Training and Development and Challenges During Covid 19

 

Introduction

Training and Development (T&D) refers to educational activities within a company created to enhance the knowledge and skills of employees while providing information and instruction on how to better perform specific tasks (Talentlyft.com, 2021). It is an overall effort to develop the personality and outlook of employees of an organization. T & D offers maximum utilization of human resources by enhancing the quality and output of human skills, increases productivity and profitability, enhances the organizational culture, increases quality and safety within workplace, improves organizational morale. Finally T & D is an ultimate indicator of corporate image.

Change of T & D during Covid 19

T & D has made a complete transformation as training, conferences, workshops and instructor led classes that gathered everyone together in one room were canceled indefinitely. Regardless of a pandemic situation such as covid 19 companies still need value creating efforts to protect and sustain the quality and deliverability of employees so that companies itself could adapt and flourish to changing diversities at tough times.

Digital and virtual learning programs were already on the rise before COVID-19 struck, and there is already a marked increase in such learning programs, which many younger employees embrace (Kshirsagar, Mansour, McNally and Metakis, 2021). There is also greater emphasis on social learning methods. It avoids conventional learning models and is based on new behaviors that is acquired by observing or imitating others. Even during pandemics an organization that values good T & D practices provides way for its employees to earn new skills and enhance knowledge, creates new and improved job positions and creates an environment that employees can enjoy working while being motivated even during unpredictable times.

Challenges to T & D

Pandemics itself offers various adversities to businesses across the globe. Among them incorporating T & D to business operations too is challenging because most importantly the grater reliance on technologies means that employees must be trained to operate them correctly and work alongside them efficiently (Alberti, 20202). As employees have different levels of skills and knowledge, some employees might find it difficult to engage in T & D virtually using emerging new technological methods.

Issues and inconveniences are sometimes unavoidable making more hindrances to connectivity to live coaching and virtual learning efforts. Such troubles act as discouraging factors to T & D. upskilling is another effort by organizations that teach current employees with new skills. Digital transformation and upskilling requirements can take people outside their comfort zone which is quite challenging.

 

References

Alberti, S., 2020. 3 ways COVID-19 is transforming learning and development HRD. [online] HRD. Available at: <https://www.hrdconnect.com/2020/06/01/3-ways-covid-19-is-transforming-learning-and-development/> [Accessed 1 May 2021].

 

Kshirsagar, A., Mansour, T., McNally, L. and Metakis, M., 2021. Adapting workplace learning in the time of coronavirus. [online] McKinsey Accelerate. Available at: <https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Business%20Functions/McKinsey%20Accelerate/Our%20Insights/Adapting%20workplace%20learning%20in%20the%20time%20of%20coronavirus/Adapting-workplace-learning-in-the-time-of-coronavirus-vF.pdf> [Accessed 1 May 2021].

 

Recruiting and Hiring Resources. 2021. What is Training and Development?. [online] Available at: <https://www.talentlyft.com/en/resources/what-is-training-and-development> [Accessed 1 May 2021].

COVID-19: Overcoming Work force Challenges and Business Continuity

Introduction

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted to every aspect of human life and presents a serious threat to people, businesses and economies across the world.

Business process functions, including finance, supply chain, procurement, human resources, marketing, sales and customer operations are being severely disrupted.  Over the last year business operations are still being challenged to ensure the business continuity as everyone cannot operate remotely and for some sectors physical presence of employees are still required to continue the operation.

Role of HR 

 In such situation the role of People and HR functions in shaping the organizational response can hardly be overstated as employee health and well-being are crucial to the organization’s continuity.  Also, it’s important to focus on resiliency and its capacity to reframe its future in the new normal to come and actions needs to be in-lined with the organization’s business continuity planning. In such difficult times to aid human resilience, Empathetic leadership and communications are two key areas that to be focused.

Recommendations

1. Take immediate steps to ensure the safety and well-being of employees.
2. Prioritize actions that put people first and exploit the capabilities: 
3. Enable people to work and connect with colleagues from diverse, safe, secure locations. 
4. Create safe and secure working environments through regular sanitization. 
5. De-densify workspaces by limiting the number of people working together, curbing large meetings and ensuring that protocols are followed in canteens, elevators and areas of common use.
6.  Limit all non-essential business travel and client visits. 
7. Align with local health and safety guidelines
8. Identify priority processes and establish a command center to manage a virtual workforce.
9. Take action to meet the needs of key stakeholders: 
10. Identify priorities of critical processes such as employee payroll, healthcare and supply chain etc
11. Establish a command center for a virtual workforce to measure quality, productivity, compliance, , people engagement and workforce well-being.
12. Be proactive and establish a comprehensive and sustainable customer-oriented plan 
13. Bring together highly skilled, distributed teams that can log in anytime, anywhere and deliver on customer commitments at scale. 
14. Build a broader ecosystem around the organization’s workforce to enable collaboration across a broader set of priorities—including healthcare and childcare which lead to improved morale and engagement levels resulting in better business outcome

Conclusion 

Adopting a pragmatic, collaborative approach with the strong and active communication strategy are crucial to adapt to run the business in new ways and improve the employee well-being and engagement across the team which contributes to maintaining the business continuity. 

References

⦁ COVID-19: How firms can protect their workforce, operations and values (Online)
https://www.ey.com/en_gl/workforce/covid-19-how-firms-can-protect-their-workforce-operations-and-values
[Accessed 02 May 2021] 

⦁ COVID-19: Continuity for Operations in Crisis | Accenture (Online)
https://www.accenture.com/_acnmedia/PDF-120/Accenture-COVID-19-Continuity-in-Crisis-Effective-Business-Services.pdf
[Accessed 02 May 2021] 

Use of Workforce Analytics in an Organization

Introduction

In this fast moving world in an organization decisions should not take merely based on the gut feelings. Managers should consider data and analytics before taking a decision. Workforce analytics helps managers to acquire information about different talents and then develop a strategy of deploying these skills for new business events and leadership development. As per Beeline (2012) report, the workflow and productivity of workforce can be enhanced more efficiently and effectively if we can measure the human dimension of a firm in a better way. The human element can be quantified and understood as the essence of workforce analytics.

Data analysis is becoming a widespread in the cooperate world. The finance, customer service and sales functions all use data abundantly, and organizations are now looking more analysis in the domain of human resources as well. 

The initial step to introducing more data analysis into the HR decision-making process is having the will to do it. The data must also be presented in a clear and accessible way for workforce analytics to obtain valuable business impact. Clear decisions can only derive from well-organized data. 

                                                    source:https://www.salesforce.com/

Benefits of workforce analytics in an organizations

Workforce analytics can help organizations to more productively address challenges or opportunities in human resources management. 

1. Capability to identify potential candidates who best match with organizational needs and work culture.
2. Capability to forecast which employees will be high-performers so that the right resources are provided to retain them.
3. Discover the need for future organizational needs so that recruitment will satisfy talent requirements.
4. Discover what factors indicate employee engagement and job satisfaction in order to sustain a better performing workforce.
5. Recognize and flag upcoming talent for future succession planning.

Conclusion

Workforce analytics is a new corporate strategy. It can escalate fresh culture in the workforce. Human intervention and intuition are also essential for successful workforce analytics to understand and extract the intelligence from the data to better inform business decisions (Beeline, 2012). 

Kiron et al. (2011) suggested that lack of an adequate analytics strategy is increasing which is likely to put the future of the current firms in jeopardy. With a full range of analytics capabilities governed by an integrated analytics strategy, organizations are better positioned to widen, or narrow, the distance between themselves and competitors to their own best advantage. There is no consistent or unique “best practices” workforce analytics strategy which is a panacea for all organizations as issues of different types of organizations are different.

References

Beeline. (2012).Workforce Analytics: How to define, Measure and Drive Productivity in Today’s Organization, retrieved October 11, 2012 from http://www.beeline.com/downloads/pdf/BE-workforce-analytics.pdf

Harvey, E. (2012), Effectiveness of workforce analytics and dashboards. Human Resources Magazine, 16(6), 24-25.

Hota, J. and Ghosh, D., 2013. Workforce Analytics Approach:An emerging Trend of Workforce Management. [online] ResearchGate.net. Available at: <https://www.researchgate.net/publication/261173868_Workforce_Analytics_ApproachAn_emerging_Trend_of_Workforce_Management/link/0c9605336ad2e13e9e000000/download> [Accessed 2 May 2021].

Kiron, D., Shockley, R., Kruschwitz, N., Finch, G., & Haydock, M. (2011). Analytics: The widening divide: How Companies are achieving competitive advantage through analytics. MITSloan Management Review

Role of Ethics in Management of Organization

Introduction

The management of ethics in the organization have huge benefits both moral and even practical for everyone. this is particularly true nowadays when it is critical to understand and manage highly diversified organization culture. The managers primarily responsible for managing ethics in the organization. The ethical culture of an organization says lot about what a organization values. Ethics codes are one way to express the prevailing values and outlines guideposts to get that goal. 

Current unethical issues in an organization

1. Resorting to dishonesty, trickery or deception.
2. Distortion of facts to mislead or confuse.
3. Manipulating people emotionally by exploiting their vulnerabilities.
4. Creation of false documents to show increased profits.
5. Avoiding penalty or compensation for unlawful act.
6. Lack of transparency and resistance to investigation.
7. Harming the environment by exceeding the government prescribed norms for pollution
8. Sexual discrimination

What management can do to create a more ethical organizational culture

1. Be a role model and be visible
2. Communicate ethical expectations.
3. Offer ethics training
4. Visibly reward ethical acts and punish unethical ones
5. Provide protective mechanisms

source:SlideShare.com

An ethical organization culture is one that offers priority to employee rights, fair procedures, equity in pay and promotion, promotion of tolerance, compassion, loyalty and honesty in the treatment of customers and employees, and the ethical pursuit of profit. When employees respect the rules of conduct and feel fairly treated by management, the employees begin to trust managers and internalize the organization’s values as their own. Once that happens, ethics becomes embedded in the organization culture. If shareholders and potential investors trust management and believe they are committed to ethics, they are more likely to invest. It is true that when the ethics are good organization tend to be good as well.  

Conclusion

It is generally observed that team leaders influence their team members to a huge extent. Superiors strictly need to adhere to the rules and regulations of the organization for their employees to follow the same. Leaders have no rights to scold their subordinates if the leader is also at fault. Furthermore no one would bother to listen to the leader if he is not act according to the rules and regulations at the organization.

In the field of ethics management more should be done. There seem to be lack of effective instructions and tools for solving ethical problems and addressing ethical dilemmas as the number and scope of wrongdoings is in rise. There is no general ethical theory that would help to eliminate wrongdoings. 

The entire life-cycle of a code from the beginning to the final institutionalization could be researched and a model could be generated. Such framework could eventually be applied in ethics management in different organizations.

References

Snellma, C., 2014. Ethics Management. [online] Available at: <https://www.researchgate.net/publication/287151217_Ethics_Management_How_to_Achieve_Ethical_Organizations_and_Management/link/5696cd9308aea2d743748999/download> [Accessed 2 May 2021].

Verma, A., 2016. IMPORTANCE OF MANAGING ETHICAL ISSUES IN ORGANIZATION :AT WORK PLACE. [online] Academia.edu. Available at: <https://www.academia.edu/23513465/IMPORTANCE_OF_MANAGING_ETHICAL_ISSUES_IN_ORGANIZATION_AT_WORK_PLACE> [Accessed 2 May 2021].

Employee Engagement in Organizational Development

 

Introduction

Employee engagement and employee happiness are two different concepts. So the happy employees do not necessarily be engaged employees. Employee engagement can be defined as “the emotional commitment the employee has to the organization and its goals” (Kruse, 2012). Therefore emotionally committed employees genuinely care about their work and goal achievement.

As engaged employees are an asset to every organization, the employee need to focus more on building a culture that enhances employee engagement. Engaged employees provide good quality service to all the stakeholders. and it resulting in higher stakeholder satisfaction. this leads to increase in sales and profits. According to Towers Perrin Research, ""companies with engaged workers have 6% higher net profit margins"(Kruse, 2012).

There are four main elements when concern about employee engagement

1. Commitment - how much an employee associates himself with the organization. They are fascinated by their work and passionate to achieve organizational goals.
2. Motivation - A motivated employee puts the best effort in performing his job role and on the other hand organization too could reward and recognize this effort to further motivate employees.
3. Loyalty - Loyal employees actively engage with the organization and are accountable for every task performed.
4. Trust - Trust prevails in an organization when both the employee and the employer share the same emotional bond to foster the organization. 

(source:Bedarkar and Pandita, 2014)

Employee engagement has emerged as one of the greatest challenges in today’s organizations. With complexities and various regulations in many organizations, employee engagement will continue to challenge organizations. This aspect challenges management because engagement is a vital element in maintaining the organization’s vitality, survival, and profitability. Organizations that have highly engaged employees have greater profits than those that do not have employee engagement. Organizations with highly engaged employees experience increased customer satisfaction, profits, and employee productivity as well.

Conclusion

Employee engagement and organizational performance are significantly inter related. Management and human resource professionals need to grasp the importance of employee engagement for the betterment of the organization and find way of enhancing employee commitment as well. Employee engagement will ultimately result in creating a workforce that genuinely foster success and wellbeing of an organization. Organization with engaged employees have higher employee retention as a result of reduced turnover and productivity, profitability, growth and stakeholder’s satisfaction.

Refernces

Kruse, K. (2012). What Is Employee Engagement. [online] Forbes.com. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kevinkruse/2012/06/22/employee-engagement-what-and-why/#5fd451b7f372 [Accessed 1 May 2021].

Osborne, S. and Hammoud, M., 2017. Effective Employee Engagement in the Workplace. [online] Scholarworks.waldenu.edu. Available at: <https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1239&context=ijamt> [Accessed 1 May 2021].

Emphasis on Learning and Development Strategy

 Introduction

Learning and development strategy describe the approach an organization embraces to ensure the goals of the present and in the future, learning and development process support the achievement of its goals by developing the knowledge, skills and capabilities of individuals and teams. This is similar to strategic human recourse development. According to Walton (1999) "Strategic human resource development involves introducing, eliminating, modifying, directing and guiding processes in such a way that all individuals and teams are equipped with the skills, knowledge and competences they require to undertake current and future tasks required by the organization". 

Importance of Learning and Development in an Organization

Learning and career development are very crucial in any organization that aims at developing. This includes decision making, thinking creatively and managing people. Learning and development is so important because, it

1. Address the employee weaknesses
2. Improvement in employee performance
3. Consistency in duty performance
4. Ensuring job satisfaction 
5. Increased productivity 
6. Improved quality of service and products
7. Reduction in cost
8. Reduction in supervision

4 phrases that required for effective learning and development strategy

1. An analysis of training needs (starting situation)
2. Specification of learning objectives
3. Design of training content and method
4. Monitoring and evaluation

 

source:exeQserve.com

The Learning Organization

The concept of the learning organization has caught the imagination of many people since it was first published by Senge (1990)"The learning organization is one ‘where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning how to learn together’.

Learning and development at the time of covid 19
Learning and development must adapt to the changing times and technologies, especially in the COVID-19 pandemic. Trainers and learners must embrace uncertainty and leverage technology to add value for the learners. It is necessary to adopt technology and customize training programs accordingly. Training has transformed from instructor-led and interactive to computer-based video training and eLearning training. Some organizations are using virtual training coaches who engage learners like real human trainers.

Conclusion

Effective learning and development process can be a crucial factor in addressing inequalities in employment in relation to race, gender and disabilities. It is recommended that organization produce a learning and development strategy, the aim of which shall be to empower all employees to carry out their roles to the highest possible level, and deliver high quality services. Learning and development are broadly defined as those activities aimed at raising the standards of employee practice and thus lifting the quality of the employees skill level. 

References

Rao, M., 2020. Learning and Development in the Post-COVID-19 World. [online] Learning Solutions Magazine. Available at: <https://learningsolutionsmag.com/articles/learning-and-development-in-the-post-covid-19-world> [Accessed 1 May 2021].

Ripublication.com. 2014. Role of Training & Development in an Organizational Development. [online] Available at: <https://www.ripublication.com/ijmibs-spl/ijmibsv4n2spl_13.pdf> [Accessed 1 May 2021].

Walton, J (1999) Strategic Human Resource Development, Financial Times/Prentice Hall, Harlow

Challenges of the globalization and role of the human resources

 

Introduction

Globalization can be defined as the ongoing economic, technological, social, and political integration of the world that began after the Second World War. It is seemingly shrinking the planet as barriers to trade are dismantled, transport and communications costs fall, and world production systems are formed and managed by huge multinational organizations.

“As a company extends its base to a foreign shore, the impact of that globalization on HR procedures will extend to current workers and also to new employees” (Natter, 2018). When catering to a wider range of audiences across the world, companies need to adapt their thinking and practices based on cultural differences, foreign regulations, rules and technological developments.

Challenges to HR

“When companies expand into new markets especially into developing regions business practices that are acceptable locally may be at odds with the values of the company and the laws of its regulatory agencies” (Wilkie, 2015). The challenge for HR is to gain complete understanding of the new environment and its accepted business practices. Protocols need to be customized for each region and be communicated appropriately right throughout the organization and other divisions.

There are many human resource management issues that are related to the globalization.

1.      Staffing policies

2.      Selecting and retaining talented employee

3.      Encouraging employees to be innovative and creative

4.      Culture barriers

5.      Legal frame work

6.      Understanding the challenges of living and working overseas

7.      Performance appraisals from a distance

8.      Training and management development

9.      Compensation packages and

10.  Labor relations and organized labor laws.

     

source:SlideToDoc.com

                                                   

Training for globalization of business

Organizations when competing in a global market place, it has to survive and prosper in the modern world of rapid change. So the organizations need to be more flexible, faster-moving and faster-learning than ever before. Thus the organizations are implementing special global training programs, the reason for doing to avoid lost business due to cultural insensitivity, improving job satisfaction and retention of overseas staff and enabling a newly assigned employee to communicate with subordinates overseas. Providing training for employees not only helps them develop their skills and knowledge, but also it motivate and it helps to organizational success.

Conclusion

The speeds of technological developments, rapidly changing statistics, and the huge increase in information technology have resulted in a business environment that changes constantly. To remain competitive in such a dynamic environment, businesses must continually improve their human resource management systems and organizational changes.

 

References

 

Natter, E. (2018). Effects of Globalization on Human Resource Management. [online] Available athttps://smallbusiness.chron.com/effects-globalization-human-resources-management-61611.html [Accessed 1 May. 2021].

Wilkie, D. (2015). Globalization Presents Complex Challenges for HR Managers. [online] at https://www.shrm.org/hr-today/news/hr-news/Pages/Globalization-Presents-Complex-Challenges-for-HR-Managers.aspx [Accessed 1 May. 2021].

Employee Empowerment in the workplace

 

`

Introduction

 “Empowerment is the process of enabling or authorizing an individual to think, behave, take action, and control work and decision-making about their job in autonomous, independent, self-directed ways” (Heathfield, 2019). Organization needs to foster a desirable work environment that encourage employees to act empowered.

An empowered culture is inspired to embark on a challenging journey through self-fulfillment and novelty. In this globalized business world, empowerment comes in to play as a linkage between employee and employer in realizing organizational goals through out of the box thinking and creativity.

The benefits of employee empowerment

Empowered employees are loyal, committed and potentially more productive. When employees are empowered they work toward their goals and drive their own career. And when they provided with the right tools and resources they successfully manage or lead their own projects. Thus the benefits are endless.

Empowered employees,

• Go the extra mile

• Follow best practices

• Be more productive

• Have good communication

• Embrace change

• Have a “can do” attitude

• Provide better customer service

 

                                                    source: Blog.smarp.net

Empowerment and Google

“The empowered culture that Google has created is exactly the kind of culture that creates an excellent customer experience” (Shaw, 2014).

Google recognize that different people will yield in different ideas and act in different ways. Thus they have created many channels for expressions to gather as much inputs as possible from employees. Some of them include,

Google Cafes - “Designed to encourage interactions between employees within and across teams, and to spark conversation about work as well as play” (He, 2013).  

Google Moderator – This is an innovation management tool by Google. Through Moderator “people can discover existing ideas, questions or suggestions, vote for ideas, questions or suggestions and see the aggregate votes to date, create a new series asking for ideas organized by topic, event or meeting” (He, 2013).

TGIF – This is a weekly meeting that enables all employees to pose questions to top management about company issues. The meeting ensures that employees are well informed about common concerns, decisions as well as future directions.

Google Universal Ticketing Systems – It is a method of filling problems pertaining to any company issues and is used to monitor patterns.

Apart from these direct emails are encouraged to any of the company leaders. Another initiation is the Internal Innovation Reviews that include formal meetings where executives present new product ideas to the top management. Both of these initiations ensures that fresh ideas are given life and issues are communicated and solved right at that moment.

Conclusion

These launches assures employees are rightfully kept on track and are inspired on their own to independently create new products and services. As an added advantage, newly hired employees too are assured that they start off right as information is readily available to get accustomed to the new environment.

 

References

 

Heathfield, S. (2019). What Do Empowered Employees Look Like?. [online] The Balance Careers. Available at: https://www.thebalancecareers.com/empowerment-in-action-how-to-empower-your-employees-1918102 [Accessed 1 May. 2021].

He, L. (2013). Google's Secrets Of Innovation: Empowering Its Employees. [online] Forbes.com. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurahe/2013/03/29/googles-secrets-of-innovation-empowering-its-employees/#2e5e32ce57e7 [Accessed 1 May. 2021].

Shaw, C. (2014). What We Can Learn from Google’s Empowered Culture |. [online] Beyondphilosophy.com. Available at: https://beyondphilosophy.com/can-learn-googles-empowered-culture/ [Accessed 1 May. 2021].