Representative image.
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Why must managers train and orient new recruits? Many companies imagine that the new hire is well-trained and ready to deliver. The plausibility explains away this notion that the newbie came across as having prior experience and skills required for the job during interviews.
Former Intel CEO Andy Grove insists that the training must be done immediately after onboarding by Johnny-come-lately’s manager and not left to others in the organization like HR.
Before understanding what, why and how, we must know that training is generically of two types—functional and cultural. The new hire must be trained across two dimensions—competence and attributes. Competence builds expertise. Attributes define conduct.
Functional training
Functional training prepares the new kid on the block to fulfil his key responsibilities (Key Result Areas-KRAs). Irrespective of how good a fitment the new hire appears during the interview, he needs to internalise the company’s unique processes, products, customers, and organisational design. Functional training builds competence for the job.
Without functional training, the new hire is all at sea, often wasting time on gleaning the rudiments of his daily tasks when he is expected to deliver as per stringent turnarounds. He is a work in progress for longer than tolerable. He lacks the competence required for the job and becomes a drain on the company’s time and resources. He is not to blame for it. His managers are.
Culture training
The company’s culture is its kernel. It determines how employees treat each other and communicate. It lays down commandments on how to value customers and how individual and team achievements are rewarded. Culture training builds attributes—like result orientation, communication, and general attitude towards work.
The company’s ethos makes employees high-performing or mediocre, innovative or mundane, hardworking or lackadaisical. Knowing the company’s culture enables the new hire to find his place in the larger organisational design, sets boundaries and expectations, and creates a sense of belonging.
Culture is the collective conscience of the company. Culture training should be imbibed in the new hire as soon as possible. There are seldom manuals for this kind of training. Culture training is most effective when senior executives take time off to train the new hires by sharing their experiences serving the company for many years. TCS does this well.
Dr Grove says: “Training is one of the highest leverage activities a manager can perform.” If the manager spends three hours preparing the training material for an hour’s lecture, it is 12 hours of work for four sessions for ten employees.
The trained employees will likely spend 20,000 hours working for the company annually. This translates into 200 hours of high-output, productive work (in exchange for your 12 hours) if the team’s performance improves by one per cent! Can you argue against this logic?
(The author is a freelance journalist)