Introduction - What is Learning & Development

 “It is not the strongest of the species who survive, nor the most intelligent; rather it is those most responsive to change.” —Charles Darwin

Humans, as a creature, grow. From the time they conceive to the last breath of their lives, growth is one essential factor which happens in various magnitudes in their lives. Along with growth, there is one other factor which is bound together, that is learning (Taylor and Parsons, 2011). Both growth and learning are two axes in the curve of success. Similar to humans, organisations, which are created, maintained and cultivated by the said humans, are also a unit which grows. For the organization and it’s people to grow and succeed, learning is a key factor indeed. If any Organisation wants to be on top of their game, it is essential for it to equip with people who believe “continuous learning” is the ladder which takes them there (Alipour, Salehi and Shahnavaz, 2009).

Armstrong and Taylor (2014) discuss about 4 methods of how an organization can uplift the competency of employees. Learning, is a process which uses experience to modify and develop knowledge and skills, create the correct attitude towards achieving the common goal and have a behavioural development. Whereas development is making aware of the employee’s ability and competence through learning. Training is an essential part of an employee’s tenure since it enriches the required skills and knowledge to perform the assigned duty to the best productivity. Even though education is not necessarily be a part of the employee’s technical advancement, it will definitely give an advantage over various aspects of values and emotions which come across when performing duties.

Learning and Development drives the organisation ahead of it's rivals and competitors. Hence, in the contemporary business world, it is essential to have Learning and Development in every section of the organisation, to have a sustainable market coverage. Low staff turn over and reduction of wasted expenditure will too reflect the effect of learning and development. Importance of a learning Organisation will be discussed in the following posts.

Figure 1 : Difference between Learning, Training, Development & Education

(Wheeler, 2013)

References  

Alipour, M., Salehi, M. and Shahnavaz, A. (2009). A Study of on the Job Training Effectiveness: Empirical Evidence of Iran. International Journal of Business and Management, 4(11), pp.63-68. 

Amstrong, M.  Taylor, S.  (2014). Armstrong’s Handbook of Human Resource Management Practice. 13th ed. New Delhi, Kogan Page Limited

Taylor, L. & Parsons, J. (2011). Improving Student Engagement. Current Issues in Education, 14(1), pp 1-33[Online]. Available at: < http://cie.asu.edu>.  [Accessed on 30 September 2019]

Wheeler, K.(2013). What’s the Difference between Training, Education, Development and learning[Online]. Availble at: < https://futureoftalent.org/whats-difference-training-education-development-learning>. [Accessed on 06 October 2019]

How important is Learning & Development to an Organisation

These 4 essential factors bring an invaluable advantage to the organization right from the very top and the employees at the dead bottom of the O-chart. Aragon and Valle (2013) have researched that concluded the fact that training for the managers play a key role in the organisation’s enhanced performance and definitely score a better result relative to organisations which did not have sufficient training. It is not only the management but also the non-executive staff require training to contribute towards the growth of the organisation (Ahamed,2013)

It is indeed an investment which will bear fruit in time to come not only in the schemes of productivity but also commitment, psychological contract and employee retention (Sahinidis and  Bouris, 2007). Beer, Finnstrom and Schrader (2016) indicating US corporations spent 164.2 Billion USD on their training programs in 2012, as much as twice the GDP for SriLanka in 2018 (CBSL,2019), shows how much the investor value training and development of the employees and that the oraganisations consider employee training with utmost interest. Nevertheless, most organisations find it difficult to find the ideal formula in converting such financial investment to Improvement of personal and corporate growth or financial return of investment (Beer, Finnstrom and Schrader, 2016).

The organisation I’m employed at is a leading airline in the country. I’m attached to the Aircraft Maintenance Department which is the technical handling arm of the aircrafts in the organisation. It is also a main revenue generating avenue for the airline by providing technical handling and certification to other airlines which requires them in Colombo. In the years 2018,2019 there were many Engineering type training offered for the engineers on aircraft types, mainly types which are not operated by the airline such as Boeing B787, B737, B777 and Airbus A350 apart from the aircraft types operated such as Airbus A320, A330 and A320 NEO (Author’s work, 2019).

Earlier, out of 30 airlines which comes to Colombo, this airline engineers certified only aircrafts from 06 airlines. However, after the engineers were qualified after the trainings mentioned above, they are managed to certify aircrafts from 20 airlines. Many other airlines are going through negotiations which will make this number only increase. This means the revenue generated by these 3rd party airline certification is increased close to thrice the amount than it was before the trainings were conducted. On the other hand, having qualified and experienced engineers who are expertise in many types of aircrafts gives the airline a chance to open up for business opportunities in other airports. Currently, a team of engineers are based in Male, Maldives and one engineer in Chennai, India who currently certify aircrafts in this airline and also airlines who operate to those airports. Hence, there will be viable business opportunities which will directly support the airline’s revenue (Author’s Work, 2019). This alone shows how valuable training is for the organization and how it  can generate revenue despite the initial cost borne as a great investment.

References

Ahamed, U (2013) Impact on Training on Employee retention [Online]. Available at: < https://www.researchgate.net/publication/263808540_Impact_of_Training_on_Employee_Retention>. [Accessed on 01 October 2019]

Aragon, I and Valle, R (2013) Does training managers pay off? The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 24 (8), pp 1671–84

Beer, M., Finnstrom, M. and Schrader, D. (2016) The Great Training Robbery. Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 16-121 [online]. Available at: http://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Publication%20Files/16-121_bc0f03ce-27de-4479-a90e-9d78b8da7b67.pdf [Accessed on 30 September 2019].

Central Bank of Sri Lanka (2019) Annual Report 2018 [Online]. Colombo: Central Bank of Sri Lanka: Available at: < https://www.cbsl.gov.lk/sites/default/files/cbslweb_documents/publications/annual_report/2018/en/1_Preliminary.pdf>.[ Accessed on 28 September 2019 ]

Sahinidis, A. and Bouris, J. (2008). Employee perceived training effectiveness relationship to employee attitudes. Journal of European Industrial Training, 32(1), pp.63-76[Online]. Availble at: < https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/c1b6/00716926dbd75ed689713a7359a610e17cd8.pdf>. [Accessed on 29 September 2019]