training room must be well equipped with modern-day requirements.

2. Business War Games

This one is really interesting. In this method, participants are divided into three to four teams. All but one team represent company’s competitors. The information is gathered around the competition (real and legal) and the teams compete against each other in a number of rounds.

You are going to need an external consultant to run war games, if you don’t have competitive intelligence to design them.

Benefits

• Executives get learning experience and an opportunity to improve business analysis skills
• You’ll be able to identify your own weaknesses and find opportunities to capitalize on competitors’ weak areas.

3. Business Simulations

This method is, in many ways, similar to war games. Business simulations involve participants competing against each other in a simulating environment. This method involves computer-based environment, so you may want to rent a classroom setup with the latest computer systems and software. Alternatively, you can introduce board games too.

Benefits

• Business simulation games are focused on building behavior skills and business skills of executives
• You can customize simulations by focusing on your company or the industry your serve in.

4. Executive Team Development

In order to get the maximum out of your executive, you can work on their soft skills and improve their coordination in achieving your business goal. You’ll need an external consultant with extensive experience of team development. He would assess teams, identify weaknesses and design discussion forums or activities to highlight behavioral issues within the teams.

Here, highly skilled consultant is very important who can address issues in a professional manner, rather than offending people. You can expect dramatic results from this kind of training.

For any kind of setup you can rely on rental facilities to get best results. You can get also rent a seminar room to conduct workshops and training sessions for executives related to different industries. Or you can conduct a company training in a relatively small facility.

In this post, you will learn the essentials of designing a training program, and implement them in your workshops, seminars, classroom sessions or field training.

There are 8 major design steps for a training program and each of them requires attention to details. You need to make sure that the program must be flexible and it can last for a long period.

1. Identify Purpose and Target Audience

Be clear about your training needs to be accomplished. The purpose of training must be clear and you should have an idea about participants, to be able to deliver your training effectively. It would be better if you’ve already worked out Training Needs Assessment. Write down the purpose of your training and the audience it covers, and promote your program.

2. Determine the Needs of Participants

There are different means to get this information:

• By means of written survey that you can conduct at the time of registration: Collect general information, such as, education, level of income/knowledge, years of service/studies, and anything that’s relevant for your training.
• By calling a random sample of registrants to note down general information: here, you can get detailed information, such as suitable time and days of the week for training; option of accessibility and more
• Have access to company’s past training data: you can note down employees’ evaluation and feedback related to training in past.

The information received will help you assess the needs of participants.

3. Describe Goals and Objectives of Training

This step is related to your expectations from training. You need to plan activities for every part of training. Choose appropriate training material and design evaluation procedures. Communicate program intent to administrators or supervisors, and make sure that the training is aligned with the purpose intended. If you don’t have in-house training facility, choose a suitable training room rental facility in Singapore or renting a seminar room according to the needs of training.

4. Sketch the Content

Content outline is divided into three parts:

• Introduction: in which you have to establish constructive environment for learning
• Learning components: these are the tools to engage participants in different training activities
• Evaluation component: minimizes the gap between training and real life scenarios, to ensure all participants feel satisfied.

5. Develop Instructional Activities

To make your training result-oriented there must be a variety of alternative strategies based on:

• Learning styles
• Adult learning principles
• Education level/work experience of participants
• Group size
• Trainer’s style
• Kind of information or skill to be provided

6. Develop Written Design for Training

A written document must include a detailed training program, along with the goals. It must also include when and where each trainer will be introduced and who will flesh out major sections of training. The written document will help you and your team to keep track of the entire training process.

7. Prepare Evaluation Form for Participants

The evaluation form will help you find out about:

• Knowledge, expertise and style of trainer
• How effective was the training
• Whether more training is required on the particular topic

8. Establish Follow-up Activities

Some strategies include:

• Mentoring,
• Booster sessions,
• Individual Coaching,
• Study groups,
• Ongoing communication between trainer and participants,
• Posting updates on websites and sending newsletters.

Staff training is vital for business specific purposes, no matter what business you have. They may need a little help and instruction in handling a new book system, first aid or food handling. Including training that extends employees toward specific goals can also improve job satisfaction. A satisfied employee stays longer and shows better productivity while working as a team player.

Less Training – High Turnover

Lack of training facility is just a lame excuse, when you can get a training room rental with latest facilities and equipment. According to recent survey, 40% of the poorly trained employees vacate their positions without completing 5 years. Majority of them cite absence of skills training as the major cause of leaving.

With one contributor gone, either one or all of these things are likely to happen:

• The overall productivity slips which leads to decline in sales.
• Existing staff has to work longer, which leads to low team morale.
• You need to screen and interview for the vacant post, followed by training.

Turnover cost rises with every step and varies with position, place and nature of work. For instance, a replacement cost of frontline employee can go beyond $2500. That’s what poor training (or the lack of training or team building) can do to you.

What Good Training Can Do To Your Business

Investing in good training is a little bit costly, but it pays you back big time. Here is a list of benefits training can provide you:

1. Trained employees can manage your complex computer system, increase sales and resolve complaints in a better way. That’s what you need at the end of the day – better business.
2. New employees with loads of theoretical knowledge want more from you. They wouldn’t settle for just a pay cheque. If new hires see you grooming talent and provide learning opportunities, they will stay with you for a longer period. You’re likely to receive more resumes and less salary negotiations if you have a proper development plan for recruits.
3. Continuous and planned training raises job satisfaction. Whether it’s a company-owned facility or rented seminar room, improving skill sets of your employees will help them show better engagement and involvement at all levels.
4. As mentioned above, training can help retain employees by making them professional, committed and loyal to you. If you face a new challenge and offer your employees to learn how to resolve it, they’ll be keen to take this opportunity to add another skill in their resumes. The emphasis is to remove boredom by keeping them involved with new activities.
5. With so much to offer, training adds another some professional attributes that are vital for any organization – efficiency, alertness and flexibility. Cross-training helps employees to learn about other departments and their general procedures. It raises the confidence level and improves decision making.

Small to medium companies are showing interest in grooming their employees. They’re not only investing in making them loyal and efficient, they’re keen to retain employees by means of intangible incentives that can take them closer to their long-term objectives.

Success and quality of workforce go hand in hand. In fact, success is the result of high performance and compliance to work standards. Your vision, knowledge about the market, work principles and their implementation become the driving force for the workforce to take your company to the top. And you know, it’s quite difficult to have an all-alert, well educated and self motivated team, unless you provide them opportunities to learn. This is why companies invest in training and development.

Why You Need To Develop Workforce?

Workforce development is as crucial for small companies as for large-scale companies. While large companies enjoy the privilege of getting market’s top professionals and fresh minds from top universities, small businesses need to create attraction through high-end training and job-specific courses.

Places like Singapore offer solid platforms for small scale business to improve the quality of workforce. To give your employees and added advantage, you can conduct seminars, workshops and classroom sessions by renting a training room in Singapore.

Here are few good reasons to conduct training and seminars for your employees:

1. First of all, the management and executives need to have the “Wow Factor” that can give you an advantage over your competitors. With critical thinking courses, you can improve their analytical skills to help them understand complex data, and to take quick decisions if needed.
2. With effective management and supervision, you can face any kind of challenge, and succeed. You need to encourage senior employees and executives to take part in such workshops and training sessions where they can learn new methods to tackle internal and external challenges of your company.
3. Do you know your ROI? Do you know where your business stands after 5 years? What are the possible markets where you can penetrate and expand your customer base? These concerns are best answered by your business analyst. If you haven’t considered business analysis training session, better go for it now, as more and more companies are sending their employees to get that value added skill.
4. If you’re new in the market, you might need to develop quality standards for your company. The best way is to send employees to training sessions and workshops to get as much awareness as possible. Even if you’re not new, there may be chances that your internal quality standards require improvements. The only way you can figure out weaknesses in your quality standards is by conducting a classroom session on latest market standards.
5. Primary objective of any small business is enhancement and expansion. Business enhancement is an improvement in more than one aspect, including work standards, customer base, increased potential of employees and business, improvement in performance and many other things. You need to design a professional development course highlighting the key factors where you need improvement. You can get a seminar room for rent and conduct a comprehensive employee development course for a week.
6. Motivate your employees and lift their spirits with team building activities so that they perform better at work and more productive.

Bonus – Conduct training for individuals

Apart from major training courses, you can invest in individual improvement of employees, on following courses:

• Communication skills
• Presentation skills
• Customer service
• Interpersonal skills
• Business writing, and more

Needless to say that you have to find out the weaknesses in your company and take measures accordingly. Focus on things that need immediate improvements. All you need is continuous monitoring and consistency in employee development.

If you’re new to training, you may be one of those thinking that adults can be trained with traditional techniques used in schools and colleges. It would be true if you were living 20 years in past, today things are quite different. Along with enhanced abilities and capabilities adults possess, technology has made a huge impact on their knowledge and thinking. Unlike past, when classroom setups and practical training used to dominate training industry, things have changed because of the influx of hi-tech equipment, better training facilities and result-oriented tools.

Moreover, researches have indicated that adults require far better techniques and more focused approach in order to understand new concepts and learn new traits. That’s because they have concrete thoughts and concepts which may be difficult to alter.

As a trainer, you need to understand different patterns of learning, to make your training effective and profitable for your organization. Here are some major adult learning principles, along with important training techniques to help you create result-oriented training sessions.

Principle – 1: They Want To Tell The World What They’re Capable of

You can expect a wealth of knowledge backed with practical experience in adult training sessions. Adult learners are likely to share their stories with you and other trainees.

Technique:

You should encourage them to share relevant information. It always helps improve the quality of training. The best way to engage them is to include activities in which they can use their knowledge and skills.

Principle – 2: They’re Self-Directed And Decision Makers

As adults are better decision makers, you can expect them to argue and disagree on some topics. They are self-directed individuals and prefer their instincts over external sources.

Technique:

Minimize arguments and conflicts in training by introducing problem-solving activities. Put them under different situations related to their position as employees, and indicate where they make mistakes. If someone comes up with a better solution to a problem, accept and appreciate him.

Principle – 3: They Follow Different Learning Styles

They may disapprove the way you train them. So, be prepared to respect the way they’re comfortable with.

Technique:

Don’t force them to learn your way. A flexible training is far better than one-dimensional training.

Principle – 4: They’re Willing to Participate

By preventing them to participate in training, you’re actually increasing the level of boredom. It means, you will not reach anywhere with all those manuals and training scripts.

Technique:

Include presentations, role plays, quizzes and discussion sessions to assess how much they have learned.

Principle – 5: They Get Motivated By Meaningful Information

They can understand what’s relevant or irrelevant to their job. They might show reluctance or straight forward discontent if you try to engage them in seemingly irrelevant activity. On the other hand, they’re keen to take part in activities corresponding to their jobs.

Technique:

Emphasize on content and clearly indicate the outcomes of activities that coincide with their original job.

TrainingRoomSG.com offers affordable training room rental in Singapore and provides well furnished facilities to deliver professional training for employees. All you need is, read and research your participants to add variety in your training. This is the only way you can help organizations get quality workforce and best results.

Whenever you hire a new employee, you gamble. You might get another creative, talented and profitable member in your team, or you end up getting a machine that performs specified tasks, not more than that. He might be the best creative liar who slacks on company time and leaves within a month. Small businesses deal with this issue more often.

To help you minimize risks of hiring less competent people, a potential training process is the best tool that carves new hires into ambitious and creative workers. In fact, majority of those leaving the company within a month say that the company lacks proper training setup, including a classroom where they can get theoretical knowledge about operations.

But before you call a meeting on devising a solid training plan for new employees, understand what you need to do.

Prep Tips Employee Training

1. Assess your business and its scope

This step is vital for you to hold on to your employees. You’re investing in them and you should secure your investment by elaborating how your business provides learning and growing opportunities, and how what they need to do to become leaders in future. If new employees understood your vision and their job description, chances are, they will stick with you for a long time.

2. Create a training manual

You must have operations manual of your business. Add the basic operations, overview of extended operations and complete procedure of how your business works. Incorporate and elaborate initial-level activities through pictures, graphs, flowcharts and bullet text. Add technical jargon with a complete guide so that your employees can learn quickly. You might want to include policies and procedures and information related to probationary period as well.

3. Plan employee training

On the basis of training manual, evaluate your employees and pick the best ones who can train on technical aspects better than the heads. Still, you might need a skilled trainer to assist and direct these employees throughout the training. Secondly, divide the training into different phases with proper time frame. In orientation phase, start by introducing yourself, followed by the management, including heads of the departments, HR, manager, team leaders, supervisors, administrator, trainer and his assistants, and other related people.

Critically analyze these procedures and organize training steps. Other people have also have to play their part with small presentations, introductory sessions, Q&A and more. However, the onus of training lies on the person who delivers technical details of work.

4. Assess the place

Place of training is the part of Training Needs Assessment, and it should be well supplied with equipment and every kind of accessories. Depending upon the nature of business, they maintain a small training facility, but it may be insufficient. Small business these days, rent training room facility because of the lack of space and supplies. The irony is, instead of looking for affordable options, business ignore the importance of theoretical knowledge related to operations.

5. Formulate your training strategy

Lastly, you need to assess the whole program in terms of time and cost, and make necessary adjustments where possible. While training remains their as the vital element of your business, it must ensure ROI based on productivity, quality and consistency.

If you need seminar room for your event, visit us at www.TrainingRoomSG.com/seminar-room-rental

High customer service turnover is not a new thing, yet it’s a big concern for small-scale businesses. As you know, high employee turnover proves to be a financially costly for businesses. At the same time, it’s not necessary for every customer service department, as there are some good businesses where customer service representatives have been working happily for years. Before you climb down into tips and tricks to reduce employee turnover, better understand why you’re dealing with it.

What Does High Employee Turnover In Customer Service Indicate?

Complexity of product:

You cannot expect your employees to understand each and every aspect of products. Most of the time, they have to deal with a large variety of them. Then there are tiers, value added services, changes in return policies, increased taxes, shipment policies, refund policies and much much more. On your part, after giving them a small refresher for 15 to 20 minutes, it’s job done. Now they’ll understand themselves, isn’t it?

Plenty of high potential employees leave every year with a firm decision of never to look back at this job again. That is, because, they find themselves short of knowledge.

Lack of rewards and benefits:

You hired them on a fixed salary and set sky-high targets to achieve. Rather than thinking about getting perks and privileges, employees dwell in fear of losing their jobs.  Initially, out of all enthusiasm, most of them might show above average performance. Real problem starts when they start to show reluctance and you start to get uncomfortable with their attitude. Are you satisfied with your incentive plans? It doesn’t matter if you do. Your employees have rejected it!

Lack of idea sharing

Companies that never change with time, face far greater challenges that employee retention. If you wonder you’re the only one who can think and make the right decisions, you’d never have to read these lines at the first place. There may be others who may not be as gifted as you, but they talk to real customers. Your employees are the best resource to find out what’s changing around and what needs to be done to adapt that change.

By now, you must have some issues of your own, but first, you need to improve on these factors:

How to Improve

1. Develop a continuous and recurring training schedule which must be based on all aspects of your operations. You may consider getting a seminar room rental for product refreshers and updates. A good training room environment that encourages employees to focus on their current competence level , is vital for better training. Organize these refreshers in classroom rental and let them share their ideas as well.
2. Your incentive or bonus plan must have realistic and achievable targets. Encourage top performers to maintain their efforts by means of appreciation, relaxation and other benefits. Prefer senior and experienced employees during promotions or inter-department transfers.
3. Conduct one-to-one sessions in which employees can share their experiences and suggest solutions to a number of issues.
4. Send them timely performance updates. Pay attention to their flaws and help them minimize errors.

Contact Us if you would like to book an affordable and convenient training and seminar rooms.