You are probably well aware of the skills needed to carry out particular roles within your business. Also, you may be aware of certain training that needs to take place throughout the year. (Things like first aid or fire safety jump to mind here.) However, what is professional learning and development and why is it so important in the workplace?
We can tell you now that if you haven’t already – you should be implementing this into your organisation. It combines expert-led training from people like us with self-guided development to encourage the real-life application of skills and knowledge.
Where possible, it involves building upon skills and training already possessed by employees and providing them with feedback along the way. Not only does this make for a rewarding experience, but offers evidence-based insight to allow the training to support chosen goals and missions.
If you’re looking for high-quality coaching opportunities that will see a more productive, satisfied and capable workforce, then get in touch to see how we can tailor your training. Having worked with many industries, our team can help you put together the perfect approach for bettering your staff’s skills and understanding of their place within the business. And don’t forget to look at what we’ve done before to get a good idea of what’s on offer.
What’s The Point?
The aim of professional learning and development is to help you manage your own growth and progression within your career. It is proven to enable all of these things when actively pursued and taken seriously within the entire business. Without the opportunity to push yourself and expand upon things you already know, it is easy to plateau and become stuck in a role. Instead of losing direction, the point is to keep you moving forwards and figuring out new paths to take along the way.
This can also help:
Increase Employee Confidence and Credibility
People will often struggle with imposter syndrome. This is the perception you have of yourself whereby you do not believe you are as competent as you actually are. This can lead to poor mental health, a decline in work quality and the loss of willingness to better yourself each day. It’s a horrible thing to feel and much of it comes from being stuck in a dead-end role with no support or progression opportunities.
So rather than thinking about the costs of training and the downtime from business as usual, think about this: what is professional learning and development contributing to your employee’s self-confidence?
They are one of the most important cogs in your organisation and when they believe in what they’re doing – they will do it well. As a result, you get a higher quality of work and your staff begin to trust you more. If they can see you investing in them, they will begin to align with your motives, beliefs and advocate for the business. Once you have confident and capable employees, the return on investment will come and you will notice amazing things happening.
Help Individuals Achieve Career Goals
A big part of success in the business world is allowing people to grow, supporting them with their dreams and allowing this to develop naturally from their current roles. The more opportunity they have to learn and improve their knowledge along the way – the more it will benefit them in the future.
Not only does it give them the chance to aim for more experienced placements, but it gets them ready for new industries and experiences when soft skills are paired with technical knowledge. Continuously moving forward in a role should lead to new opportunities, whether that be within the same business or a new one. Either way, the progress they make is going to benefit you as a business owner.
How? Because providing these opportunities increases your employee retention rates greatly, meaning you can hang on to that top talent. As well as this, When they do move into new roles, you now have a very capable and experienced member of staff to train those moving up the company or onboarding. As a result, new skills and knowledge will be passed down – increasing the quality of your talent pool.
Keep Up With Changing Industries
Adaptability is another amazing skill to possess. It allows you to tackle problems creatively and develop a more flexible approach to work. The benefit of this is being able to overcome stressful situations before they impact your productivity or mental health. When you notice an issue or need to implement change – it is important we can do that without creating too much disturbance.
Continued professional learning and development will give you the tools and knowledge you need to prepare yourself for the inevitable and unexpected challenges in your industry. It is never going to be smooth sailing all the time and we need to remember that.
Similarly, this can help when moving into different jobs or companies. While you may be in the same industry – it is likely that organisations have their own ways of managing certain tasks. As a result, you will be far more equipped to adapt to these differences and excel in a new job role when you have previously been allowed to grow.
What Is Professional Learning & Development Like For Small Businesses?
Smaller companies may be worried about budget constraints and the possible lack of a human resource department. These factors can usually mean that any training put in place is less structured. However, it doesn’t make it any less valuable.
Many times, potential candidates choose small businesses because of this unique and personal approach to training and growth. You will often find that the lack of budget and smaller teams means employees may have to be more flexible within their roles and work outside of their comfort zone more often. This is a positive advantage to the approach as you are more exposed to wider skillsets. Not only that but you will be expected to implement this new knowledge at a pretty fast rate, encouraging that growth even further.
While this isn’t formal training, it can be beneficial when paired with such courses. What you have already taken from the experience working in an agency setting, for example, will only be elaborated upon when technical training is implemented.
Some people are put off by the intense and fast-paced nature of a small business, it can set you up for much quicker career progression and a greater level of experience than you would get from a corporate organisation.
What Is Professional Learning & Development Like For Larger Businesses?
We may have sold you on the above points, however, larger companies tend to have a very strategic and structured approach that can really help hone in on attractive skills for your role. This is usually because they have dedicated people to decide what training needs to be done and what kind of growth is going to benefit employees and the business. Some may even have in-house teams to carry out certain coaching or mentoring that can be tailored to individuals or across departments.
The more formal approach led by specialist training providers such as Azimuth allows each person in the company to become extremely familiar with the industry as a whole and become experts in what they do.
Within large corporations, departments tend to be more niche. This means hiring people with specific skills and experience that can dedicate all of their time to certain areas of the business. This can be really advantageous as it gives you a chance to learn more about how the company works – approaching tasks efficiently and in line with your targets.
Furthermore, with a more complex management system, it is likely that many large companies will also invest in training tailored to leadership roles. This can bring much more effective communication between departments and allow for growth to be carried across the rest of the employees. Our services give everyone (no matter their role or position in the company) the opportunity to develop their skills and play to their strengths.
Having worked with organisations of all sizes, we understand the need for personalisation and adapted training.
We Can Work With You To Develop Your People
Now we have answered the question – what is professional learning and development – we hope it is clear to why you need it within your organisation.
Employees and leaders alike cannot progress, grow or excel in what they do without this opportunity. As a result, you could start to see less productive and engaged employees that consistently underperform.
To maintain your credibility and retain talent, speak to one of our dedicated Azimuth experts today and implement your own, tailored approach. You can reach us at enquiries@azimuth.eu.com or call 01483 24 33 81.
We will be more than happy to discuss how we can help you and with over 20 years of experience across a range of industries, we have the innovative, proven tools that can help you unlock the true potential of yourself – and your business. What are you waiting for?
Work with the experts you can trust. Azimuth, a new direction in learning.
