American businessman, founder of a large investment bank Charles Merrill advised to hire the best people and then invest time and effort in their training. At the same time, it is not necessary to allocate a budget for trainers and traveling seminars. If you need knowledge that you can immediately put into practice, choose on-the-job training.
In this case, the employee will use the same work tools, equipment, or documents as after the training. This means that there will be no questions about how to transfer the acquired knowledge into the working environment. Since training in the workplace does not require large financial investments, it can be carried out as often as required.
What does such an education consist of? On-the-job training includes coaching, rotation, mentoring, the delegation of responsibility, and other methods. Below we will analyze them in more detail.
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Basic Training Methods in the Workplace
On-the-job training of personnel can be active or passive. For example, lectures, webinars, or seminars are passive because they do not require active participation from the audience. A business game, training, and group discussion are active teaching methods. In order to participate in them, maximum involvement and concentration are required from employees.
Modern technologies make it possible to combine these two methods into one. For example, many distance learning platforms allow you to create online courses (passive education) and supplement them with interactive inserts and tests (active education).
This allows you to simultaneously train any number of employees and, at the same time, guarantees their active participation. You can even create writing tasks for the employees and let them either do the writing on their own or employ platforms like privatewriting service.
There are six methods that are used for workplace training:
- Production instruction;
- Directed acquisition of experience;
- Rotation;
- The use of workers as assistants;
- Mentoring;
- Preparation in project teams.
Let’s Consider Them Ii More Detail
When we talk about employee training, on-the-job coaching is one of the most popular methods. Its essence is that more experienced colleagues help newcomers to adapt, talk about their responsibilities and workplace. Mentoring is a bit like instructing. Here, an experienced employee transfers their knowledge to the trainee and provides constant feedback.
For employees who already work in the company, they conduct training using the method of directed gaining experience. To do this, the manager formulates training goals and draws up an individual plan for each employee.
Another method of training experienced employees is working in project teams. Here we are talking about groups that are created in order to improve the skills of employees and develop large tasks limited in time.
If the employee has reached the ceiling in the position held or the manager has noticed signs of burnout, the rotation method can be applied. It is a way to gain new knowledge and experience by changing jobs. Rotation is also used in order to acquaint the employee with the full range of tasks facing the company in a short period of time.
On-The-Job Training Form
Despite the fact that on-the-job training saves on travel and training costs, it is not always convenient for the head of the company. First of all, this format requires the personal involvement of experienced workers. You need to take professionals away from work and instruct them to train other employees. With this approach, work tasks can suffer.
In order not to interrupt professionals from work, the manager can choose the remote form of employee training in the workplace.
In either case, the employee will be trained on the job. It’s just that in the version with distance education, all information will be pre-recorded in the format of video clips or text documents. An experienced specialist only needs to write down instructions or lectures on the necessary topics once. After that, any number of employees can be trained on them.
Classes are held using the devices that most workers have. For example, the many online learning platforms allow you to record and take courses from phones of any model. The manager can choose an individual set of classes for each employee or assign one course for the entire department.
Why do distance learning in the workplace? After all, with the help of an internet connection, an employee can do it anywhere. Some people find it more convenient to study on the way to work or in the evening when no one is distracting. However, by law, compulsory training takes place during business hours, and online courses are no exception.
Author’s Bio: I’m Diana Larsen, I hold a Master’s degree in English literature, and I’m a former college lecturer. I founded this site – TopsWriting.com or just simply TopsWriting – to help all college students find a great service where essay writing help is reliable, cheap, and doesn’t miss deadlines.
