Top training tips any company can put to work

It doesn’t matter whether your trainees are young or old, new hires or existing employees, or even if your topic is safety or sexual harassment, every form of employee training will share a common thread.

Especially today, companies are looking for programs that deliver the best training ROI. At the very least, these programs must be designed with a clear purpose and outline measurable objectives for employees to reach.

Any organization can use these top five employee training tips to help design their own training courses or to improve the ROI of any current programs:

1. Set clear goals. Identifying goals should be the first step to developing a new training program or enrolling employees in outside courses. A clear set of goals will ensure that employees complete the required course material and know what is expected of them once the program is finished.


2. Keep it ongoing. Employee training should be viewed as a way to continually learn and improve, rather than just something to check off your to-do list. With continuous training, employees will develop new skills and abilities that will improve their productivity and boost to your bottom line.


3. Keep it simple. Keep training programs focused on one topic at a time. If there are too many topics or too much information, you can easily overwhelm employees and turn training into a burden instead of an opportunity. If necessary, split up a large training program into smaller, more manageable courses.


4. Spend wisely. Do your homework and make sure you’re getting the best bang for your buck when investing in employee training. Whether you’re using an outside resource or developing an in-house training program, ensure the materials are the best quality for your budget.


5. Follow up. After the training course or seminar is complete, managers should meet with employees on a regular basis to determine the effectiveness of the training and to monitor employees’ progress. Managers can also help employees who may be struggling with any new information.
   

You can only improve your employee training ROI if you put in the time to plan an effective program and are prepared to follow up. Without any follow through, many employees will lack the motivation to hang onto their newly-learned skills, turning the training into a waste of time.

A business is only as good as the people who work for it. Help your business succeed by giving employees the tools and training to perform at their best.

Goal setting: 100 is the magic number

Goal setting is an important part of our personal lives and careers. Setting goals in the workplace helps motivate and engage employees in their work. Creating a list of small, whisker goals can also provide an energetic kick start to move a team of workers out of a motivational rut.

Sometimes you just have to write it all down in order to get a clear picture of what you want to achieve, according to Caroline Adams Miller, author of Creating Your Best Life and founder of Your100Things.com.

"One of the best ways to achieve your own goals is to create public accountability and support by sharing them with a wide audience," says Miller.

Your100Things.com is free tool to help anyone get started on their personal or workplace “bucket list” of goals. Creating a long list of personal and workplace goals can help employees find direction in their work and can also put work/life balance issues into perspective.

It's free to register and the community forums can help you to keep working toward your goals. If you're having trouble with a certain goal, you can reach out to others on the forums for help on how to get through it or read how other users accomplished their own goals in the “I Got It Done” section.

The site stemmed from Miller's personal "100 Things To Do Before I Die" list. To serve as a role model to her readers, she keeps her list public and sets out to achieve a few goals each year. You can check out everything she hopes to achieve here.

Setting small goals can kick start your team

Earlier this year many of us were asked by our managers to set “stretch” goals that will require going the extra mile and pushing ourselves to the limits.

In most cases, stretch goals can be the stimulus that inspires employees to “think outside the box” and improve their performance in ways they never thought they could. When times are tough, however, such goals may throw some into a state of shock.

While they can be a great way to tap into an employee’s ambition, setting stretch goals may stir up “a recipe for paralysis,” according to Dan Heath and Chip Heath in the Fast Company article Set Smaller Goals, Get Bigger Results.

Dan and Chip argue that setting smaller goals is the key to jump-starting performance during tough times and recommend that employees set “whisker goals” instead of intimidating stretch goals.

Instead of setting goals that are seemingly unattainable, whisker goals set targets that fall just slightly short of the “status quo.” Because their small and easily reached, whisker goals help us to get past the initial fear and anxiety that deter us from trying to reach lofty goals.

From the Fast Company article:

Whisker goals are particularly well suited to our current moment. Adversity taps our strength. When you've just laid off someone, it feels like too much to bear to offer constructive criticism to another employee. When you've given up your bonus and had your budget cut, it feels like too much to consider going back for that master's degree. In hard times, we retrench. We maintain. We certainly don't stretch.

But retrenchment is the wrong response to adversity. Adversity calls for change, and change doesn't arrive via a miracle: It arrives via a kick start.

Setting small, whisker goals are a great way to energize a team that may be stuck in a state of paralysis. Use whisker goals, along with small employee recognition awards, to get the ball rolling.

Once you start reaching a handful of smaller performance goals, those stretch goals may not seem so far away. Sometimes it takes a little push to get people off the starting line, but they’ll be off and running before you know it.