In your opinion, what training design is most effective for training all generat
ID: 343750 • Letter: I
Question
In your opinion, what training design is most effective for training all generations? What can be done (personally) to foster respect, and understanding, for all employees in the workplace? In addition to this week's reading, what can be done to ensure the best ROI for training programs?
An average of 10,000 Baby-Boomers retire every day, meaning that by 2025, 75% of the workforce will be Millennials.Therefore, it’s important to realize now that the gap between Millennials and Baby-Boomers isn't just about their age—it’s their lifestyle, their beliefs, what they do in their free time, what they look for in a job, and so much more!!! Millennials have grown up in a world booming with technology. Whether it was their first iPod Shuffle at age 12, or their first cell phone at age 15, there has hardly ever been a time that this generation can remember being apart from their technology. Today, almost 90% of Millennials say their phone never leaves their side (even in the office, and also during training). Baby-Boomers were taught to keep their cell phones on silent, put them away in professional situations, and to keep them for personal/emergency use only; they're much less likely to pull out their phone to make a personal call during working hours. It's more important than ever before for Millennials and Baby-Boomers to effectively work alongside each other in the office; taking a step back, and looking at where some of the generation gaps may exist, is one way to achieve a healthy balance...and save your company a lot of confusion and conflict among employees.
Explanation / Answer
Training in workplace is the most important aspect of a business and when the workforce involves more than one generation based on the age group then the approach is far more difficult. It is very much important to design a training program which will be effective to all the generation and therefore in order to devise such an approach the organization needs to promote the approach of blended learning which will consist of the conventional classroom training along with the use of technology which will help both the generation relate to what is expected and required. The training needs to bridge the gap between the generation which may seem difficult but achieving that is possible if proper communication is facilitated. Attitude of the generations are different towards the world and also towards work therefore they need to team up so that the challenges can be resolved and collaboration is fostered between the generation. The training program should be a collaborative and interactive one so that the trainees can actually work together and overcome the challenges experienced by one another. In order to foster respect and understanding, communication is the key and that should be done on basis of the age group because the millennial needs to understand the importance of working with the seniors and individuals from the previous generation and their strengths and weakness that will help them work on that and be successful in working with them. Same should be applied for the older generation because even they need to understand the importance of the next generation and their way of working which is quite different from the previous generation and therefore again communication is the key and needs to be effectively used. A training program is successful when the learning is applied effectively in workplace and in order to do so the above mentioned facts needs to be considered and facilitated, only then the retune on investment can be expected. The training programs needs to be interesting rather than making it a mandatory because voluntary participation is required else there is actually no point.