A disengaged workforce can cost your business thousands in loss of productivity and high staff turnover. Recent studies have found that training and development can improve company culture for any level of employee–with a direct positive effect on staff retention. So to chat all things training and culture, we brought in the experts, our friends over at Typsy.
Author: Glennise Pinili – Typsy
As an employer, training your staff properly is one of the best things that you can do to improve company culture and cultivate a high performing workforce.
It’s not just for the obvious reasons – getting your employees familiar with your company’s processes and how to do their day-to-day job – it also improves staff retention, contributes to your team’s personal and professional development, and in big picture terms, contributes to your company culture.
65% of companies with strategic, holistic wellbeing and training programs saw improvements in their company cultures.
What is your company culture?
Your culture can be defined as the personality and the unique identity of your organization. It’s the values, attitudes, and behaviors that your company upholds, expresses and practices within, and outside of the workplace environment.
It’s the vibe that new employees get when they join your business, the sentiment of interactions staff have with each other, and the structure of your business – often the stuff under the hood that’s implied, but keeps your business running and developing organically.
Richard Branson puts it simply:
“There’s no magic formula for great company culture. The key is just to treat your staff how you would like to be treated.”
Take a moment now to think about what your company culture is…
What’s it like? Are you happy with it?
Building and improving your company culture doesn’t happen in a day, it takes time and needs to start early with business processes such as training programs.
Investing in a training program is particularly effective when it comes to introducing new hires and keeping employees – especially in an environment such as hospitality where staff turnover rates are reported to be as high as 70%.
Understandably training isn’t always a priority for some companies and for others it can be daunting because of the time and effort involved. However, when considering the benefits of training, it should be a no-brainer. Online hospitality training provider, Typsy believes you need a training program to not only provide valuable skills to your staff but to improve your company culture too.
Here are some reasons they believe training is beneficial to help improve company culture:
It sets employee expectations:
Training programs are a great way of getting your employees – particularly new ones – in understanding how your business works and setting your expectations as an employer.
For example, if you’ve defined your culture as fair and respectful, this needs to be demonstrated day-to-day. Do your employees feel safe? Are they treated equally? Are there systems or policies in place for these? If your culture is focused on teamwork, do your employees support one another? Does everyone look out for each other during a rough day?
As an employer and leader, you need to drive your expectations to help develop the culture that you want.
Training programs that outline these will help set the standard early on and help maintain and improve your overall company culture. That’s because everyone will be on the same page. You can start by clearly defining these values, making them aware to your staff, practicing what you preach and then following up to see if it’s been effective.
It encourages a positive learning culture
When your staff are trained they are likely to feel empowered and confident in their skills and knowledge.
Imagine that learning sentiment echoing throughout your company – your wait staff can better manage difficult customers, bartenders can up-sell with their stronger beverage knowledge, managers can feel assured by their staff, and in turn, your customers are going to be happy – it’s a positive feedback loop! Learning tools such as Typsy can help hospitality professionals learn relevant industry skills with their 350+ strong online video library, taught by expert hospitality instructors.
As your team constantly learn and improve themselves, it becomes contagious. The more your team knows the more your team is likely to support each other and encourage self-development.The benefit of a positive company culture is that you’ll have continual growth among your staff, and training can happen organically and on an ongoing basis. The result? You’ll end up with a highly motivated and productive team!
It boosts team morale
Low team morale can depend on any number of things, including lack of training or opportunities for self-development. go2HR reported that 40 per cent of employees who receive poor job training, leave their positions within the first year.
The reality is, not enough training is provided for employees. According to CHART, 86% of hospitality businesses offer less than 10 hours of ongoing training for employees. How long do you think your employees are going to last in your company?
When learning and development is practiced with initiatives such as ongoing training programs, your staff are likely to become more productive and develop a positive attitude towards their work. That’s because they know their responsibilities, feel a sense of purpose, and may even feel motivated to take on more. Morale and job satisfaction levels are then likely to increase, which means happier staff and an improved team culture.
So, don’t neglect training, and by all means, go ahead and schedule in that fun team date at a theme park, or eat out somewhere fancy! It will make such a difference!
It reduces staff turnover rates
Don’t underestimate the importance of learning among your staff, because they want to grow. EdenRed reported that 68% of workers say training and development is the most important workplace policy. Similarly, TINYpulse reported that employees with opportunities for professional development were 10% more likely to stay with their current employer.
Sure, in the short term your chefs might be ok with serving the same dishes, but in the long term, they may get bored and find that they’re not getting challenged or excited by their role. As a result they might look elsewhere. So be sure to offer opportunities for them to experiment with the menu or learn different technical skills, for example. Effective training programs should help your staff grow on a constant basis, and shouldn’t stop once they’ve completed their induction training.
Through training, employees become self-aware and accountable for their responsibilities. They understand their role in your business and know how they can add value. By offering employees training you’re giving them a reason to stay. They’ll stay with you because they genuinely want to be there.
The effect on your culture is positive – your team is going to be full of motivated, satisfied and productive employees who won’t want to leave. It will set the standard for your current employees and will also attract the right candidates when you’re recruiting. Consider your team now, are they reflective of the culture that you stand for? If so, that’s awesome! If not, think about what might need to change to get them there.
By introducing training programs into your company you’re positively contributing to your team culture. Overall training helps with improving your employees’ self-development, helps with staff retention and sets the tone of your employee expectations. That’s because training allows you to bring out the best version of your employees and get more from your team.
Need help training your hospitality staff? Get in touch with Typsy, an online hospitality training platform built for today’s fast-paced hospitality world. With their hospitality courses and lessons, you can effectively train and upskill your staff with the skills they need for today, tomorrow and the future.