Executive Summary.3
Training in human resource4
Dynamic workplace environment..4
Collective responsibility in employee training..4
Skill development..5
Role of Supervisors and employers in employee training.6
Career development in employee training.7
Hurdles in employee training.8
Value of employee training9
Fairmont Resort Training program10
Shangri-La Hotel training program11
Recommendation13
Conclusion.13
References 15
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Employer training is a usual process that takes place nearly in all workplace settings. In particular job, training has its roots in the early observational learning. In practice, the experienced employees are given the roles of training the newly oriented employees on their specific responsibilities and briefs. The training takes place in the same job environment, and therefore, becomes on-job training. The dynamic nature of the workplace due to diversity and globalization calls for continuous training and development of human capital. Constant training ensures that employees attain best practices in human resources, but also creates a synergy for the organization to tap into their creativity and innovativeness. Employee training can take the form of on-job training, where employees train as they work. Alternatively, an organization can adopt the supervisor-training trainee where workers undergo training from their supervisors as they discharge their mandate. In explicating the nature of employee training in the face of globalization and diversity, this paper, compares the training methodologies adopted by Fairmont Resort Hotels and Shangri-La hotel. It's important to note, while the two organizations employ versatile employee training methods, they are successful in growing their human capital and developing skills. Fairmont result Hotels uses the corporate management method of training by using lectures while Shangri-La hotel uses a supplemental nutrition program that involves coaching and mentoring of employees. Upon discovering the methods used by the two hotels in employee training, it is recommended that the two hotels adopt training programs to empower human capital and strengthen the relationship between top managers and the junior officers. Besides, apprenticeship is also another practical tool that the companies can use for career development and employee training.
TRAINING IN HUMAN RESOURCE
The fundamental goal of this research paper is to describe how the human resource department carries out employee training in the companies. It explains the reasons why some companies provide employee-training services while others do not. Besides, the paper shall compare two hotels; Shangri-La Hotel and Fairmont resort and hotels and reveals the programs that these two hotels use to run their employee training. Lastly, the paper provides some recommendations for other hotels on the best approaches to provide employee training.
Dynamic workplace environment
Over the years, there has been changing nature of the work and the working environment in most companies. This shift calls for rapid change, which requires skilled and knowledgeable workers who are flexible, adaptive and dedicated on the future. It is the role of the manager to make sure valuable training and development of the workforce are done (Boxal, 2011). According to the philosophy of human resource, the manager should inspire career growth and development by ensuring intensive coaching and assisting employees to attain their goals. The best way that one can develop human resources is by providing satisfactory training, giving the employers an opportunity for growth, and encouraging the staff to develop (Ulrich, 2013).
Collective responsibility in employee training
Ensuring effective training and development requires a collective responsibility between the employees and the managers. The manager has the role of ensuring he works in tandem with the staff to assess their skills and interests then provide the feedback. After understanding the skills and interests, then the manager chooses the training and development activities that suit the employee. The manager uses the career development manual and best practice catalog as a quintessential directive to inform the personnel concerning employee training and skill development chances (Gatewood, 2015). This directory enables the employees to stay informed about the current practices and policies that support employee development. After the learning activity, the manager then does a follow-up to the employees to integrate the newly acquired skills in their responsibilities (Mello, 2014).
Skill development
Most employee training and skill development programs fall under career development, management development, professional skill, preliminary skills, technical training and supervisory skills. The employer uses his/her inventiveness to evaluate the skills and benefits and design skill development activities that are in tandem with the need. The organization and managers must collaborate to identify skill development and training objectives (Hoque, 2013). The importance of the employer supporting the development and training of employees is that it enables him to win workers in his workplace. The employees will have elevated skills, optimize their workability, and since they are armored with requisite skills to deal with the varying demands of the workplace environment, they will increase their productivity. Increased productivity is achievable just because the workers will work with higher morale, with a feeling of satisfaction, with a lot of creativity and motivation (Boxal, 2011).
Training of employees, both old and new equips them with the capability to know what they are doing, get off a good start, save time and have a good feeling about the company. There are different types of training in the human resource management department among them is the new hire orientation (Mello, 2014). New hire orientation has programs such as showing workers how they should perform their job safely and effectively. Orientation introduces the new employee to the company, its products, policies and culture. This orientation also introduces the employee to the competition of the company, and so they can improve their satisfaction and employee retention (Armstrong, 2014).
Role of supervisors and employers in employee training
There is the supervisor training which is equally important in the organization. The skills addressed in management training are manager communication, employee recognition and motivation. Since managers are always good people, they are trained using cutting-edge skills, which is the best way to keep the supervisors at their best and break them from messy, unsafe working habits (Ulrich, 2013). Training today offers employee training in the following topics; workplace safety, employee diversity training, workplace sexual harassment training, emergency preparedness, team building training, hazard communication training and training on office ergonomics. Employee training is very crucial for the general success of a company. In some cases, despite the advantages associated with training, the employers may get resistance from the employees and managers. The employees and the managers may claim that the training is taking the workers away from their work (Armstrong, 2014).
Employee training educates the workers on how to use technology effectively in their specific responsibilities, ensures that there is always competition in the market, and promotes safety and health relationships among the employees. To retain the workers, career development and personal growth are needed, and this is only achievable through employee training (Chuang, 2010). Training helps the employees to comply with the law and increase their profitability and productivity. The law has recommended employee training, and there are several federal laws, which define the employee training. Among them, is the Occupational Safety and Health ACT (Gatewood, 2015). In this ACT, training has been recommended in two areas. The areas are ethics and sexual harassment. The importance of training workers and supervisors on this subject is to make sure that the employer exercises reasonable care by making sure the employees understands their responsibilities under the organizations anti-harassment policy (Alfes,2013).
Training reduces an employer liability, particularly, at the event that an employee is found culpable of engaging in criminal offenses. According to the Federal ruling procedure and guidelines, the employer must provide the employees with ethics and compliance training. A company that has implemented an effective ethics and compliance programs reduces its liability for a criminal conviction by 90%. Employers with none existed training programs sees the negatives in training the employees because it happens to be costly and time-consuming at the same time (Gatewood,2015).
Career development in employee training
Career development is the honing of capabilities and skills, which include job description mastery and professional development. Job mastery skill is the skills that one needs to perform his duty successfully while the professional skills are the skills that exceed the scope of employer expectation and job description by indirectly improving the employee’s performance in the job (Chuang, 2010). In career development, employers need to be encouraged on the value of reassessing and a review of their goal since the development is a continuous process. New information can be offered through formal training and class work away from the job environment. Old members in the field should be given an opportunity to practice their newly acquired skill (Chuang, 2010)
The initiation and support of career development happens to be very important because the focus on skill development contributes to learning opportunities. The employees can set realistic career development goals with the knowledge of the organizations current information and the future trend. Moreover the employee’s gets career satisfaction through promotional opportunities that are possible for a well-trained employee (Mello, 2014). Career development instills a sense of responsibility in which the employee portrays self-confidence in their work. Besides, career development knowledge is also effective because the employer can use the trained individuals in the same department and use them to educate the rest. As an employer, the support of career development enables the manager to attract and maintain valued employees and lastly productivity is ensured since the employees are motivated (Harzing, 2010).
Hurdles in employee training
Some companies do not train their employees with the claim that the training is expensive, and people spent less time in their jobs when engaged in training. The lost time lowers the expected return on the training investment. The company incurs losses if they train their employers who might quit the job and join other firms. Loosing employees costs the company more than developing a new one itself. In essence, knowledge retention and reduction and employee churn-rate is the most challenging aspects in employee training. The changing nature of work itself has greatly influenced the decline of the on job training since there are numerous job chances in the society (Boxal, 2011). A certain job requires a specific skill and specialized; however, the challenge is for the worker to translate his experience to the new environment. For instance, in automotive, auto assembly requires more standardized skills and less mechanical ability. If the skills learned at general motors were specific, it is easier to take them to Ford (Gatewood, 2015). Today’s dynamic workplace has made skills in a certain area become extremely flexible, and the service/hotel industry has greatly grown. Jobs in the hotel industry, value heavily interpersonal skills and ability to access to relatively large networks. After all, a new employer meets new co-workers, but it is almost impossible to develop similar skills because of staying in the same environment (Mello, 2014).
Companies choose to make the cost-saving decision because the job skills translate. In most cases, companies hire the people with the skills that they need. The problem with the practice of relying on training done by other companies results to a collective problem, especially, when no companies offer training. The fact remains that schools cannot offer what an individual learns in their new jobs (Armstrong, 2014).
There is great loss that comes along with the failure to train the employees. Withholding the career development of the employees is not a solution to the fear of the employee. The employees may as well leave if their jobs do not offer career development for the achievement of successful careers. When the employers fail to train employees, they become disengaged and unmotivated. When employees are less engaged in their work, they require a lot of supervision and make many mistakes, which in return cost the company regarding liabilities (Hoque, 2013).
Value of employee training
Conversely, employers who know that their employees value them and invest in their future become more motivated and engaged in their work. Engaged employees are more productive and profitable. Some employees enjoy satisfaction in their jobs when they are engaged and encouraged to take part in achieving the company’s goals and missions (Mello,2014). The mission must be well communicated, go beyond the shareholder values and be focused on a greater purpose. When the workers feel like strategic partners, they become motivated, help the company in achieving its goals, and even stay longer in the organization (Armstrong, 2014). To solve the problem of fearing to train the employees, the employer should think of some solutions like understanding the employees learning styles (Mello, 2014). People learn differently, and there are those who prefer reading by themselves, others in small groups while others like reading information from their phones. Flexibility should be vital in choosing the training method for the employee. The employer still needs to work on the employee's strengths instead of working on their weaknesses. Strength based approach increases the productivity and reduces mistakes and sick off days since the employers do what they love doing best (Hendry, 1986). The issue of time poses a lot of complaining too, for instance, as a manager does not make the people read a whole book while they can get the information needed in a single article. Employers are mature people and can learn on their own when well-motivated. Allowing the employers to take charge of their training enables them to plan their time and own development, apply the skills learned and collaborate with the rest. Making the employees feel valued enables the employer to capture their hearts. Training the workers increases their loyalty to their work and stay for longer leading to the general growth of the company (Hoque, 2013).
Fairmont resort and training programs
Fairmont hotel emphasizes on soft skill training for its employees. This type of training program emphasizes on imparting employees with desirable personality traits, effective communication skills, interpersonal relations and social graces. These skills are crucial for Fairmont hotel business because they characterize every bit of interactions in the business operations. Training employees on soft skills strengthens the employees customer relations, imparts skills on how to answer telephone calls and generally how to interact with customers in a friendly manner (Murphy, Putter & Johnson, 2013). Fairmont is being a hotel, employees receive training relating to sexual harassment, ethical practice, reporting of workplace malpractices and most important ways of resolving conflicts either with fellow employees or with customers. Further, the soft skills training for Fairmont extends to employee motivation, establishing rapport with customers and ways of maintaining small talk (Murphy, Putter & Johnson, 2013). The human resource managers realize that the hotel environment requires employees who possess soft skills for smoothening customer interaction and leveraging customer expectations (Strother, 2002). There are some tools employed in this training, including on-the-job training, mentorship, web-based tools, brown bag lunch, job swapping, job shadowing and vestibule training. A combination of these tools enables the trainers to equip employees with cutting edge soft skills necessary in streamlining operations.
Shangri-La Hotel training programs
Shangri La Hotel used specialized corporate training (orientation training) for its employees. The human resource department normally conducts the training. It is meant to synchronize employees’ skills with the organizational goals. Usually, the hotels have three classifications of specialized corporate training, which includes corporate executive trainings, corporate management training and corporate training. The human resource department champions and undertakes the three types of specialized training to ensure that the incumbent and new employees acquire a better understanding of the hotel operations to discharge professional goals and mandates effectively (Strother, 2002). Ultimately, through the training employees receive orientation concerning the operations of the hotel, team-building skills and collaborative approach towards work. The training is experimental in nature, and all trainees learn human capital values, interpersonal relations with customers, interventions and problem-solving techniques and effective communication. The tools used during the training include role profiling, diagnostic assessment of employees, personalized learning, and infographic cards. Under role profiling, trainees receive direct and questions with factuality to spur their thinking. However, based on the responses offered, the trainer makes recommendations on training topics that relate to the subject of the responses. Diagnostic assessment ensures that the trainer involves all the trainees in a competency matrix to assess their skills. This method of training assist reduces the overall time consumed during the training and employee gets to learn only areas with difficulty. Personalized training relies on the results of role profiling and diagnostic assessments to enable the trainers personalize training materials for every trainee. Finally, infographic cards are visual aids embedded in digital content delivery tools such as powerpoint presentations and mobile devices to assist in training. These tools are critical for Shangri La hotel specialized training (Murphy, Putter & Johnson, 2013).
Comparative table matrix
Recommendation
The recommended training strategy is that the two hotels can adopt the soft skills training because they are critical in the hotel industry. Customers appreciate good customer relations and sober interpersonal relationships, as such; employees can only acquire these skills through soft skills training. Besides, the soft skills training may include imparting employees with proficiencies needed to accomplish the hotel services. The skills, in general, should be delivered in-house to cut down on cost. For that reason, both Fairmont and Shangri la Hotels should encourage on-job training and mentorships. Concerning, ethical practice, it can be made a reality by ensuring that there is a good relationship between the employer, employee and the managers. In the case where the employee needs to get practical knowledge then an apprenticeship is the best way. Apprenticeship happens to be cheap since it does not require many resources and thus, the company does not spend a lot of money in the activity. Finally, the two groups of hotels may consider conducting professional training for its supervisors to make sure they acquire up-to-date skills concerning the hotel industry and its dynamics. While it may be expensive to conduct professional training; however, the hotel acquires updated human capital to place the hotels in comparative advantages and competitive edge.
Conclusion
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