The Benefits of Developing your Employees

The benefits of developing your employees

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Personal Development Plan

Ensuring my personal development in the workplace has always been important to me. In order to ensure my skills are up to date, I enjoy my work, have a challenge and increase my skills, personal development is key. Currently, I am completing a Master’s to increase my skills, add education and eventually change roles. My employer currently has a tuition reimbursement plan that is helping me achieve this. Currently, we also have performance appraisals yearly to ensure we know our targets, understand expectations and strive to meet these goals. These are both very effective for employee development however, I think we need others.

At my organization unless you change roles it is rare to have job javascript:void(0)enlargement. This means we tend to continue in our usual roles with the same responsibilities and expectations in our set roles. If we want to have any job enlargement we need to ask for additional projects or really express what other areas we are looking to learn and expand on. Currently, I am trying to ‘job enlarge’ by asking for additional project to train other staff (Noe, R. A, 2010). . I would really like to pursue a career in Training and Development in the future so gaining experience in my current role in this field would be beneficial and exciting.

At the moment we do not have a mentoring program at work. I think this type of initiate would be an excellent one for helping to push employees into new areas (Noe, R. A, 2010). Also, it would build relationships further within our organization which is always a positive. I would like to be mentored by our Director of Training and Development as I believe he has a lot he could teach me. If he does not agree to this then I will reach out to one of my previous co-workers to help me.

Personal development is an area that we all must take an interesting in to ensure our roles keep us challenged; we enjoy our work and expand our skills. These two additional development initiatives would really ensure everyone at my organization has options for development.

References

Noe, R. A. (2010). Employee training and development (5th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill.

The Future of Education

The future of training and educational development is headed down a technology driven path.  This means that the traditional lecture settings that we once were accustom to “on-campus” and in person will be a method of the past.  The future of education is we will communicate virtually with our instructors through online means or possibly watch their lectures through interactive media.  I did not expect technology would shape education this quickly but it seems the future is driving us to be online, read our textbooks on our mobiles or Electronic book readers, communicate online and graduate without ever having to set foot on a campus.  This link to YouTube addresses how quickly the world is changing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPO_HGafBsE . I think since this video was published back in 2009 it is already out of date which shows again how quickly technology and technology usage is changing us.

For the last two years I have been completing my Master’s online which has meant interaction throughout my program has been completely online with classmates and faculty.  I think throughout this time I have picked up the phone 3 times and on two occasions the call was made through Skype.  This method of education will continue to rise as more and more people decide to study online as it is more flexible and convenient.  

Prior to my online studies I had never used interactive videos to learn course materials.  However, throughout my online Master’s program we have constantly reviewed media files to get a better understanding of course content.  This method is also the future of training and education as materials going online will mean students are watching their lecturers online or will use interactive videos to understand materials. 

The other major learning tool has shifted to mobile phones.  Students can review materials on their phone, participate, research, email and even complete some of their classroom tasks on their smart phones (Noe, R. A, 2010).  As we have all seen a shift in personal phone usage I do not see this changing.  Computers and phones will continue to be put together and made more portable for student usage and for learning purposes.

Although it seems all learning materials are being placed online; there are definitely some fields and areas that cannot simply be learned online.  Blended learning which combines face-to-face instruction and online learning is also an important learning format (Noe, R. A, 2010).  .  For instance, those in medical or psychology fields must complete practicum and a certain amount of face to face interaction with patients or complete case studies to fully understand their future profession.  I do not believe these fields can change to completely online learning.  The future of these areas will most likely be the same unless the requirements change.

References

“Education and the Future of Technology.” (7 April 2009).  Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPO_HGafBsE

Noe, R. A. (2010). Employee training and development (5th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill.