Do your training investments lead to business opportunities?
Tom Kraack, partner with Accenture’s Learning Outsourcing business, looks at the pressures on training and the demand for ever quicker returns. Everywhere we go these days we hear a common lament about the training function of organizations: money goes in, but who knows what comes out? Do our people know more? Are they performing better? […]
Advertising feature: Investors in People Leadership and Management Model
The leading questionAs TrainingZONE’s feature last month showed, leadership is top of the agenda for large and small employers alike. It is recognised that good leadership, in any organisation, leads to intelligent investment, enhanced creativity, improved productivity and better all round performance.In particular, UK organisations are increasingly recognising the importance of succession planning of leaders […]
Management development at Abbey National
Tracy Toon describes how Abbey National handle management development. Who is responsible for Management Development in Abbey National?The Management Development and Education Team is responsible for helping Abbey National leaders to identify their learning and development requirements, arising from business objectives and Group strategy, and to provide the learning and development solutions to meet these […]
New structures for developing management – Investors in People interview
Investors in People has launched a new model for Leadership and Management. TrainingZONE talked to Chief Executive Ruth Spellman about the growth of interest in management and leadership development.TrainingZone Where did the impetus first come from to develop the leadership and management model?Ruth Spellman We have done a lot of research and consultation among existing […]
Workforce development investment pays off, finds aerospace industry research
A report by the Society of British Aerospace Companies has demonstrated that investing in workforce development brings benefits. A High Performance Work Organisation (HPWO), as here defined, comprises complementary sets of practices in human resources and employee relations. There is a close relationship between HPWO and financial performance. Companies high on the HPWO index in […]
Implementing a training solution in the face of inadequate systems and procedures – opinion
Dave Green, senior consultant at Training for Advancement, offers a trainer’s perspective on the system failures that prevent organisations from making the most of development opportunities. Having spent many years working in a hard-nosed profit-focussed organisation, I have learnt that for any training intervention to be truly successful we must be able to prove we […]
Thinking like a revolutionary – CIPD conference keynote address
The sheer size of the CIPD event marks out the difference from the other shows during the year. This was evident from the exhaustion that resulted from exploring the whole exhibition, but it really became clear when we attended the keynote address. The sight of thousands of HR people in one room brought home just […]
Communicating change effectively – feature
This feature was contributed by Bill Quirke, Managing Director of Synopsis Communication Consulting. Use English, not Management SpeakPlans are usually sketched out in management speak, with the benefits of proposed actions framed as advantages to the company, since this helps sell the proposals to management internally. The same information is then used, often with the […]
Languages: recruitment v training – feature
Catherine Cook, founder and managing director of Inter-Monde, looks at the advantages of training in languages above recruiting. The world is unarguably becoming smaller, with globalisation dragging the continents closer together with every new advance in technology. Companies are finding themselves competing on a much smaller battlefield against increasing armies of competition. As cultures assimilate, […]
Training: To levy or not to levy?
The long-running issue of whether companies should be required to pay a training levy raises its head again in the Scotsman.Writing for the publication, Keith Aitken takes a look at some recent research undertaken by Dr Christine Greenhalgh for the Institute of Fiscal Studies, which compares the systems in France, where an employer training levy […]
New European academy for corporate social responsibility
In an effort to demonstrate to the European business community that Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) makes good business sense, Business leaders and academics from across Europe have formed are teaming up in the European Academy of Business in Society. Companies involved include Shell, Johnson & Johnson, Levi’s, Danone and Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations.The Academy […]
The Elephant and the Flea – Review
Title: The Elephant and the Flea: Looking backwards to the futureAuthor: Charles HandyPublisher: Hutchinson, 2001ISBN: 0091793637Price: £17.99Buy this book from the TrainingZONE – Blackwells bookshop.My study contain several of Charles Handy’s books collected and read over the years, each adding new ideas and fresh perspectives to my understanding of work, motivation, and the way we […]
Just what does it cost to deliver IiP status?
A recent report for the Department for Education and Skills suggests that in 1999 -2000, the average cost of following through and supporting the Investors in People process, including overheads, was £6,058 (and higher if TEC support and overhead costs are included).The figures come from data supplied by 11 former Training and Enterprise Councils, during […]
Investors in People appoints new board members in its tenth year
As it reaches its tenth anniversary this year, Investors in People (IIP) UK has apppointed six new members to its board.Samantha Gemmell, MD of media production company Creative Media Matrix Ltd, Geoff Hall, LSC Director of Learning Programmes, Garry Hawkes, Chair, NTO National Council, Amin Rajan, Chief Executive, CREATE, Ed Sweeney, Generay Secretary, UNIFI and […]
NTO Council staff get learning days entitlement
The National Training Organisation National Council is hoping to lead by example by announcing all its staff will be entitled to five annual learning days.With just 20 full-time staff, the Council will be taking on a potential logistical problem in allowing all staff five off-the-job learning days a year, but Chief Executive Andy Powell thinks […]
Conservative attitudes to training mean companies lose out, says survey
New research shows that over half of financial employers in the private and public sectors are unlikely to be getting the most from their investment in training. It may be thought those with finance departments would have a better grasp of the need for ‘Return on Investment’, but the Association of Accounting Technicians (AAT) finds […]
UK spending on training has reached record levels, says DfEE
£23.5 billion was spent on training in the UK last year, more than in any previous year, according to figures released by the Department for Education and Employment this week. The figures, which are made up of over £14bn for off-the-job training and £9bn for on-the-job training, show an increase of 25 per cent in […]
50 more signs of an unhealthy organisation
This list is a modified version of those I first published within Training and Development in April 1993. It picks up on, and expands the theme explored within its close cousin, ‘the 50 signs’.As with the first 50, these are not just made up, they are the result of observing, and all too often, despairing, […]
50 signs of an unhealthy organisation
Written by Andrew Gibbons.This article was first published within Training and Development in December 1991. I wrote it to point up the tell-tale signs that are the early indications of all not being corporately well. These days I am all the more interested in looking for, finding, and doing something about the often obvious evidence […]
Could your organisation be Employer of the Year?
Hot on the heels of the ‘family-friendly budget’ comes an incentive for companies to help their staff balance work and home lives. The reward is the chance to be recognised as the Parents at Work/Lloyds TSB Employer of the Year 2001.The competition is open to any company based in the UK which can demonstrate they: […]
