How to improve your IT. Part 9 - How much should I spend on IT Training?
IT Training
A series of posts on how to improve the performance of your IT
Get bang for your buck.
The best answer is “as much as is required to have a qualified and satisfied workforce”. Sending staff off for training is always a pain because you are always too busy to make them unavailable. Yet you know that training needs to be done, it just gets deferred and often then doesn’t happen. This post is a reminder of the bigger picture benefits that IT staff training brings. The right training for the right people at the right time is a great investment in more ways than one, and whilst I am a great believer in keeping product training levels up to date, I know that in times of cost-cutting and budget restraints, IT training is usually the first thing to be cut, - so when times are good and the budget allows, this is when training needs to be bought up to date.
The importance of training cannot be overstated. Companies invest large amounts in hardware, software and services but often fail to train or fall behind in the training of their staff in these products (hardware, systems and applications software, software suites and utilities). Failing to train staff on products they use is simply an inefficient and often costly use of those assets. Having untrained staff using IT products is also a risk, and when training on new technologies falls behind, capability and productivity suffer as does staff morale and the professionalism of the IT department.
Not convinced? Look at it this way, would you fly on a plane knowing that the training of the maintenance people was not up to date, or worse, completely lacking. Well, your IT systems are just as valuable an asset that need the same level of protection.
The Best practice IT standard for training is:
A product must be from a reputable vendor who provides training, technical support and a technical upgrade path.
At least two members of staff must be trained on any one product for back-up purposes and to increase the resource knowledge available to business projects.
Free, off the Web products, are not allowed due to the inherent risks they introduce and potential negative effects on system upgrade paths. (Unless there is an extenuating circumstance).
Benefits of Product training:
Proper product installation and integration.
Proper OS and systems software configuration set-up.
Proper Application interface set-up.
Full use of product functionality.
Risks of introducing the product are reduced.
The use of scripts and associated risks decreases.
Capacity management integration improves.
Security integration is better.
Staff morale and confidence improve as staff are vendor qualified.
Also, consider what happens when a staff member uses a product without having been trained, but then subsequently goes for training, this is what tends to happen.
Software gets reinstalled and reconfigured.
OS and systems software configurations get changed.
Application interfaces get changed.
New functionality is used and business outcomes improve.
Risks are reduced.
Security gets tighter, hacking gets harder.
Morale and confidence improve.
Performance Assessment
The Performance Assessment is to do a thorough audit of all products in use and match staff training needs against each. The Roles and Responsibilities template also recorded staff training and training needs so you can refer there.
Record on a spreadsheet the following items. (Some items may need to be grouped, like hardware types as the volumes may be high).
Desktop and Mobile hardware.
Server Hardware.
Network hardware.
Systems software.
Utilities.
Infrastructure toolsets.
Applications development toolsets.
Applications.
Legacy systems.
Other.
Against each product, record:
Staff member name who has been trained on the product.
Staff member name who requires training on the product.
Questions to ask
Which products are in use that is not vendor supported?
Which products are Web freebies?
How many staff have been trained on legacy systems?
Are there individual staff training plans in place?
Is staff training up to date with new technologies?
Is there a shortage of critical skills?
Are skill shortages due to lack of staff, staff turnover or lack of training?