Respond by Day 6 to at least one of your colleagues’ postings in one or more of the following ways:
- Ask a probing question.
- Share an insight from having read your colleague’s posting.
- Offer and support an opinion.
- Validate an idea with your own experience.
- Make a suggestion.
- Expand on your colleague’s posting.
- 1 Paragraph
Classmate’s Discussion Post:
“Evaluating Training Programs
The scenarios in the assignment were interesting to me, considering the last two apply to the role I’m currently in – overseeing the guest experience section at an airport. That’s why I decided not to address either of them and instead tackle the nuclear power plant scenario. As a personnel consultant, it is important to have background knowledge and an understanding of the organization services are being provided to. According to the U.S. Department of Energy’s U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA, 2017), about 20% of the electricity in the U.S. comes from nuclear power plants. Not only is electricity a significant factor within these plants, so is the amount of radiation they contain – making it critical that structures are intact and employees remain vigilant and follow all rules, regulations, policies and procedures.
The role of a nuclear power plant to society is major. Failure to comply with company policies may be the result of many factors. Performance issues do not automatically warrant training as the employer must first determine whether employees are prepared for training, since their readiness can have a direct impact on whether training is successful (Kraiger, 2003). Three of the factors to be considered when proposing a training evaluation for this organization are: 1) whether employees understand the importance of their role and the role of the company to the customer (mission, visions, objectives, and goals); 2) whether the company’s procedures are applicable to the tasks being completed (i.e. current and appropriate to the job); and 3) whether employees are aware of the possible consequences their lackadaisical behavior may have on safety when procedures are not followed, if so are they held accountable. Most organizational issues are not just what is seen on the surface, but more often something else that has led to the surface issues.
The most important aspect of training is to evaluate whether training is intended to facilitate changed behavior – transfer of training – or is it just for informational and learning purposes. In this scenario, transfer of training is expected. Existing research supports that transfer is most likely to occur when job-related tasks are similar to those demonstrated within the training (Blume, Ford, Baldwin, & Huang, 2009).Therefore, the training method must align with the skill and tasks associated with the job and procedures employees are expected to follow (Arthur, Bennett, Edens, & Bell, 2003). Training that is not properly aligned, may result in increases in knowledge, but not necessarily result in that information being transferred into changed behavior and practices.”