One of the main reasons companies outsource their training needs is to save money. How they manage training basically comes down to reducing costs. While training reduces mistakes, improves customer retention and is core to developing an effective staff, the bottom line is always about money. Investing in outsourced training may come with an initial outlay but the benefits of utilising a professional training provider can offer a return that goes far beyond the actual training sessions.
Training, for many organisations is a necessity. The development, delivery and management of that training however can be a major distraction. For organisations like TutorCare, that train every day, it IS CORE to their business. If you manage a team of care professionals and your computer system goes down, it is sensible to call out your IT provider. Why? Because it is their business. Therefore, if you don’t have the time to train your staff, why not look outside your existing infrastructure to see if alternatives exist. In your business it is true that realistically you may have all the skills and be ideally suited to provide that training (after all you understand your business better than most) but in the real world time may not permit that.
Training helps prevent failures, it mitigates risk and in the care profession it helps protect the company from the liabilities associated with providing the wrong training. It ensures a company stays ahead of legislation, frees management resources to focus on other aspects of the business while reducing risk that an injury or catastrophic failure occurs. It’s easy to see that using a company who specialises in training in the organisations primary sector not only impacts upon risk but also helps prevent against legal costs that may come around as a result of such failure.
The alternative to outsourced training is an internal programme requiring a pool of various levels of skills by staff that are able to train effectively. A manager may understand every aspect of the job but they may not feel comfortable training in situations larger than 1 to 1. On the job training is a highly proactive method of training new staff members but if a department of 30 employees needs to understand a new concept or has to implement considerable changes to how they do their job – time becomes a major factor, at operational level as well as management. Does time permit such training or more importantly is the manager trained to the level necessary to pass on the knowledge required to those that may need more attention than others? In a way that is easily digestible or helps engage their staff?
Training is a variable activity. Using an external provider allows the company to maximise output by leveraging resources they may not have in house to deliver training that is needed. It allows a company to scale up and down based on the demand of the training required. For example a new contract may require a sudden increase in staff over a short period of time. Outsourcing training allows management to focus on the new customer while still identifying and meeting employee needs.
No company has all the knowledge they need internally to be successful. In simplest terms a business needs a product or service, the ability to sell that product / service and the mechanisms in place to monitor performance. Three control elements effectively broken into product, sales / marketing and finance. Admin embraces all three of the controls but in no instance is any one individual 100% capable of performing their best in all three. Shareholders appoint Directors. Directors delegate to managers and managers empower and co-ordinate staff. If everything could be done internally, there wouldn’t be a need for accountancy firms, recruitment agencies, information technology contractors or training providers. Sometimes it’s necessary to hire an expert to teach internal employees how to do something that is new to a company or frees up other resources.
Effective analysis of an organisations training needs is a must if a company is to grow. It’s an integral part and is as important as hiring staff or retaining customers. When the staff understand their roles and the implications of any mistakes (legally as well as financially) retaining customers and finding new ones becomes a lot easier. Customer service improves and the company is able to focus on the service it offers. Running a company is about managing resources. Identifying training need and implementing a plan is key to this. If you are to manage resources effectively, hiring an outside consultant to deliver training quite often makes sense.