by Not from employers! That’s been the long-term trend. The crude joke is that training has moved from in-house to the outhouse. Does anyone remember the days when upon being hired, one was subject to a week’s worth of training? Then periodic training was not only available, but mandatory. Some may welcome the removal of mandatory, but the pendulum has swung far in the other direction, to the point that employer-provided training is increasingly scarce.
As a professor with the University of Houston’s Futures Studies program, I see the challenge being particularly acute for younger students without significant workforce experience. Their potential is not viewed as worth much — what experience do they have? It’s a classic catch-22. Thus, we try to provide internships, and have even tailored our curriculum to provide work samples as part of a portfolio that one may show a potential employer.
This development reflects the evolution of the workplace. Large training investments make sense when one is going to be with an organization for years or even a lifetime. They make less sense with the typical shorter stays of today’s employees, who jump from organization to organization, often as contractors and sometimes on a project-by-project basis.
An implication for individual workers is in learning how to creatively and cost-effectively get the training one needs, and build up a portfolio of skills on their own.
An implication for organizations and HR professionals is that instead of providing training, they may become a clearinghouse that identifies others sources for acquiring essential skills and knowledge.
I will talk more about this and other “surprises” about the future of work in the Spring issue of Employment Relations Todayin a piece called “A Dozen Surprises about the Future of Work.” Andy Hines
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