Training your staff: It’s good for workers, and it’s good for employers, too. It’s easy for businesses to get sucked into the perceived reasons why they shouldn’t be providing training to their employees, such as the cost to the business and the time it takes out of regular working hours.
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But, the benefits of training your employees by far outweigh the costs. Businesses that fail to understand the importance of training their employees are missing a trick. You don’t want to miss an easy opportunity to create success for your business in the long term.
Not convinced? Here are six reasons why training your staff is worth the investment.
1. Training Keeps Your Business Competitive
By exposing your employees to the latest cutting-edge information, you are ensuring their knowledge and skills are being honed regularly. This is particularly important concerning technology or online skills; the landscape is frequently changing, and it’s essential staff are kept up to date.
Staff can bring these new skills and ideas back to the workplace and are more likely to be able to provide innovative solutions to new issues. As a result, your business stays one step ahead of your competitors who’ve failed to invest in their staff.
2. Training Increases Staff Loyalty
Everyone loves to feel valued—and for your staff, it’s no different. Putting the time and money into building their skills increases their loyalty to the business and generally makes them happier employees. This means they are more likely to want to continue working in your business for the long term.
Around 40% of employees leave their job in the first year if they aren’t receiving the training needed to do their roles effectively. So it pays off to invest in your staff.
3. Training Attracts Good-Quality Staff
A great way of attracting high-quality staff to apply for job roles is having great training opportunities to grow their skills, which is a key incentive for high-performing workers. This is particularly true for younger people. Eighty-seven percent of Millennials think professional development and career growth are significant.
4. Training Increases Staff Autonomy
Micromanaging staff is an inefficient way of running a business. The best workers flourish under light-touch management and an atmosphere where they are trusted to get on with their day-to-day work without being heavily scrutinized. Proper training empowers your staff to carry out tasks to a high standard and make decisions without the need for constant supervision.
5. Training Creates Future Managers
Training provides an excellent opportunity for self-development among your more ambitious employees. Many training courses improve on leadership and strategy skills, as well as generally build on an employee’s self-esteem. Soft skills training in areas such as communication, conflict resolution, and emotional intelligence can mould your staff into future management material.
The increased likelihood of gaining promotions will also strengthen their loyalty to your organization—most people want to work somewhere that they feel will give them opportunities to move up the career ladder. So it’s a win-win.
6. Training Makes Staff More Productive
Employee engagement is extremely important when it comes to productivity. Engagement is essentially how committed staff are to their role and organization. Training your staff shows that you are invested in them and, in turn, makes them feel more engaged.
So why does this matter? A Dale Carnegie study shows that employees who are more engaged tend to outperform other staff by 202%. In other words, they are working more than twice as hard. So it pays off for a business to train its staff.
So, what’s stopping you? These six reasons show that training your team is well worth the investment! It will keep your business competitive, increases loyalty, attracts high-quality staff, shapes staff into future managers, makes them more independent, and makes your business more productive. The short-term investment in your team will help your business grow and succeed in the long term.
| James Craigmillar writes for Inspiring Interns & Graduates, a leading graduate recruitment agency in the United Kingdom. |