When considering the many options available to you when it comes to employee development, the two instructor-led options come down to in-house or sending your employees to a public offering workshop with other company employees in attendance. In-house, or company-specific training, can be conducted onsite at the organization’s facility, or we are finding many of our members are selecting to hold the customized program for their employees at an “offsite” location. Those that choose to do so have found that it helps to eliminate interruptions and encourages the employees to focus on the learning experience.
We routinely request a company tour and conduct multiple discussions prior to conducting the workshop to assure that we are meeting the expectations and objectives for the workshop. This provides an opportunity for the instructor to get a feel for the culture, work environment and helps to better relate to the group’s discussions having seen what and where they are referring to during the program.
A question we get quite often is how many people do we need to have to be able to conduct a program in-house? We find that most often, our workshops contain anywhere from 10 to 20 employees. We have conducted programs for as few as five and as many as 25. Anything smaller, or larger than that, can produce participant engagement challenges. This is especially important to consider when conducting a workshop that is between three and eight hours in length. If it is a one or two hour presentation of information, and group interaction isn’t critical, the only thing that determines the limit on the size of the group is the room itself.
Company-specific training typically requires more planning, dialogue and coordination of schedules, but we find that the little bit of additional effort pays significant dividends. There are many benefits of company-specific training:
- The training can be scheduled when it is best for the organization from both a time of year and time of day standpoint.
- The materials and discussions can be patterned to meet the specific needs and objectives of the company and its employees.
- This training option assures that any sensitive company information is kept in-house while at the same time able to be freely discussed.
- It is easier for the material to be presented across departments, shifts and facilities at one time.
- is that some element of team building for the participants will occur. It’s common that many participants will spend more time in a single workshop session than they may spend together in a month or even a year at work. Plus, the workshop provides a common experience for the participants.
To discuss more about in-house training or if you are interested in having any of our programs conducted for a group of your employees, please contact Patty Welther at 814/833-3200 or pwelther@mbausa.org.
