What is the significance of technology training in your organization and how do you measure its effectiveness? If your organization is similar to most K12 enterprises, significance is correlated to the latest software or hardware implementation and measurement beyond a simple quiz following formal training is all that occurs. Further complicating matters is the fact that new employee training rarely includes technology and the hiring manager is typically required to provide on-the-job training for systems and applications utilized within their department.
How does such a strategy affect the organization? If training typically begins and ends with a new implementation or upgrade or is left entirely to individual departments, you can rest assured that your organization is not functioning at an optimal level. The bright side is that there is an opportunity for you to fairly easily increase organizational effectiveness, as well as, boost morale and job satisfaction.
There are two main obstacles, however, that you most likely will need to overcome to take advantage of this situation. The first is financial. Most organizations, on paper, allocate a fair amount of their budget to technology training. For example, many technology grant programs require as much as twenty percent (20%) of funding to be allocated for training. Unfortunately, very often this training takes place haphazardly which leads us to the second obstacle. Without a plan for measuring the long term effectiveness of the training in relation to organizational goals and objectives your organization cannot make reliable, informed decisions. The implications of uniformed decisions as they relate to training effectiveness go straight to the bottom line, financially and organizationally. Higher support costs, over-taxed support staff, unnecessary purchases, and employee turnover are just some of the outcomes that can be expected.
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