Many things in life are certain – the changing of the seasons, tides… (there’s a theme song here, isn’t there?!) and one of the things that is most certain is that when times get tough for a business the cost base gets cut. Aside from people (which should be the most valuable commodity any business can have) the other costs that get cut are inevitably marketing and training.
I had a conversation recently with a manager; he had identified that he has a skill deficiency in his service department – his Service Advisors lack confidence in selling ‘red’ work and struggle in dealing with price objections relating to fast-fit competitors. Through our past association he knew that I would be able to show a demonstrable, significant and sustainable return on investment if I was able to deliver a training programme to help bridge the skill gaps.
However, the leaders of the business weren’t keen on spending money. I offered to deliver the programme free of charge on the understanding that when we could prove that the KPIs were being achieved and the business was performing to a higher standard then the training would be chargeable - I guess you know the answer as to whether they took me up on the offer or not. To my knowledge, the Service Advisors still are still failing to maximise on profit opportunities and the business is losing revenue as a result.
Onto a more enlightened business; the same challenging trading climate but this Managing Director had the vision to invest in his sales team. Over the course of 2018 they were out of the business for 7 days in total and we covered a myriad of topics relevant to their role.
At the conclusion of the programme they were invited to conduct a presentation to the key stakeholders in the business and this was the brief I gave them:
During the course of 2018 you attended four separate training modules covering personal awareness, presentation skills, relationship building and creating desire and negotiation and closing.
We purposely decided not to ask you to complete a post-course evaluation and instead wanted to give you the opportunity to demonstrate what your key take-outs were from the learning that took place.
With this in mind we would like to ask you to construct a 10-minute presentation which you are then going to deliver to the key stakeholders in the business. You have total creative freedom in terms of what the format and content of the presentation is, but the following should be considered:
· What were my main ‘lightbulb’ moments?
· How has the learning transferred into the workplace?
· Are there any examples you can give of skills/knowledge/behaviour learned during the programme that resulted in a positive customer outcome?
· Are there any examples of the learning that took place resulting in increased revenue for the business?
· How have you personally grown/evolved/changed as a result of the programme?
These are just a few things to consider – the stakeholders of the business will be interested to see what the return on investment has been on the business as well as you as an individual.
There will be 5 minutes allocated at the end of each presentation for you to answer questions.
During these presentations numerous examples were given by the participants of where their learning had transferred into demonstrable increased revenue for the business; revenue that would not have been achieved without the behaviour, skills and knowledge learned during the training. By my rough calculations on the examples given, the training paid for itself 8 times over.
Makes you wonder why a business wouldn’t invest in the development of their people (particularly in challenging trading conditions) doesn’t it?