In a conference, HR manager of a pharmaceutical company was explaining his dilemma. Their research department had undertaken a 3-day training program six months back, which was an instant hit. Participants rated the program highly. They were in a 'high' for a long period of a month or so. After that, the initial enthusiasm died down slowly. And now they were looking for another trainer with another training program.
He was asking the audience if 'training should be treated as a tonic'. Tonic acts as an energiser, vitalises people, but slowly looses its effect. Or should training be seen as an intervention that needs to be 'sustained'?
According to non-linear thinking paradigm, a training of a new skill/mindset, to be useful, has to be contextualised in the 'system' of participants. This is the first requirement. Contextualisation does not mean just using the 'jargon and words' of the industry. Contextualisation means understanding the variables affecting the 'problem symptom' in a specific case.
For instance, if team building workshop has to be done for a team, say for pharma research unit, the challenges of functioning as a 'team' has to be understood before a workshop has to be designed to help them. For instance, why do intelligent PHD professionals in pharma research unit do not cooperate? Why don't they see the benefits of cooperating? What policies and factors prevent them for coming together? Which of these variables can be impacted by training? Which of them are beyond the scope of training, and therefore required to be put into place, for sustained 'team building'?
An off-the-shelf program of team building, howsoever brilliant it may be, will not contextualise their issues, the challenges they face. Without appropriate understanding of the 'problem symptom', the program design will not incorporate the real-life questions and the dilemmas the team members face. Due to the brilliance of a trainer, the program may become a hit; but it will fail to produce any visible result.
The second reason, why programs do not sustain the behavioural change, is the effect of threshold limit. Until the team learning the skill, crosses the threshold skill levels, they need support, both emotional and physical. If you remember your driving experience of learning a four-wheeler you will remember the time you took till you reached your threshold limit. Until you reached the threshold limit, you were scared of taking the vehicle for drive. You were worried of the incline that will create a driving problem for you. You were worried about the u-turn that had to be taken, or the difficulty of parking in a lane. Until threshold limit is reached, you avoided the chance of driving.
No sooner you reached the threshold limit, your entire outlook of driving changed. You found situations where you could drive. After threshold was reached, the virtuous cycle helped you become a good driver; but until then, you required support from your friend, spouse and others.
The same threshold effect also works in the case of training. For instance, as soon as a team learns 'team-building', they learn to engage with each other freely. But no sooner they face a complex issue of 'conflict between two functions', the team requires support, hand-holding and even some skills to talk to each other. Once the team crosses a threshold limit, they can tackle even tougher conflicts by themselves. Until they reach threshold level, they need to be consciously supported. In short, HR managers need to tackle these issues, contextualisation and threshold limit, to make training 'effective' for their companies.
Without tackling these two thorns, money spent on training just goes down the drain. On the other hand, after negotiating these two issues, the money spent on training produces positive and sustained results.
He was asking the audience if 'training should be treated as a tonic'. Tonic acts as an energiser, vitalises people, but slowly looses its effect. Or should training be seen as an intervention that needs to be 'sustained'?
According to non-linear thinking paradigm, a training of a new skill/mindset, to be useful, has to be contextualised in the 'system' of participants. This is the first requirement. Contextualisation does not mean just using the 'jargon and words' of the industry. Contextualisation means understanding the variables affecting the 'problem symptom' in a specific case.
For instance, if team building workshop has to be done for a team, say for pharma research unit, the challenges of functioning as a 'team' has to be understood before a workshop has to be designed to help them. For instance, why do intelligent PHD professionals in pharma research unit do not cooperate? Why don't they see the benefits of cooperating? What policies and factors prevent them for coming together? Which of these variables can be impacted by training? Which of them are beyond the scope of training, and therefore required to be put into place, for sustained 'team building'?
An off-the-shelf program of team building, howsoever brilliant it may be, will not contextualise their issues, the challenges they face. Without appropriate understanding of the 'problem symptom', the program design will not incorporate the real-life questions and the dilemmas the team members face. Due to the brilliance of a trainer, the program may become a hit; but it will fail to produce any visible result.
The second reason, why programs do not sustain the behavioural change, is the effect of threshold limit. Until the team learning the skill, crosses the threshold skill levels, they need support, both emotional and physical. If you remember your driving experience of learning a four-wheeler you will remember the time you took till you reached your threshold limit. Until you reached the threshold limit, you were scared of taking the vehicle for drive. You were worried of the incline that will create a driving problem for you. You were worried about the u-turn that had to be taken, or the difficulty of parking in a lane. Until threshold limit is reached, you avoided the chance of driving.
No sooner you reached the threshold limit, your entire outlook of driving changed. You found situations where you could drive. After threshold was reached, the virtuous cycle helped you become a good driver; but until then, you required support from your friend, spouse and others.
The same threshold effect also works in the case of training. For instance, as soon as a team learns 'team-building', they learn to engage with each other freely. But no sooner they face a complex issue of 'conflict between two functions', the team requires support, hand-holding and even some skills to talk to each other. Once the team crosses a threshold limit, they can tackle even tougher conflicts by themselves. Until they reach threshold level, they need to be consciously supported. In short, HR managers need to tackle these issues, contextualisation and threshold limit, to make training 'effective' for their companies.
Without tackling these two thorns, money spent on training just goes down the drain. On the other hand, after negotiating these two issues, the money spent on training produces positive and sustained results.
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