Training And Development Dissertation

Ever since Training and Development has been a vital part as far as the human resource management issues are concerned. Basically it is an organizational activity taken lead by human resource managers as for bettering the performance of the employees and staff personnel’s. Training is the activity which is focused on inculcating the necessary skills upon the individuals as to perform a specific role within a particular firm and it is evaluated timely as for performance appraisal or for further training activities. Development is the activity which cannot be evaluated and focuses on the activities that the organizations employing the individual partake in the future. Though training and development are different perspectives both are dealt together under the human resource management process.

Health industry is an ever concerned business sector that thrives on constant improvement techniques in all arenas. Health industry needs a careful consideration towards all the operational aspects as it directly deals with the customers and even other people are indirectly associated who may be the concerned people to the customers and again they are also a concern. There are many sensitive issues in relation to this area and even morals and ethics have a significant role which makes the training and development process most crucial pertaining to this arena of industry.

It is not always the guided duties that matter for the staff in this industry, at times they need to act around their boundaries of specified duties as some instances involve human emotions which just cant be justified with specific services and as per the regulations.

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3. Research Rationale

Aims:

The prime motive of the study is to research on the effective techniques involved in the training and development process pertaining to health industry. The research study also aims at trying to benchmark the techniques with significance to rehabilitation centres.

Objectives:

1. Researching on conventional and contemporary approaches towards training and development
2. Identification of effective practices
3. Benchmarking the feasible techniques
4. Modifying and attributing the techniques as to suit within the health industry

Section B

4. Literature Review

There are many different training and development methods. On-the-job training, informal training, classroom training, internal training courses, external training courses, on-the-job coaching, life-coaching, mentoring, training assignments and tasks, skills training, product training, technical training, behavioural development training, role-playing and role-play games and exercises, attitudinal training and development, accredited training and learning, distance learning – all part of the training menu, available to use and apply according to individual training needs and organizational training needs.

Core Aspects of Training and Development Process

Training is also available far beyond and outside the classroom. More importantly, training – or learning, to look at it from the trainee’s view – is anything offering learning and developmental experience. Training and development includes aspects such as: ethics and morality; attitude and behaviour; leadership and determination, as well as skills and knowledge. Development isn’t restricted to training – it’s anything that helps a person to grow, in ability, skills, confidence, tolerance, commitment, initiative, inter-personal skills, understanding, self-control, motivation and even more.

If we consider the attributes of really effective people, be they leaders, managers, operators, technicians; any role at all, the important qualities which make good performers special are likely to be attitudinal. Skills and knowledge, and the processes available to people, are no great advantage. What makes people effective and valuable to any organization is their attitude. Attitude includes qualities that require different training and learning methods. Attitude stems from a person’s mind-set, belief system, emotional maturity, self-confidence, and experience. These are the greatest training and development challenges faced, and there are better ways of achieving this sort of change and development than putting people in a classroom, or indeed by delivering most sorts of conventional business or skills training, which people see as a chore. This is why training and development must extend far beyond conventional classroom training courses.

All supervisors and managers should enable and provide training and development for their people – training develops people, it improves performance, raises morale; training and developing people increases the health and effectiveness of the organization, and the productivity of the business. The leader’s ethics and behaviour set the standard for their people’s, which determines how productively they use their skills and knowledge. Training is nothing without the motivation to apply it effectively. A strong capability to plan and manage skills training, the acquisition of knowledge, and the development of motivation and attitude, largely determines how well people perform in their jobs.

Training – and also enabling learning and personal development – is essential for the organisation. It helps improve quality, customer satisfaction, productivity, morale, management succession, business development and profitability. Have to start with basic essentials of training; induction training is especially important for new starters. Good induction training ensures new starters are retained, and then settled in quickly and happily to a productive role. Induction training is more than skills training. It’s about the basics that seasoned employees all take for granted: what the shifts are; where the notice-board is; what’s the routine for holidays, sickness; where’s the canteen; what’s the dress code; where the toilets are. New employees also need to understand the organisation’s mission, goals and philosophy; personnel practices, health and safety rules, and of course the job they’re required to do, with clear methods, timescales and expectations.

Managers must ensure induction training is properly planned – an induction training plan must be issued to each new employee, so they and everyone else involved can see what’s happening and that everything is included. These induction training principles are necessarily focused on the essential skills and knowledge for a new starter to settle in and to begin to do their job. However there is great advantage in beginning to address personal development needs, wishes, opportunities, particular strengths, abilities, talent, etc., during or very soon after the induction process. The sooner the better.

An organisation needs to assess its people’s skills training needs – by a variety of methods – and then structure the way that the training and development is to be delivered, and managers and supervisors play a key role in helping this process.

People’s personal strengths and capabilities – and aims and desires and special talents (current and dormant) – also need to be assessed, so as to understand, and help the person understand, that the opportunities for their development and achievement in the organisation are not limited by the job role, or the skill-set that the organisation inevitably defines for the person.

As early as possible, let people know that their job role does not define their potential as a person within or outside the organisation, and, subject to organisational policy, look to develop each person in a meaningful relevant way that they will enjoy and seek, as an individual, beyond the job role, and beyond work requirements. If possible ‘top-up’ this sort of development through the provision of mentoring and facilitative coaching (drawing out – not putting in), which is very effective in producing excellent people. Mentoring and proper coaching should be used alongside formal structured training anyway, but this type of support can also greatly assist ‘whole-person development’, especially where the mentor or coach is seen as a role-model for the person’s own particular aspirations.

It’s also vital to understand the other person’s style and personality too – how they prefer to learn – do they like to read and absorb a lot of detail, do they prefer to be shown, to experience themselves by trial and error? Knowing the other person’s preferred learning style helps to deliver the training in the most relevant and helpful way. It helps to design activities and tasks that the other person will be more comfortable doing, which ensures a better result, quicker. Various models and tests are available to help understand learning styles like the Kolb’s model.

DIF Analysis

DIF stands for Difficulty, Importance, Frequency. DIF Analysis is a sophisticated (and potentially very complex) method of assessing performance, prioritising training needs and planning training, based on three perspectives: Difficulty, Importance, and Frequency. The system looks at tasks and activities (or skills, competencies, whatever) rather than looking at development from a personal individual perspective. DIF Analysis can be used in different ways: for example as a flow diagram to consider each activity using a simple yes/no for each of the three factors in sequence of Difficulty (yes/no), Importance (yes/no) and Frequency (yes/no), which generates eight possible combinations. At a simple level, an activity that scores low on all three scales is obviously low priority; whereas an activity that scores high on all three scales is a high priority.

Ultimately the best way to prioritise training is can be simply to agree with the trainee what they are most keen to commit to. All the analysis and detail in the world will not guarantee trainee commitment, which is generally the most powerful force for effective training and development. Task-based analysis is important for organizational development measurement and planning, but approaching training prioritisation from purely a task perspective ignores the vital personal factor.

6. Briefing of Research Case

The Indian health sector is a wide arena with new frontiers opening constantly. In terms of business the health industry is booming generating high revenues contributing to the nation’s economy. The modern era has seen wide diversifications in the health services operating with sophisticated equipment and even names. Health Spa is the most recent industry segment which is perceived as a profitable business. For any business customer satisfaction is the motive as it ensures returns at the same time sustainity which is very essential. Health spa can be considered as a B to C type of business and needs more care pertaining to the human resource issues rather than a manufacturing company which operate in a B to B type business environment.

The customers in this sector are most of the times called as patients and the staff needs to take utmost care in delivering the services to their satisfaction for which training and development acts smartly as from the side of human resource management.

This research primarily concentrates on the specific techniques pertaining to training and development of the health spa staff and supporting workers. As there would be physical contact with the clients even more issues are a concern. The research concentrates on benchmarking the most feasible and effective practices in this regard.

Section C

6. Research Philosophy

A research philosophy depends on the way we think in relation to the development of knowledge. Three views concerning the research process which dominate the literature are positivism, Interpretivism and realism. They are different, if not commonly restricted, views regarding the way in which knowledge is developed and judged as being acceptable. All three have an significant part to play in business and management research. (Saunders et al, 2003)

The philosophy of interpretivism permits researchers to explore the details of complex situations that occur in the case of business, management and economics. It is therefore appropriate for conducting research in the proposed topic area. (Saunders et al, 2003)

7. Research Approach and Methodologies

The two approaches available for conducting a research project are the ‘deductive’ and the ‘inductive’ approach. The deductive approach to research involves the development of a theory or “hypothesis” prior to data collection and verifying it through testing. Whereas, the inductive approach involves formulating a theory on the basis of the analysis of data collected

This dissertation will involve the issues pertaining to health industry in India which is booming and in particular the rehabilitation centres/health spa’s which have got a significant value in contributing to economy both in national and global perspectives. However the results will not be predicted in the beginning. Thus, this research will owe more to the inductive approach as the conclusions and theories developed will depend on the analysis of the data collected. (Saunders et al, 2003).

8. Research Strategies

A research strategy is concerned with the overall approach adopted for data collection and analysis. The various methods available include conducting an ‘Experiment’, ‘Survey’, ‘Case study’, ‘and Grounded theory ‘,’ Ethnography ‘and’ Action research’.

A survey involves collecting data from a sizeable population for comparison and analysis. For example, a census indicating that a percentage of the population thinks or behaves in a particular way. It is impractical for this research as it involves a long time and complicated methods to analyse the large amounts of data collected.

The most appropriate strategy for this research is a Case study – “A case study is a strategy for doing research which involves an empirical investigation of a particular contemporary phenomenon within its real life context using multiple sources of evidence” (Saunders et al, 2003). This strategy fits the research of a single industry where various methods of data collection will be employed such as questionnaires, interviews as well as the use of secondary data.

The research study would be carried out on a cross-sectional time horizon basis as time is a limiting factor and then too the research data acquisition methods are well suited for this time horizon.

10. Data Collection

For the purpose of this dissertation Personal Interviews, Questionnaires and Secondary data will be used for interpretation and analysis. Sampling theory will be taken into account to try and ensure good representation and for the avoidance of bias. (Saunders et al, 2003).

Sources and Acquisition of data:

Secondary Data Source:

Secondary data will be collected from official government statistics on the performance of the health industry in regards to health workers commitment for their patients. In addition, previous studies related to this subject have presented valuable data and statistics on the Indian health industry.

Primary Data Source:

Primary data will be collected through semi-structured interviews conducted with managers as well as staff of at least 3 Rehabilitation Centres in India as well as in UK. Still talks are going on as to access the relevant information from the NHS and local health centres. One of my well known friend is operating an health spa in India and I can be assured of access for information and as well as he also assured me for all the help required.

11. Data Analysis

The research for this dissertation will involve collecting both qualitative data from semi-structured interviews and quantitative data in the form of questionnaires and statistics from secondary sources. The quantitative data once collected will be organised into tables and pie charts and will be used to support the theories and conclusions derived from a subjective analysis of the qualitative data.

The method of analysis to be followed is that proposed by Dey, Miles and Huberman:

Comprehend and manage it

Merge related data drawn from different transcript and notes

Identify key themes or pattern from it for further exploration

Develop and/or test hypotheses based on these apparent patters or relationships

Draw and verify conclusions

(Dey, 1993; Miles and Huberman, 1994, cited by Saunders et al., 1997)

12. Validity and Reliability Concerns

The reliability of a study has two aspects; whether similar results would be obtained if the same research was repeated and whether the results would be similar if the same research was conducted by another researcher. In the different phases of this study, several choices like different method of collection of date will be made with care and to reduce certain threats to these criteria and improve the quality of the research. (Langley A. (1999) Strategies for Theorizing from Process Data, Academy of Management Review, vol. 24, no. 4, p.691-710).

It is said that the validity and reliability of the survey data depends upon the clear explanation of the methodology used in the research and by having a clear idea about the sampling technique used. The response rate of the survey depends on the how efficient the sampling, techniques are used. (Saunders et al, 2007).