Learning and Development Program - North Yorkshire Homes - Case Study Example

Student name Instructor’s name Course name Date НUMАN RЕSОURСЕ MАNАGЕMЕNT LЕАRNING АND DЕVЕLОРMЕNT BUSINЕSS САSЕ Introduction North Yorkshire Homes is a social landlord that is registered and provides about 4, 500 properties allover North Yorkshire coast. It is managed a twelve member board who are volunteers (Cipd, n.d.). The staff force in the company has grown considerably over the last ten years and therefore the need for project management training for its staff. The company’s leadership team is headed by the chief executive officer assisted by director of operations who works under the CEO. The other employees who form a structure work under the supervision of these senior workers in the company. The company monitors and reviews how it performs regularly to a number of indicators with the aim of making their employees as well as their customers more comfortable (Cipd, n.d.). Learning and development is important in the company because it is actually a branch or a subset of human resource management. The main aim of learning and development is to make the performance of employees better through increasing their knowledge and skills (Donovan et al., 221). North Yorkshire Homes has identified the need for learning through the continuous monitoring and reviewing of its performance. This has shown the changes that are taking place in the industry. There has been continuous consultation among the leadership of the company and other employees to identify the factors that will make their customers more satisfied (cipd, n.d.). Consultation with the customers has shown the changing tastes among customers and therefore the need for learning to meet their target. This article will analyze the objectives and aims of the proposed training on project management with the targets and the whole process of learning and development in the company. Aims & objectives of the proposed program North Yorkshire Homes will adopt learning and development program to its employees with the aim of having better workforce as far as project management is concerned. The program will provide all the involved employees with knowledge and skills on better project management practices (Elliott et al., 660). The aim of this learning and development program will be to improve the performance of concerned workers in bringing up projects within the stipulated time. Workers will also be trained on how to do the assigned projects within the available budget and hence reduce time wastage. In this regard, human resource management will take training and development as an undertaking with an organizational activity with the aim of making the employees’ performance better (Russ-Eft and Hallie, 37). The learning and development program in North Yorkshire Homes will provide skills on the best procurement processes which meet the organizational needs of the company. According to Schmidt (298), workers in the company will be able to carry out their different roles after undergoing the learning and development program. This will be accompanied by improvement of their productivity as well as profitability together with efficiency (Donovan, et al 221). After the program, the value for money will increase significantly. There will be changes in the products offered by the company in form of housing structures. Houses offered to tenants by the company will be of higher quality and in time after the program. The attendees or employees who will be undergoing the training will learn on how to manage the different projects in the company. They will learn how to manage their time in the implementation of the projects and come up with quality products. The organization will gain from the learning and development program in that profitability will increase due to the better products it will deliver to the customers. It will also increase its competitive advantage compared to other companies in the same industry (Short, 16). Target audience Basically all the employees either junior or senior in North Yorkshire Homes need to undergo learning and development program. Bearing in mind that the program will be affected by financial as well as time factors, not all workers will have the opportunity to undergo the training. Supervisors, planning administrators and head of operations will also undergo the training to make sure that they bring development to the company. The company needs to recruit more project managers and take them through the learning process for it to come up with better services and increase its profitability. The workers who need to undergo the training will be identified through a thorough audit of their responsibilities in the company. Managers in different departments need to identify the employees under them who require the training. There will be need for serious consultations between the workers and their managers for them to identify the needs of the company and how to go about the training. All the stakeholders in the company will be required to involve themselves with the training process for the company to benefit directly from the learning and development initiative. Active involvement between employees and other stakeholders including customers will be required before the learning commences (Wiessner, et al, 370). This will make the employees aware of the customers’ needs as they learn to solve their problems and develop the company in the long run. Prospective workers will also be enticed by the provision of opportunities in learning and development (Yeo, 320). Timescales for training Time for training is a factor that requires good decision making. This will include when to conduct the learning and development programs and how. Managers will be required to take much time that their juniors after proper understanding of the company’s strategies to increase productivity. They will have to undergo the training for six hours daily for a period of six months. This time will be considerably enough for the managers to interact with learning materials and understand the objectives of the learning fully. Supervisors in different departments will have to take four hours daily for a period of four months. This time will be enough to equip them with the required knowledge and skills for them to fulfill the company’s expectations in their different capacities. Project managers will have to learn thoroughly on how to initiate different programs and work on them to satisfy their customers. Two days per week for a period of six months will be enough for the managers to acquire the necessary skills for managing different projects within the company. Junior employees on the company will take less time for learning. Two hours per day for a period of two months will be enough for the workers to learn different skills that will be of benefit to the company as well as their customers. Training courses and content Different workers under the different working capacities will be equipped with different skills depending with their responsibilities. Managers will learn on different communication skills they are supposed to use when passing information to their juniors. Management skills will also be offered to the managers. This will enable them discharge their duties in a manner than be will be beneficial to the company and their customers in general. As the technology changes, there will be introduction of new facilities and equipment to be used by managers in their line of duty (Wiessner, 368). This makes it important for the managers to get training on the use of different technological devices suitable for their work. Managerial economics courses will also be provided to the managers for them discharge their duties well and timely. Strategic planning will be of benefit to the company if delivered by the managers. This makes it important for the managers to undergo training on strategic planning. This will help in value addition to the company. Supervisors will be taught on different skills they are supposed to be put into place when discharging their duties and make the company develop in the long run (Short, 18). This will include communication skill as well as project management courses which will make them discharge their duties in the correct manner. Junior employees will be trained on how to do their respective work in the required way. This will help the company in increasing its competitive advantage and profitability. Basically the learning and development program will encompass contents from communication skills, management skills, project management as well as the different technical courses depending on the worker capacity (Donovan, et al 221). Learning Methods The program will be facilitated with the use of different learning methods depending on the content as well as the involved individuals. Information presentation will be done through different media such as projectors to the participants. Managers will undergo learning through different materials such as books, journals as well as electronic media (Schmidt, 300). Practical exercise will be conducted to the trainees in different levels or capacities. This will be with the aim of imparting the correct skills to the workers for successful learning and development program. Supervisors and managers will be engaged in discussion sessions which will help them in sharing information on the required development programs. There will also be engagement between the learners and the learning materials with relevant information depending on the fields of engagement (Short, 18). As learning is continuous process, job training will be availed to the employees for them to increase their competence in their field of work. The company’s profitability will be increased significantly through job training sessions. Coaching is very important in learning and development programs. The specific program of North Yorkshire Homes Company, learning will encompass the coaching for it to be successful. Junior employees will be associated in coaching together with role play sessions which will give them necessary knowledge of the role they play in the company (Short, 18). Training will be facilitated through on site as well as offset sessions. On site will be for the realization of practical experiences needed by the learners for development to be achieved. Different design constraints will be used to impart the knowledge to the learners as per specifications. Trainers Learning will be provided by both internal employees as well as external providers. Old and experienced internal employees will train the junior ones through discussions as well as coaching. External facilitators will be from university of York, York St John University and university of Hull. These facilitators have been identified due to their competence in offering business related courses. They also offer programs through which workers can attend when still working. For learning and development to take place, workers need to attend the program as well as work in their respective capacities. Facilitators in the identified learning institutions are experienced in businesses and they have been providing learning and development facilities in other companies both locally and internationally. This makes them qualified to offer the same in our company. Practical experience will be offered by the same facilitators in the company. Internal employees will be given some to interact and in so doing they will be sharing important information and therefore learning and development will take place. Managers and junior employees will get a chance of interacting where they will get the required information on their different working areas. Cost analysis The learning and development program in North Yorkshire Homes Company will incur some costs. This will come as a result of paying the facilitators, the venue to be used as well as the materials for facilitation. Catering services will also be paid for and therefore the need for a budget to incur the costs. The external facilitators will be paid at a rate of 750 pounds per day for the whole period of time. In training the managers who will take a considerable time of six months, the facilitators will 135, 000 pounds. In discussion sessions which put together all the workers regardless of the posts they hold in the company, a total of 1, 000 pounds will be spent to pay the facilitators. The facilitation venue will be provided by the company in its premises therefore there will be no costs on the venue. Catering services will spend 2,000 pounds making a total of 138,000 pounds. An additional amount of 2,000 pounds will be put aside by the company for miscellaneous expenses making a total of 140, 00 pounds. Internal providers will not spend any money making it cheaper to use them than the external ones. Evaluation Evaluation of learning and development is very important for any company undertaking the program. The company will keep on measuring and evaluating the success of the strategies put into place for the learning and development program. The Kirkpatrick model will be useful in evaluating the success of the program. This will take four stages which are the reaction stage, the learning stage, behavior and results. On the first stage, evaluation will be done on how the employees feel about learning and development and the customers’ satisfaction. In the second stage, evaluation will be conducted to know the extent of learning that has taken place (Elliott, 660). Change of attitude on the workers will be assessed on this step of evaluation. The change on work behavior will be assessed on the third step of evaluation. Here there will be assessment on the results of the program as far as how these employees will be viewing the change. Step four will look at the results of the training. This will look at the performance of the company after the learning and development program initiation. The returns of the company will help the evaluators in making their judgment on the program (cipd, n.d.). In the fourth stage, the output of the company will help the human resource managers in getting the advantages as well as disadvantages of the learning and development program. Conclusion In conclusion, North Yorkshire Homes requires a learning and development program for its employees as they continue to grow and diversify. Learning and development, a subset of human resource management will be aimed at developing a better workforce among the employees of the company in project management. It will achieve the objective of doing the different projects in time and within the stipulated budget. Workers performance will also tend to rise as a result of the program where different skills and knowledge will be given to the employees in the different departments of the company. The program will benefit both junior and the senior employees of the company depending on their needs and requirements. It will be take different time frames depending on the workers’ capacities ranging from the managers to the junior employees. Management skills, communication skills as well practical lessons will be given to the workers for them to use the skills in their working environment. Learners will be engaged with their learning materials for them to get the relevant information and the best job training contents. The program will be facilitated by personnel from outside the company as well as the experienced workers within the company. The whole process of learning and development will cost the company 140,000 pounds for paying the facilitators together with the required materials. It will be evaluated using Kirkpatrick model to make sure that is done as required. This will encompass the four steps of evaluation and every step will help the human resource management team to assess the progress of the learning. Works cited Cipd. CIPD. N.p., 1 July 2016. Web. 17 Apr. 2017. https://www.cipd.co.uk/knowledge/strategy/development/factsheet Donovan, Paul, Kevin Hannigan, and Deirdre Crowe. "The learning transfer system approach to estimating the benefits of training: empirical evidence." Journal of European Industrial Training 25.2/3/4 (2001): 221-28. Web. Elliott, Michael, Ray Dawson, and Janet Edwards. "Providing demonstrable return‐on‐ investment for organizational learning and training." Journal of European Industrial Training 33.7 (2009): 657-70. Web. Russ-Eft, Darlene, and Hallie Preskill. "Improving the quality of evaluation participation: a meta-evaluation." Human Resource Development International 11.1 (2008): 35-50. Web. Schmidt, Steven W. 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