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7 Steps to Develop a Training Program for the Workplace

The need for a good training program in an organization can’t be relegated to the background. As a matter of fact, if you want your employees to perform optimally, then you must invest in training and re – training them at regular intervals. You are expected to train every new employee that you recruited into your organization before assigning them to their work station and also you are required to re – train old staff members whenever you want to introduce a new skill set in your organization or whenever they are operating below expectation.

Most organization hold their training department in high esteem simply because it is like an incubator that helps them mold their staffs in line with the picture the organization has in mind. So in essence the training department of any organization must always be on their feet to develop suitable training program for the organization. The success of any organization depends on the effectiveness and skills of its employees.

A good training program is different from an orientation program or seminar, it goes deeper and loads of research must be put into it. If you are a trainer or you are an aspiring trainer and you want to know how to develop a good training program for your organization or clients, then the following tips will surely guide you from scratch to finish;

7 Steps to Develop a Training Program for the Workplace

1. Conduct Training Need Assessment (TNA)

As a professional trainer, the first thing that is expected of you before going ahead to start developing a training program is to conduct training need assessment. The essence of training need assessment is to discover skill set gap in an organization and then design a specific training module to plug the skill set gap. A good training need assessment involves series of interviews of all cadres of employees. If indeed you want to develop a good training program that will address specific need in your organization, then you must conduct Training Need Assessment (TNA).

2. Make Use of Survey to Gather Information

Another important thing that you need to do to ensure that you develop a good training program is to make use of survey to gather information that you would need. Survey is almost like Training Need Assessment but with survey, you can go beyond the people in your organization that you are going to design the training program for to people outside the organization but in the same industry. The essence of survey is to ensure that no area of the training subject is left out hence it covers a wider scope.

3. Engage in Research

Becoming a good trainer means that you must be good with research. You can’t come up with a good training program without taking out time to conduct research on the required subject. So once you are able to identify the training need of an organization, then the next step you are to follow is to look for relevant material to use in preparing your training program. You can visit the internet and any library close to you to source for training material.

4. Pencil Down Training Options and Develop Bullet Points

Once you are able to gather all the relevant materials from your research and the required information from the training need assessment, then the next step to follow is to pencil down training options and to sketch a draft of the training module. After you must have sorted out the materials that will be useful to you, then you should bring out a notebook and as you read through the materials, ensure that you pencil down all the points that strikes your heart.

5. Liaise With the Head of HR and Other Key Staff to Review The Training Options You Have

As a training and development specialist, it is very important to liaise with the head of HR and other key staff to review the training options you have. The input you get from will go along to help you develop an effective training program. Although some training and development specialist might decide to go solo when preparing training program for an organization, but liaising with the head of HR and other key staffs is just the best way to go.

6. Develop (Flesh – up) Your Training Module

Once you have gotten the required input from the head of HR and other key staff members, the next step to follow is to take out time to flesh up all the highlighted bullet points (your draft). One good thing about going through all the above listed points is that it will enable you develop a training program that will address specific need in an organization and also you will be able to use relevant examples to drive home your points.

7. Review and Edit Your Training Module

A training program is not complete until a proper review is done. Once you are done with preparing the training program, then the next step to follow is to personally review and edit your training module. After you have done your own reviewing and editing, then you can pass to the Head of HR or other training and development specialist to help you review and edit. The truth is that, sometimes after the review, you might have to re – develop the whole training program. Going through this process will ensure that you come up with a very good training program that will effectively serve the purpose it was designed for.

Developing a good training program is not a one man job, you would need the contributions of other people; it might be through one on one interactions or by reading their books or watching their training DVDs. Once you have successfully develop a training program, then you can go ahead to copyright it so that anybody can’t just go ahead to make use of your training modules without your consent.