Prior to developing your training programs, you must analyze your organizational needs, identify employee skills gaps based on performance, and have resources available to support training goals, including those associated with succession planning. These constitute learning conditions to ensure training programs have purpose and alignment to organizational goals. Thinking about the learning conditions described, what do you think is most necessary for learning to occur in your current organization? Assume your organization has the readiness for learning, recommend at least one training program your organization would benefit from implementing. Explain why.
Discussion 4-1: Developing Employee Training Program
The success of a training program depends on effective planning which must take a number of factors into consideration. For example, in order to create learning conditions that facilitate the implementation of a training program which is aligned with organizational goals, an organization must assess organizational needs, identify employees’ skill gaps, and provide resources to support training (Damery et al., 2021). The most necessary condition for learning to occur in the current organization is the identification of employee skills gaps based on performance. The reason is that learning can easily occur when employees understand their skill gaps and are committed to participating in a training program in order to address those gaps. Although the training team might adequately identify the needs of the organization and provide the resources required to implement a training program, it will be difficult for learning to occur in the absence of employee commitment which is influenced by the manner in which employees view the usefulness of the program in addressing their skill gaps (Gifford et al., 2022). Ideally, identifying employees’ skill gaps promotes the development of a training program that focuses on developing employees’ skills.
An example of a training program that a healthcare organization can implement, assuming it has the necessary readiness for learning, is a telehealth training program for enhanced healthcare delivery during the COVID-19 pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed skill gaps among employees of different healthcare organizations and the current healthcare facility is not an exception. According to Brei et al. (2021), telehealth training increases provider comfort with the software. Implementing a telehealth training program at the facility will increase providers’ skills and knowledge of how to use the software to interact with their patients virtually.
Brei, B. K., Neches, S., Gray, M. M., Handley, S., Castera, M., Hedstrom, A., D’Cruz, R., Kolnik, S., Strandjord, T., Mietzsch, U., Cooper, C., Moore, J. M., Billimoria, Z., Sawyer, T., & Umoren, R. (2021). Telehealth training during the COVID-19 pandemic: a feasibility study of large group multiplatform telesimulation training. Telemedicine Journal and E-Health, 27(10):1166-1173. doi: 10.1089/tmj.2020.0357. Epub 2020 Dec 30. PMID: 33395364.
Damery, S., Flanagan, S., Jones, J., & Jolly, K. (2021). The effect of providing staff training and enhanced support to care homes on care processes, safety climate and avoidable harms: Evaluation of a care home quality improvement programme in England. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(14), 7581. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18147581
Gifford, R. E., van de Baan, F. C., Westra, D., Ruwaard, D., Zijlstra, F. R. H., Poesen, L. T., Fleuren, B. P. I. (2022). There and back again. Examining the development of employee commitment during a prolonged crisis. SSM Qualitative Research in Health, 2:100053. doi:10.1016/j.ssmqr.2022.100053. Epub 2022 Feb 3. PMID: 35132402; PMCID: PMC8810278.