You’re having a review with your manager and she suggests that you go on a few training courses to update some of your skills. Initially, you may feel a little put out – you can do your job, what do you want or need training for?
Rest assured that your manager isn’t necessarily calling your abilities into question. There are all sorts of reasons why training can be beneficial.
• Training may keep you up to date with the company’s plans to move forward – don’t get left behind.
• New skills might open the way for you to advance up the career ladder.
• Learning something new helps prevent you from stagnating in the job.
• Training with others offers you an opportunity to meet others in the company or in your field – this can also be useful for your career later on.
• Employers are realising that training staff with new skills is a key to retaining them, as people who are developing in their roles are less likely to look for new challenges elsewhere.
And don’t think training will mean learning computer skills or about new food hygiene practices, although these are two important areas. There are plenty of skills you can pick up, such as:
• How to team-build and work in teams
• People management
• Leaderships skills
• Improving on customer service
• Financial management – how to write budgets; reading profit and loss accounts
• Selling with confidence.
Have an open mind about what you can gain from training courses – it will show you’re willing to take new ideas on board, which may in turn mean your boss sees you as a possible candidate for promotion.
Getting the right training is usually decided between yourself and your manager. If your manager doesn’t raise the subject with you, do your homework about what training is available and go to him or her.
Discuss the potential benefit to you and your team, and how it is relevant to your job. In some cases, you may be able to demonstrate considerable benefit – for example, being trained to an advanced level in food hygiene could mean you are able to train the rest of the team.
With your manager, set out the aims of what you’d like to learn and achieve on a course.
If training is taking you away from your job for a day or two, be sure your team are aware of where you’re going and what you hope to achieve. They’ll have to cover for you, and including them in the process will help to motivate them and encourage them to also look for learning opportunities.
Once you’ve done your course, be sure to give feedback to your manager about its usefulness. Did it achieve the goals you set out before going on it? Can you put some of the skills or techniques into practice immediately? In time, will there be follow-up or advanced courses that you can take to move further ahead?
If you have a deputy or a team member who would also benefit from the training, encourage and support their application to do so – a learning culture is a healthy one in any organisation.