What is Training?
The purpose of training is to bring about changes in behaviour so that people perform better in the workplace. In order to do this it has to meet the aspirations of the individuals on the course and also of their organisation as well as whoever commissioned the training.This means that the primary purpose of training is developing skills – attitudes and awareness are absolutely secondary to this and are addressed in so far as they are blocks to change.Training is not group therapy. On some courses (Working with Loss, Assertiveness and Stress Management) the boundaries may be very fine – but the application is always firmly on how the skills will be applied in the work place – often when complex emotions arise the appropriate solution may be to facilitate the stabilisation of the group and indicate possible sources of support outside of it. A trainer works across the whole of the training cycle. A large part of activity is, of course, the development and delivery of learning material. This is crucial, but for the training to be effective, as much work has to go into the often-neglected areas of training needs analysis and evaluation.