More and more knowledge workers get trainings informally
When training budgets are slashed, what could workers do to further their knowledge and skills?
When the business atmosphere is rife with fears over the possibility of another round of pink slips, workers have no choice but to either look for new opportunities elsewhere or beef up their cache of skills to be employable. The irony is that as workers need to gain new knowledge and skills, one of the things that get slashed out of the corporate budget is that which should be dedicated to skills training. In lieu of formal trainings, workers have found a way to collaborate and protect themselves against the worries of being unemployed or unemployable just because they are not skilled enough.
The nature of most IT jobs requires workers to collaborate. The off-shoot of the collaborative nature of most IT jobs requires project team members to over-communicate and support one another lest a project’s dependency fall apart just because one team member does not know how to do things right. So what’s a project team to do? Share knowledge, of course.
Most IT workers have found themselves providing tips and tricks amid impending coding disasters or project failures. It has become common practice among engineers to give insights about how things work and, more importantly, where to find new sources of knowledge. Some even share codes themselves to help a fellow engineer out of a sticky situation. Online forums have become minefields of coding tips and tricks, of discussions about processes and methodologies.
The collaborative nature of knowledge gathering and sharing has permeated many other businesses. In no thanks to the prohibitive costs, tight schedules, and logistical challenges of formal trainings, workers have been slowly opting to enhance their knowledge by consulting colleagues. How to manipulate images in Photoshop? Watch a colleague work. How to generate reports from a project management application? Check the reference tip that a co-worker sent to the mailing list during her free time. A script sends your application on a fritz? Ask the genius on the next cubicle.
Increasingly, many workers are foregoing formal trainings and the corresponding certificates in favor of informal learning sessions with co-workers. That is the beauty of today’s many business environments. Team work is not only displayed by working together on a project, but more so in making sure that the next person is equipped with ideas on how do things right.
In a white paper distributed by e-Learning company, Skillsoft, Dorman Woodall, Director of Skillsoft Learning, reports that “research by the US Department of Labor shows that 70 percent of workplace learning occurs through informal learning processes driven by workers finding the information they need to do their jobs.” These learning efforts have an effect in a company’s productivity and performance capabilities.
Even in times of budget cuts and pending recession, companies should see the value in supporting informal trainings conducted through small-group knowledge sharing or, if their resources allow it, computer-assisted trainings that workers can accomplish at their convenience. A company’s best asset is its people, as the saying goes. And an organization with skilled workers have a better chance at surviving a turbulent business environment.
