International Journal of Management Volume 1 Issue 1 May 2010 pp.104-110 http://iaeme.com/ijm.

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IJM
IAEM

TRAINING EFFECTIVENESS A STUDY ON PRE-TRAINING AND POST-TRAINING EFFECTIVENESS S. Ganesan 1, Dr. V. Badrinath 2, Dr. N. Panchanatham 3

Abstract:
Training is a planned process to modify attitude, knowledge or skill behaviour through new learning experience to achieve effective performance in an activity or range of activities (MSC, 1981). In 20th century it was considered the machines and technology were the most important assets for organization, but in 21st century it is considered that the skilled employees are the best assets to organization (Peter Drucker, 1999). Training is essential to facilitate improved performance and everyone seems to have one opinion on the best way to train (Berthelsen, 2002). Even though the employees are experienced in the organization with their existing jobs, due to several factors like technology upgrade, obsolescence of products etc, they must be in a position to go for new trainings time to time to update the knowledge and skills. The organizational culture provides a sense of identity for employees and this identity increase the employees retention and satisfaction (Eskildsen & Nussler, 2000). Trainings in organizations have an extensive history of research regarding active training, learner driven training and impact of training on performance. The wise organizations always assess the market situation, plan and priorities the training requirements for their employees (Berthelsen, 2002). This article is an attempt to find the gap in the competency level of employees even though they are in the same job over several years, and this competency gap is mainly due to redundant technology, obsolescence and lack in technology updates etc. From an employee point of view, competencies were seen as assets tradable for higher salaries (Rita, 2002). The results of this article proved significant increase in their knowledge shift to higher level.
1 2 3

Training Manager & Research Scholar. Dean, School of Management, SASTRA University, Thanjavur 613 401, India. Professor & Head, Department of Business Management, Annamalai University 608 002, India

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Introduction:
Training has been defined as a method of enhancing human performance (Silberman, 1998). In this competitive world it is very important for organization to have skilled & talented employees to achieve sustainable growth. The talent of the employees includes in depth knowledge in the subject matter, up to date skills to perform the work, motivated attitude to perform the job. The performance of the employee depends upon their knowledge, skills and attitudes. Engineering industries facing continuous demand to produce more with less input, better quality products and services in shorter production cycles.

Increasing demand, technology upgrade, obsolete technology, energy efficient and environment friendly technology are some of the main reasons forcing the employees to update their existing knowledge and skills to achieve sustainable results for the organization. Training is important to improve the performance of employees (Rummler and Brache, 1990), impacting general growth of employees (Swanson, 1994), and recruiting and retaining the best employees (Olesen, 1999).

Large size organizations do have their own training and development centers to update the knowledge, skills and attitudes of their employees time to time. But the new skills, knowledge available in the market must be updated to trainers of such organizations to give the opportunity for them to train their employees. This can be achieved by means of external specialized trainers with specialized skills, knowledge. The training is usually a short-term activity comparing the teaching, which is usually long-term activity.

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Methodology:
The key to effective training is designing learning activities so the participants acquire knowledge and skills rather than receiving them (Silberman, 1998). Trainings are designed to emphasize the importance of building upon the learners prior experiences while integrating new concepts and promoting improved self-efficacy (Berthelsen, 2002). A reputed global engineering company with around 44000 strong employees across the world and present in over 160 countries with more than 100 production plants across the world involved in conducting external training for their customers across the world made an attempt to find the employee competency gap in their specialized field of work.

The organizational support to employees through training to acquire new knowledge, self empowerment to do better work and recognition for their best results will impact positively on employee commitment towards their job, retention and job satisfaction. A group of Fertilizer, power, food processing, refining, water transmission and petrochemical industries were selected for this project and specific skills related technical trainings had been given to 129 employees. The qualification of employees ranging from diploma level to engineer level and having the industrial experience ranging from 1 year to 32 years in their respective industry. During each training a pre-training and post-training evaluations were carried out. The characteristics of adults as learners (Cross, 1981) that consists of two variables, personal and situational characteristics respectively. In this study the personal characteristics are taken to test the hypothesis. The personal characteristics include aging, life phases and developmental changes.

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Analysis and Discussion:

Any proactive engineering company will identify the organizations priorities and plans training to address those needs (Rita, 2002). A technical training in industrial machinery vibration diagnostics methodology has been conducted for 39 selected people who are working in fertilizer production plant and power production plant. Organizational training includes the areas of personnel development, technical skills development and interpersonal skills development (Rita, 2002). The experience of people attended the training range from one year to thirty years. The mean average industrial experience of the employee is 8 years. Two days condensed format training has been given for these selected people. Prior to training pre-training evaluation has been carried out. The results shows, even though they are well experienced in their field, the technical knowledge is well below the best industrial standard. The pretraining evaluation marks mean average is 19%. The main reason for this is due to continuous development in engineering technology, new techniques in industrial production and implementing electronics in mechanical field to automate the industrial process, which were not adopted by the company, thus lagging in the knowledge. After two days training, the post-training evaluation mean average is 74%.

As mentioned by Silberman (1998), training is a method of enhancing human performance. In another instance there was a root cause analysis of rolling element bearings training has been arranged by a fertilizer plant-training department, through an external training provider and the training was conducted onsite for selected 24 attendees from mechanical maintenance. They all are Oman nationals and having minimum qualification of higher diploma in mechanical engineering. The average industrial experience of the attendee is 3.6 years. Pre-training evaluation result shows the mean average score by attendees are 10%. This is a very clear indication of poor

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knowledge transfer during their induction and in-plant training. After successful completion of two days intensive training in root cause analysis of rolling element bearings, the post-training evaluation result shows significant improvement of 72 out of 100 marks.

The employers are constantly searching for the key to retention, employee satisfaction and improved productivity (Rita, 2002). There was a public training arranged by world leader bearing manufacturer, in which there were 33 attendees participated to acquire latest knowledge in the field of rotating equipment machinery alignment by using laser alignment technique. This is the latest advancement in this field improves the quality of work over 95%. The people who have attended this training are from different countries (India, Philippines, Oman and Bahrain) and the average industrial experience is 7 years. They are from different industrial background includes fertilizer plant, power production and aluminium smelter plants. Pre-training score shows mean average of 14% and post training average score shows average of 70%.

Training sessions are planned to improve productivity, to increase technical knowledge and skills and to adopt new technologies available in the market to produce efficiently (Rita, 2002). In a fertilizer plant, the internal training department decided to send its 28 technicians for lubrication management system training. In any process plant, it is very significant that the lubrication management plays a vital role in machinery health monitoring and improving machinery availability. The average experience of the attendee is 3.8 years. Pre-training evaluation results are ranging from 0 40 mark out of 100. It is evident that the lubrication is treated as blood for the machines, hence it is very important to manage the machinery lubrication at right time. But the lack of knowledge in this field results in higher machinery failures. Posttraining evaluation the marks mean average is 70 out of 100.

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Conclusion:
It is always challenging to motivate employees to learn new skills and possess high levels of satisfaction and to increase retention (Rita, 2002). Based on above case studies conducted in various industries like power generation, fertilizer production, water transmission it is evident that the knowledge of employees can be improved by providing appropriate trainings time to time. The degree of learning and satisfaction through the training by the trainees is mainly based on the learning environment, trainer behavior and training methodology (Rita, 2002). This is mainly due to the technological advancement, new innovations in the engineering field etc. Thus employee training at right time provided by right people (external source or internal source) is really an investment to the company never being expenditure for the company.

References:
1. Cross, K. P. (1981). Adults are learners. San Francisco: Jossey Bass. 2. Drucker, Peter F.. Management Challenges of the 21st Century. New York: Harper Business, 1999. 3. Eskildsen, J., and Nussler, M. L. (2000). The managerial drivers of employee satisfaction and loyalty. Total Quality Management 11(4), 581 589. 4. MSC Manpower Service Commission (1981), Glossary of Training Terms, Third Edition, HMSO, London. 5. Olesen, M. (1999). What makes employees stay? Training and development, October 48 52. 6. Rita Tworek Berrhelsen., University of Nebraska, Lincoln, December 2002.

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7. Rummler, G. A., and Brache, A. P. (1990). Improving performance: How to measure the white space on the organization chart. San Francisco: Jossey Bass. 8. Silberman, M. (1998). Active training: A handbook of techniques, designs, case examples and tips. San Francisco: Josey-Bass Pfeiffer. 9. Swanson. R. (1994). Analysis for improving performance: Tools for diagnosing organizations and documenting workplace expertise. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

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