Uncommon knowledge the key

WOULD you let an untrained and unqualified mechanic work on your car?

The answer would be no. Why is it then that every day we employ or promote unskilled people to manage and run our businesses or departments in a business?

Every year, businesses spend money training their frontline staff, administration people and trades people, yet they fail to develop those who manage and run our operations. They are the team members who are relied on to make decisions, recruit staff, determine and follow budgets, report on business activity, manage complaints, manage and develop the team. These are not common knowledge skills, yet it is common practice for employers to expect our key personnel to learn through on-the-job without training, coaching or support, often learning through very costly mistakes.

It's a fact that staff will often leave if they are under stress, which can be caused by the lack of knowledge and or support from management.

Team members are not committed to the business unless the person with whom they work knows what they are doing. If they don't, how can they be committed?

This is often the main reason why staff leave their employment - the lack of skills and knowledge of the leader.

Leaders within the business will also leave due to the stress of not knowing or being able to perform their job due to a lack of skills required to perform tasks.

Leaders need skills that are current and can be applied immediately and a learning experience which focuses on the application of skills to the individual's current employment situation.

To be effective leaders, staff need training which develops the skills they need - and which they can apply immediately. They need training which is practical and uses industry-related solutions for leadership development.

When considering the investment required to train the key personnel in your organisation, weight up the costs that an ineffective staff member incures - through mistakes such as losing a valuable customer, employing ineffective personnel, ineffective budgeting or rostering too many staff on a public holiday! 

Angela McGregor-Goodwin is the owner and manager of Quality Training Solutions, providing training and consulting services for businesses since 1999, and a Registered Training Organisation in January 2003.