The training was a failure. All of that time, all of that effort, all of that money, just gone, just out the window and gone. What other explanation was there, after all, for drop after drop in the hard numbers from a talented sales team in the wake of a training and development session?
It could have happened at any business, but for the purposes of this story, it happened at a large technology company with headquarters in the Midwest. The top executives, frantic for answers, called a corporate training firm. “Our sales are down,” the executives said. “We need training.”
That technology company was part of a large percentage of businesses that continued to invest in corporate training, education and development during the last couple of years. Thousands and thousands of others turned away from training, unable or unwilling to spend more money during the recession.
But a panel of more than 30 industry experts and academic professionals agreed that it would have been far better for businesses to continue to spend on training during those tough times — to invest in their employees and to show the extent of that investment, to improve the business and keep it up to date, to be in a better position when the economy ultimately turns around — than to tighten the budget. The same rule applies now, too.
“Even in the hardest times, those companies that have kept spending money on employee training, those companies have been the most successful companies and have come out of those hard times with a more engaged and satisfied work force,” says Tom McGuire, program director, Business & Management, UC Berkley Extension.
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