Training Won’t Always Help
Employees that are miscast for their jobs will rarely be able to turn around their performance. Trying to make these employee’s performance consistent at acceptable levels will be like trying to drive a square peg into a round hole. All the training in the world will probably not help enough to make him/her perform sufficiently.
Training is an absolute necessity for people who are appropriately placed into jobs they can perform. The sad truth is that too many employees are hired into jobs they stand little or no chance of being successful in. With these employees, spending a lot of time and money on training is simply a futile effort. Many managers will try to “force” the employee to fit the job because they don’t want to admit they made a bad hire. It’s preferable to admit to bad hires as opposed to pouring money into training them. We all make them from time to time. The intent, however, is to minimize the number of employees hired who can’t do the jobs they are hired for.
Employees are rarely a perfect fit for the positions hired for. The degree to which an employee “fits” the position will determine degree of success. It also helps determine the amount of training required to enhance the job fit. However, an employee that is a poor fit to begin with generally can’t be trained to be a good fit. Employees who are initially a good fit to a position by meeting acceptable standards for a particular job relative to ability, interests and personality can often be coached and trained to higher levels of performance within that position.
The point of this Business Brief is to help managers and owners understand and accept the fact that some employees simply can’t be trained to become adequate to high performers in the jobs they currently hold. If an employee doesn’t have the ability to perform appropriately in a particular job, don’t waste money and time training him/her. Take the appropriate measures to terminate the employee or move them into a position they can perform well in.