In such straitened times, companies are even less inclined to shell
out on expensive courses for staff who may pack their bags once
they've got their new skills to take with them. Colin Beveridge
suggests some solutions.
Looks like it's time to get out the handcuffs again.
Don't worry, I'm not about to embark on a politically incorrect
account of my impending visit to Amsterdam with the other guys from
the Leeds United mailing list - I am referring to the staff
training programme and how I can use it to secure my best people
for another year or so.
Now, if your company is like mine, your IT department may well have
an obligation to provide personal development plans and associated
training opportunities for all staff. Generally speaking, these are
closely linked to individual and departmental objectives, forming
an important aspect of routine performance appraisals.
This is a really great idea in principle, but not always sincerely
realised in practice. Either because the training budget doesn't
exist in the first place, or it becomes a very early casualty in
the annual budget round challenge; which is a pity.
It seems that far too many IT directors and managers still don't
recognise the true value of providing ongoing development training
for their hard-won staff. Despite the fact that our industry has
allegedly been suffering from an insoluble skills crisis for the
past 30 years - most of us still prefer to buy in the finished
article, rather than growing our own.
Sure, I understand that we can't always wait for new skills to
develop organically and we often need immediate access to
state-of-the-art expertise. I do live in the real world, where
market forces
 | | "It's a good job that other
professions don't follow IT's example. If they did, I for one would
want to look very closely at the staff training records before I
submitted myself to medical or dental surgery. Or, perhaps before I
buckled myself into an aircraft seat?" | | | | | |
| | Colin Beveridge | | |
|
|
come into play and strong demand always drives up the premium for
rarer skills: those skills which we all need now but which we have
not adequately planned to acquire for ourselves.
We have all seen and smiled at the job adverts asking for two years
of experience in software or hardware that is less than a year old
- but, hey, these job specs weren't dreamed up by the naïve little
agency representatives who are handling the requirement.
No, we - the employers -are to blame. We are the ones who
deliberately create the churn that drives staff turnover,
repeatedly robbing Peter to pay Paul by hoping to recruit staff
that someone else has trained.
Such is life you may be thinking. This is just a normal part of the
IT industry career ladder - regularly moving on to a new company
every other year, getting some new skills and then moving on again
to exploit their true market value, through increased salary or by
turning freelance.
No wonder then that many companies are so reluctant to provide
their existing staff with training in new, marketable, skills. No
wonder also, that a large proportion of their longer serving
in-house staff may be well beyond their personal "best before"
dates.
At the moment, though, we are undeniably in the midst of a
technology downturn and, no doubt, this has already translated into
a wide-scale and severe reduction in the recruitment of IT staff -
just look at how thin the jobs section in the weekly trade press
have become over the past year.
Every day it seems national news broadcasts are filled with
disheartening announcements of further large-scale job losses in
our sector. IT is well and truly on the front line of this downturn
and there is little that you or I can do about it. We have to ride
the storm.
In most normal years, this would be good news for IT employers - a
"buyers' market", allowing us to avoid paying through the nose for
essential staff. Sorry, if that sounded a little bit too harsh for
those of you already on the receiving end - but that's the way it
is.
However, for the next year at least, we are unlikely to be able to
exploit the situation by recruiting the finished article for our
vacancies, even though they may be cheaper than usual, because our
headcount limit is capped. Furthermore, general budget cuts will
also make it harder to use consultants and contractors to fill our
skills shortages. Talk about rocks and hard places.
At the moment, anybody with any sense who has a good job with a
reliable employer is probably keeping their head down, waiting for
the inevitable turn of the cycle. More than ever, I believe, that
now is the time to sit tight and, if possible, build on personal
skill-sets as insurance for the future. Of course, this will create
an even stronger than usual pressure from staff for training.
So all of this indicates that a number of factors are steadily
coalescing into a compelling argument to make a number of
department heads seriously reconsider their previously unreceptive
attitude towards staff training and development.
Which is where I go back to my opening remark about the
handcuffs
In the past, the argument against paying for our staff to refresh
their technical skills has usually been along the lines of "why
should I pay five grand for them to improve their chances of
getting a better job somewhere else? If I pay for this course they
will just leave us even sooner".
It's a good job that other professions don't follow suit. If they
did, I for one would want to look very closely at the staff
training records before I submitted myself to medical or dental
surgery. Or, perhaps before I buckled myself into an aircraft seat?
After all, would you be happy to fly if you knew that the pilots
had not been trained for a specific aircraft, or indeed any modern
aircraft since the Dakota in which they originally qualified? I
think not.
And yet, we do expect our IT people to be able to pick things up as
they go along, almost by osmosis, even when their output may be
critical to the success of the business, or personal safety. This
is just another of the questionable management techniques that we
like to keep safely hidden from our colleagues- behind the closed
doors of the data centre.
The answer though is fairly simple.
We CAN provide our staff with the training they would like and that
we require for them to do a good job. All we need to do is to
protect our investment. A simple "training contract" between the
employee and employer should benefit both sides and be relatively
simple to implement.
If both sides agree the potential mutual value of a training
investment, say £5,000 for a particular course, the employer will
pay for the course, subject to an agreed rate of return with the
employee, ie. the period over which the employer may derive real or
perceived benefit from providing the opportunity.
In this way, by remaining with their employer, the retained
employee sees their training "account" credited by their grateful
employer, for the duration of the training contract, and both
parties derive longer-term benefit from the investment.
Premature termination of employment during the training benefit
period, by either party, would, naturally incur an appropriate
compensation to the other party.
This all seems too easy to me; which is probably why it doesn't
happen very often.
Is Colin right or just an old (metaphorically speaking)
cynic?
Are you are deliriously happy with the status quo
in the area of training or do you think Colin's ideas make sense?
Please say whether you are happy for us to publish an edited
version of your email and if possible supply your job title
.>
>Send an e-mail.Colin Beveridge is an interim executive who has held
top-level roles in IT strategy, development, services and support.
His travels along the blue-chip highway have taken him to a clutch
of leading corporations, such as Shell, British Petroleum, ICI, DHL
and Powergen.