Free Training
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Comments posted to this topic are about the item Free Training
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One of the several reasons that I am a contractor rather than a full time employee is that I want the time for training. I don't trust employers to provide that time.
Russel Loski, MCSE Business Intelligence, Data Platform
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Steve, I am 100% with you on this one. I've worked for companies that didn't offer training because they thought it was only making the employee more attractive to other companies. How short-sighted can you get!
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I can't say I'm suprised. I have seen many companies that don't understand the value in training. You are expected to keep up with the latest technologies on your own time and with your own money, and then, when you aren't up to speed on the latest and greatest thing, you are considered a slacker.
Oh, if you ever need to fill a slot again, feel free to let me know. I think I could get the time off, I might have pay my own way, but I could deal with that!
Jack Corbett
Consultant - Straight Path Solutions
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My company is interesting in this respect. No training offered, very little in the way of conferences, etc.
Here's the interesting part, they pay 100% for grad school, as long as its work related.
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Well said, Steve!
Looonnnng ago, in a GUIDE conference in a city faaaarr away in a mainframe community, a presenter made some excellent points which I offer (in my own words) in addition to Steve's arguments for training.
• When an employer provides training, it oftimes encourages the employee to stay (because the company cares ... and I add, because the manager cares).
• Training injects "life blood" into the employee and there is renewed excitement in his/her work.
• The LAST thing the presenter said was, "If an employee leaves after receiving training, it isn't because of training, — he was going to leave anyway."
It's great to work for managers who will "go to bat" for their staff because they value them as people and not just commodities or utilities. Hmmm ... that leads me to wonder if such a manager feels that way about him/her self (i.e. not valued).
Norm J.
Norm Johnson
"Keep smiling ... it gives your face something happy to do
... and it makes people wonder what you're up to!"
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I completely agree with you, Steve.
The worst case scenario is that the employee gets some time off in an environment where at least there is SQL being discussed everywhere. The best case scenario (and one most likely to happen) is that the employee will learn something to bring back after having a chance to plug the company.
I don't understand why more companies don't see the opportunity cost of being tight with training. And in this case, the cost of the training was free!
To validate the training, if they are so worried about return on investment, they can (1) give the employee a question/problem they want solved to see if they can learn how at the training or (2) assign the employee a 5-10 minute presentation to do afterward to sum up what they learned and how it might be valuable.
Look at what happens when other professionals (doctors, cops, civil servants) don't get sufficient training. Most IT jobs don't have lives on the line in the same way, but IT employers should still take a lesson about the value of getting their employees some training time.
webrunner
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A SQL query walks into a bar and sees two tables. He walks up to them and asks, "Can I join you?"
Ref.: http://tkyte.blogspot.com/2009/02/sql-joke.html -
Training is so important that it's number one on my list, ahead of salary, for job criteria. A company needs to recognize the value of training to the employee and the company for all the reasons previously stated and budget the time and resources necessary for it.
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This is my thought on this issue and I always tell my boss (no matter where I am working):
If you think paying for training and watching your employees go is expensive, try not training them and watch them stay 🙂
* Noel -
I also work for a company that I feel isn't as willing to train as they should be. We have free training sessions available on some machines we bought for anyone that we want to send. One of the main support people is finally going this November, after having the machines for two years. They fail to understand that if the employees get trained, no matter what level of the company, they can improve what they do. It's hard to sell intangibles to business men.
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A friend of mine is at a place where they are having the developers take an online VB.Net course through the local community college. And get this: they have to pay in advance for it out of their own pocket! They will get paid back for it (theoretically), but this has to be the first time that I've heard of employees have to pay in advance for training that the company is requiring them to take.
They also have the policy that if you leave within a year of having training or the company paying for you to take a cert test, you have to pay back the training on a pro-rated basis. Provides a nice incentive to get yourself fired! 😀
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[font="Arial"]Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves or we know where we can find information upon it. --Samuel Johnson[/font] -
I've had managers like that. Fortunately, as a consultant, I don't have to stay with them as long as full time employees do.
When I see managers refusing to send people to conferences (even local ones where there is minimal travel expense), I'm pretty much sure that it is due to the following reasons:
1. The managers themselves attend conferences that are more like wine and dine, hooker and cooker events, so they think that all conferences are that way. Seriously. I had one poor manager refuse to send an employee struggling with a new ERP database because "she just had a vacation a couple of months ago". He thought that these conferences were just exhibits and one-on-one breakfasts and lunches. When I told him that the conference was hands on training with tons of tips, he just laughed. Then he regaled me with tales of his last heli-skiing vendor even he and the CEO attended in Colorado. He said the only hands-on stuff was from a stripper one vendor hired for the evening.
2. The managers think that conferences are just one big resume swap, where recruiters are abducting their employees by the boat load. That's because they only attend these things when they themselves want to jump ship.
3. They don't want to set a precedent that would then make them have to send everyone else on the team for training as well.
Unfortunately, PHBs are more common that real leaders in some organizations.
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I'd be curious to know if they would have had better response if they were ask to pay something. There's a HUGE bias against anything "free" (based no doubt on the "you get what you pay for" principle) . That seemed to be a dead giveaway to them that this was a "fluff session", even if there were other circumstances essentially proving otherwise (like a vendor trying to give you free classes to grease the wheel towards other contracts, etc...)
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Your lack of planning does not constitute an emergency on my part...unless you're my manager...or a director and above...or a really loud-spoken end-user..All right - what was my emergency again? -
I got a call recently from some conference organization wanting me to attend their "free" conference. I told them that we hadn't budgeted any travel and couldn't attend. They kept reiterating the free punchline, adding in that they hold them around the country. I finally got rid of them by saying "Are you going to hold one in El Paso, Texas, or Las Cruces, New Mexico? Because otherwise, I have to travel and stay at a hotel and eat. And that isn't free, and that isn't budgeted."
The poor girl is probably just a telemarketing drone, but perhaps she finally realized that just because something is free, it doesn't mean that it doesn't cost anything.
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[font="Arial"]Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves or we know where we can find information upon it. --Samuel Johnson[/font]
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