1. 66
Outsourcing & More | Articles
November / December 2012
There are two ways to look at the subject of trainings.
On the one hand there is demand as companies
and individuals using the training and on the other hand
companies providing wide range of training services
representing supply. Ideally, the demand should be
equivalent to the market offer. But it is not. Training
market in recent years has been dominated by sprouting
like mushrooms after the rain companies based on EU
funds. The economic downturn has contributed to the
reduction of budgets spent on staff training, but also
resulted in significantly prudent spending the money.
Training – cost or investment?
Companies and policy makers responsible for employee
training can be divided into two basic groups. There are
those who believe that training is primarily cost. Expenditure
on education in many companies is the first item in the
budget, where they try to save or which is completely
deleted. Of course, there is awareness of the need for the
development and training of employees in the company,
but this is not necessary, especially when the future is
uncertain. Sometimes the training budget is simply “frozen”
until the financial situation improved. Those who are careful
and skeptic, doubt the importance of the development and
investment in human capital, quite often think short term.
There is also a second group, which even during the
economic downturn will enjoy and benefit from the various
types of trainings, even if the budget is limited comparing
to the previous one. However, most of these companies
are changing their approach to the selection of personnel
to be trained, themes and external trainers or training
companies. Employee development is definitely long-term
investment in building competitive advantage.
Who will be trained and why?
Most often the companies which decide to train their
employees are the ones that etched in their strategy human
capital development. This way the companies can motivate
people, reward and benefit them, but also effectively build
a competitive advantage and grow up. According to the report
“End of Financial Support – the future of training in Poland,”
prepared by the HRP Group, the groups of employees who
will be trained in the coming years include specialists (68,5%),
mid-level management (54,8%), line managers (43,8%), top
management (28,8%), line employees (28,8%), clerks (27,4%).
There are many reasons why people want to be trained, as
well as the reasons why the decision-makers want to train their
employees.
Due to the current economic situation and limited budgets
the most important reasons include the development
of skills needed for work, promotion, development processes,
procedures and products, learn the most important changes in
the law, procedural changes, statutory changes, enabling the
development of internal coaches who train their colleagues.
Increased awareness of training needs is evident, however
it brings increased awareness of the expectations from the
training company which offer education for their employees.
Outsourcing or…
The dilemma for many is the decision: who will train?
Does the company use the services of companies that
To train or not to train?
This is the question!
Are Polish companies use the services of external
training companies?
Source: «End of Financial Support - The future of training in Poland» report prepared by the
HRP Group
Graph 1. The groups of employees who will be trained in the coming years
Specialists
Mid-level Managers
Line Managers
Top management
Line employees
Clerks
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%
68,5%
54,8%
43,8%
28,8%
28,8%
27,4%

2. 67
Outsourcing & More | Articles
November / December 2012
offer business training? Or are focused on their internal
trainers? And at the end what kind of education form they
choose?
There has been noticed a decline in number of clients in
outsourcing companies providing wide range of training
services. These are not only trainings in open formula, but
also trainings tailored completely to suit the customer’s
needs. On the one hand this is due to a significant
reduction in training budgets, but also because of the
increased use of internal trainers’ services.
Very often the internal trainers are trained “outside”, and
then this knowledge is used in the company. It is similar
with the group of employees specialized in a particular
field who share their knowledge with others.
There is still a constant need for the services of external
training companies. Specific topics, highly skilled trainers,
or a very small group to be trained cause that there is
demand for the services offered by the outsourcers.
External training companies’ offer is very rich – at least
in theory. It is very important to select properly the
contractor. With a limited financial resources, respecting
the time led to the training of staff, or even caring about
the development of your organization, you have to select
properly. Neither color brochure, or extensive range
of thematic are not a guarantee. So what to look for?
First of all, companies are looking for a great coaches
– huge experience and knowledge of the trainer who
conduct the training is the first step to success. It is worth
to ask the company for references issued by the previous
clients – the feedback from participants of other courses
offered by the selected service provider is enough. You
should also look at the training methodology. In general,
the lecture itself is not enough, it is important to be sure
that there is a workshop formula, Q&A session, or even
a follow-up session.
Before using the services of outsourcer you should think
over which method of the training suits you. Of course,
e-learning courses are much cheaper, but mostly they are
not the only-sufficient form of gaining new skills. They
may be just entry or complete the offer. Experienced
experts providing training services are focused on
delivering knowledge through various channels, methods,
techniques. With an experience on the market they can
guarantee access to the best experts.
What if the company needs the training for more than
one small group of employees? Often uses the skills and
knowledge of the internal coach. However it is noticed
the trend of development outsourcing services in the
field of broadly defined tailored trainings and consultancy
projects. An experienced company offering training
services can bring a lot of benefits. It has extensive
experience in the preparation of the appropriate form
of training, ensures the highest quality, but also reduce
the time that the client’s employee needs to spend on the
organization of training.
Crisis and what next?
People say about the crisis for a long time, and according
to the experts it crosses the plans of the traders. Will it
affect the market of the training services and use of the
companies offering these services? Skeptics argue that
the end of free and subsidized by the EU trainings will
cause that the it will be hard for the employers to get
used to the prices on the commercial market for training
services, while the others say that their training needs
have been met.
There are also those who believe that the training
needs can not be satisfied in the long run, because the
recruitment of new employees, changing customer needs,
evolving market environment enforce additional training.
First of all, the company will put particular emphasis on
those topics that will be needed for their development
and achieving competitiveness. The second important
issue is attaching a great importance to the quality
of service and also after sales service.
How about the training companies? These will have
to skillfully and quickly respond to the market needs.
To survive they will have to put in their strategy flexibility
– adapting to possibilities of clients, providing the
highest quality of the services. Training services’ provider
will no longer be just a training institution, but a kind
of consultant, trainer – the main objective of the training
will be to resolve a specific problem.
If the external company succeed in this task and also will
measure the effectiveness of the training for the customer
with important conclusions – will secure itself long-term
cooperation.
Author:
Rafał Szary
Project Manager: training and conferences
tel. 696 442 465