TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT SESSION ONE: THE CONTEXT OF TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT

IN THIS SESSION The scope of T&D Identifying the need for T&D Designing, delivering and evaluating T&D Strategic (not reactive) T&D

DEFINITIONS Training involves the acquisition of skills, concepts or attitudes that result in improved performance in an on-the- job situation (Goldstein) Education is humanistic, liberal, self-actualising and concerned with equality, democratisation, liberation and creativity (Knapper & Cropley) Differences between training and development and learning and development

SCOPE OF TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT UK organisations spent £18.3 billion on off the job training in 2005/2006 (decline of 0.3% on 2004/2005) Private training companies have a 39% share of the market while FE Colleges have 19% 31% of trainees think training provided by private training companies is unsatisfactory (15% for FE Colleges) Training much more accessible to managers, professionals and graduates

SCOPE OF TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT Problems with time and tight budgets More short courses with clear benefit, less e-learning and softer courses Training makes significant income difference to the young and highly educated Training makes significant job security difference to older and lower educated workers Training needs to be accompanied by strong commitment to change

THE UK SKILLS BASE 5 million working age adults have no qualifications Poor skills of literacy and numeracy Low productivity rates through low skill levels Job opportunities will fall for unskilled workers from 3.4 million today to 600,000 in 2020 (Leitch Report 2006)

ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT Aptitudes, Knowledge & Skills Tasks & Goals People Choose to Work People Choose to Expend Effort People Choose to Persist Costs & Benefits

A SYSTEMATIC APPROACH TO TRAINING Investigate Training Needs Design Training Conduct Training Assess Effectiveness of Training

PROBLEMS & SOLUTIONS A large high street electrical retailers was experiencing problems with its poor after sales service to customers who were dissatisfied with the goods they had purchased. Watchdog type programmes had started highlighting the plight of unhappy customers who were not receiving the same levels of customer care from sales staff when they were attempting to return goods they had bought because they were faulty or they were not what the customer wanted. What is the problem and does it have a training solution?

INVESTIGATING TRAINING NEEDS Performance Records Assessment/Development Centres Self-Assessment Performance Appraisal

DESIGNING TRAINING How People Learn and Remember Skills Acquisition Preconditions for Learning Motivation for Learning Needs of Adult Learners Transfer of Training

CONDUCTING TRAINING Building Rapport Establishing Credibility Managing the Group Counselling the Individual Handling Conflict Facilitating Transfer of Training

EVALUATING TRAINING Reaction Learning Behaviour Results

STRATEGIC TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT T&D Professionals: – expect spending to rise – contribute to business strategy – understand business objectives – have limited budgets

STRATEGIC TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT Training should run like a business: – assessment of training activities – making a business case – planning phase – installation phase – delivering value

TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT SESSION TWO: HOW PSYCHOLOGY CAN HELP TRAINING

IN THIS SESSION Understanding memory to improve training and learning Fear of learning and learned helplessness Rehearsal, storage and retention of new materials Acquiring new skills

SOME DEFINITIONS Learning means cognitive and physical activity that gives rise to a relatively permanent change in knowledge, skills or attitudes Training means organised efforts to assist learning through instruction and practice Job-specific training for current role or development for longer-term perspective

FEAR OF LEARNING SITUATIONS Classical Conditioning is the process by which we learn that one stimulus predicts another and we respond in anticipation of that fact What has this got to do with training?

REWARDING LEARNING Instrumental Conditioning says a response in a given situation will be followed by a reinforcement Benefits and problems of partial reinforcement The case of learned helplessness What has this got to do with training?

REHEARSAL & REMEMBERING The importance of quick, deep and meaningful rehearsal Problems of access and passive rehearsal Three stages of memory: acquisition, retention and retrieval What has this got to do with training?

EFFECTIVE STORAGE Does practice make perfect? Sheer exposure doesn’t mean learning Importance of elaborate processing Importance of generation effect What has this got to do with training?

ELABORATION IN STUDY SKILLS The next time you read a book, do: – preview each chapter and identify the main sections – make up questions relevant to each section – read section trying to answer questions – recite key material from section – review main points of text

EFFECTIVE STORAGE The importance of “chunking” Memory for pictorial material Memory for meaning What has this got to do with training?

EFFECTIVE RETENTION Decay Hypothesis (memories weaken as a function of time) Interference Hypothesis (other memories compete) Retrieval-Cue Hypothesis (losing access to the cues)

EFFECTIVE RETENTION Study and retention intervals Interference of new material The importance of arousal What has this got to do with training?

EFFECTIVE RETRIEVAL Memory failure often caused by poor access to appropriate retrieval cues Memory and context dependency Memory and state dependency False inference and recall What has this got to do with training?

SKILL ACQUISITION From unconscious incompetence to unconscious competence Stages of skill acquisition (Fitts 64: Anderson 82) – cognitive stage – associative stage – autonomous stage

APPLICATIONS TO TRAINING Identify component tasks of a final performance Ensure each component tasks is fully achieved Arrange learning in a hierarchy Master early stages before moving on Difficult to apply to cognitive skills

STILL TO COME Types of knowledge Impact of training method on learning Impact of support on learning Impact of personal factors on learning Transfer of learning to the workplace