1.3 Training as a Subsystem of the Human Resource Management System

Training and development activities take place within the broader scope of human resource management or HRM. HRM represents the entire set of activities used by an organization to align its human capital with organizational objectives and strategies. In addition to training and development, HRM includes planning for human resource needs, recruitment and selection of employees from outside the organization, evaluating job performance, rewarding and compensating employees, maintaining positive and productive employee relations, and assuring a safe and healthy working environment. The overarching objective of the HRM system is to support the organization's efforts toward effectively and efficiently meeting its business goals and accomplishing its strategy for succeeding in the marketplace.

It is critical to understand that in supporting overall organizational goals, training is but one of several avenues available for human resource development. Training can be thought of as a subsystem of human resource management. Just because a training program is well thought out and addresses a significant issue in a firm, it is not guaranteed to succeed. In some instances, managers may not encourage recently trained employees to use the new skills or knowledge they have acquired in training. In other cases, the proper tools, equipment, and/or time may not be available for recent trainees to put their newfound expertise to use. In yet other cases, training may not even be the answer to a particular problem.

For example, because of a past history of discrimination, AT&T was once under a court order to increase the number of women in outside craft jobs to about 20 percent. The company diligently and competently designed a training program to help women develop the skills necessary to be effective in such jobs. Unfortunately, they found that the female dropout rate was alarmingly high—about 50 percent—and that of those few who completed the training, the majority didn't last more than a year on the job. Further investigation revealed that the nature of the work, particularly carrying and climbing a long and heavy ladder, made it very difficult for most women to complete. Using basic ergonomic principles, the job was redesigned so that it could be performed equally well by trained women and men.1 The point of the story is that what seemed to be a training problem was actually a work design problem.

Viewing training as only one part of the overall system of human resource management might have allowed AT&T to avoid this costly and time-consuming mistake. In another example, a trainer had carefully designed a training program to increase front-line supervisors' knowledge of the details of a union contract that they needed to be familiar with if they were to perform their jobs without a worker filing a grievance. However, the trainer could sense that motivation to attend the training program he had designed was extremely low. So, instead of implementing the program as planned, the trainer developed an extremely difficult open-book exam on the topic of the details of the union contract with a one-week deadline for completion. As an incentive to do well, the trainer and the plant manager offered a free steak dinner to the supervisor who submitted the exam with the most correct answers. They also encouraged the supervisors' managers to wager on which supervisor would win the steak dinner. Because of these side bets, the managers began to organize their supervisors into study groups wherein they helped lead the discussion.

As a result, the test writer was besieged with requests for clarification and complaints that some multiple-choice questions had two or more correct responses, other questions were misleading or ambiguous, and so forth. By the end of the week, all exams had been submitted and most were either all correct or nearly all correct. Faced with this high performance from all supervisors, the plant manager decided to host a steak dinner for all supervisors and their managers. Amazingly, the most popular topic at the dinner table was the exam and what everyone had learned about the union contract from the process. In this example, a savvy trainer was able to turn very low motivation to learn in a traditional training environment into very high motivation to learn in another non-training environment by recognizing that training is not always the best solution, even if there seems to be a training-type problem.2

New Employee Training

It is also important to understand that one of the first places a new employee is sent after he or she is hired is to a training program. That is, the initial impressions—which can be lasting—that a new employee will form about an organization often happen in training. This first training program is commonly called an orientation. Here new employees are exposed to the expectations the organization has for them, key policies and procedures relevant to them, the basic business model under which the organization operates in order to be successful, the variety and types of coworkers present on the job, the corporate culture, and other aspects of organizational life. Newer, more extensive versions of orientation are now frequently referred to as onboarding. This latter process can last for months rather than just days and may include several quick job rotations, in-depth coaching and mentoring from an experienced employee, and an initial performance review with feedback from multiple sources.