| THE
FIVE MYTHS: |
1.
“Our people are experienced. They don’t need to be trained.”
2. "We tried it and it didn’t work.”
3. “Our organization (or department, or division) is
too small.”
4. “We can’t afford it.”
5. “We don’t have time.” |
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Let’s take a look at each of these myths, starting with the organization
or manager who says, “Our people don’t need
to be trained. They are all old ‘pros’ who have years of experience.”
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It is important
to remember the tremendous difference between experience and competence.
I am reminded of the small-town doctor who lamented to a friend, “You
know I can’t believe how many of my patients have switched over to
this young upstart who just moved to town. Why he just finished medical
school, and I’ve been practicing medicine for 25 years.”
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The friend threw
his arm around the doctor’s shoulder and said, “Doc, I don’t know
quite how to break this to you, but more than a few people in town
are wondering if you perhaps have one year of experience that you’ve
been getting by on for the last 25 years.”
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Think about it.
Imagine a professional football coach saying, “Our people are all
experienced, so we’re going to skip training camp this year. We don’t
need it.” How do you think that team would stand up against the competition?
How long do you think the coach would keep his job?
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Ask yourself
this question. Do you think that business is the same today as it
was 20 years ago? Of course not. Business is changing. Management
is changing. Successful organizations don’t do business the same today
as they did five years ago, or 10 years ago, let alone 20 years ago.
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Let’s examine
the second management myth, “We
tried it, and it didn’t work.”
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I’ve heard executives
say, “When Harley Hotshot came to town, we put half of our people
through his training and they haven’t sold any more than the rest
of the team.” There are two very important things to remember about
training. Number one: training is not an event, it is a process. And
number two: in order to be effective, training must be ongoing.
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Training is a
little like calisthenics. If you haven’t worked out for years, and
you jump right into a heavy exercise program, you’re going to be uncomfortable.
So whether you’re talking about training or calisthenics, if you do
it occasionally you grow sore; if you do it regularly you grow strong.
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Let’s look at
the third management myth, “We’re too small.”
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It’s important
to understand that training is equally important for organizations
of all sizes. Consider this. If an organization has one hundred people,
and if one person is not operating at maximum capacity, that’s one
percent of the entire organization. On the other hand, if an organization
has just two people, it may be easy to rationalize “We can’t justify
training” … but, if one of those two people is not operating at maximum
effectiveness, that’s 50 percent of the entire organization. So, training
is equally important to organizations of all sizes.
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The fourth management
myth: “We can’t afford it.”
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This is a cop-out.
If you think the cost of training is expensive, compare it with the
cost of incompetence! In today’s service-oriented environment poorly
trained staff will drive your customers right into the camp of your
competition.
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Number five.
“We don’t have the time.”
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This myth is
not only a cop-out. It’s also an exercise is self-deception. If you
are like most executives, I’m sure you sometimes ask yourself, “Why
is it we never have time to do it right, but always make time to do
it over?”
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| The manager who
says, “We’re so busy we don’t have time for training” makes about
as much sense as the woodcutter who says, “I’m so busy cutting down
trees, I don’t have time to sharpen my ax.” Abraham Lincoln once said,
“If I have three hours to cut down a tree, I’d spend the first two
hours sharpening my ax.” |
Now, let’s address
a final point. How long should you continue training your staff?
|
Years ago, my
good friend, renowned motivational speaker Zig Ziglar, and I were
talking with an executive who posed the question, “How long do I need
to keep training my people?” Zig instinctively answered him with a
follow-up question that cut right to the heart of the matter. Zig
said, “How long do you want your people to keep improving?”
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As the management
consultant said, the three factors separating the business winners
from the losers over the next ten years are: training, training and
training.
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| Hal Krause
is president of Crestcom International, Ltd., a Denver-based franchise
company, which specializes in training managers through a combination
of video and live-facilitation. Crestcom’s flagship program, “The
Bullet Proof® Manager, “ took its name from a speech Krause gave a
few years ago in which he said, “The manager’s world is filled with
snipers. There are people shooting at managers from every direction.
If we are going to have successful organizations, we need to have
bullet proof managers. “ (The material in this article is copyrighted
by Hal Krause and used with his permission.) |
