Employee development education and training can be critical tools for your company's success. When you provide employee training courses for your staff, you enable them to become more proficient at their jobs and often to excel. But, it isn't enough to train the workers. It's important to train the trainers, as well.

Your company's management is responsible for team development and training, in addition to many other duties which fall to them during the day-to-day operation of your business. So, arming them to find or provide excellent employee development training by giving them a superior employee development education should be well worth your while.

Some advantages of adding adequate employee development techniques to your managers' skill sets are these:

1. More competent, confident management of your company's affairs
2. Greater improvement in rank-and-file employee skills and job performance
3. Higher level of employee satisfaction, which tends to match employee development level
4. An organization that runs more smoothly
5. Improved customer satisfaction

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Get the background info you need on employee development classes

Since you'll want to provide the best employee development training courses possible, it will be helpful for you to learn as much as you can about the process, as well as the evaluative methods you and your managers will need to use for assessing employee skill levels and determining individual employee development needs.

I recommend: Business Training Library provides information to help you administer your employee development and training program, and Lorman Education Services offers both live and archived teleconferences on a variety of issues that confront the business owner or manager in setting up an employee training program.

Consider online employee development education and training

Online seminars in employee development can make your management or employee training simpler and less expensive.

I recommend: Paradigm Learning offers a variety of online learning media and opportunities (podcasts, webinars, etc). Small business management course guidance is also online in the eLearning Yellow Pages.

Seek the best training in employee development techniques for your managers

As you prepare for regular employee training courses, give your managers the best possible opportunity to perfect their training skills.

I recommend: You'll find on-site training for your managers at PeopleFit, which also offers managerial leadership training. The Bob Pike Group offers Train-the-Trainer Boot Camp, and Langevin Learning Services provides an e-learning course specifically aimed at trainers.

Be sure to follow up your managers' employee development classes with regular employee training

Once your managers have received the training they need, they'll be better prepared to help your other employees with their own classes in employee development. You'll find a number of different training programs available to help you find the right employee training course for each member of your staff.

I recommend: Langevin Learning Services provides in-house workshops for multiple employees, in addition to their public workshops and other employee development seminars. Belding provides customer service, as well as sales and team-building training. In addition, the company provides "world-class leadership and management training programs." Honig Idea Guides also offers a variety of seminars on employee development, along with a number of other educational services.

Use either system- or web-based software to administer or track your employee development seminars

Training management and tracking software can help you not only train your employees, but also track their competencies, completed courses, certifications and regulatory compliance.

I recommend: Cornerstone On Demand provides an online solution to your employee training information tracking needs, while, at the same time offering 30,000 pre-integrated e-learning courses. Sage Island offers its Windows-based Conductor employee education training tracking software.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  You'll have numerous options from which to choose for employee development classes. These include location-based seminars (which could be either local or long-distance events), online classes, computer-based learning modules or on-site training that's either offered by an outside trainer (who comes to you) or provided in-house by your management. Give these options some thought to choose the best one.
• •  If you have many employees to train, you could save money by having an out-of-town trainer come to you, rather than sending your employees to the seminar location. Be sure to calculate the cost both ways and decide which will work best for you. The other options mentioned above could also prove less expensive than sending everyone to the event.