Training and Qualifications

Training and education of staff is often promoted both from within businesses and from outside agencies, as a motivating tool, which is essential to maintaining a top performing organisation. The unfortunate fact is that employers are not obliged to train their staff and many organisations take advantage of this.

Changing World or Work

In the fast moving world of work that we face today, changing employers is far easier and more common than it was fifty years ago. The days of a job for life have truly disappeared. In this new environment, many employers, especially in smaller organisations where the cost of training is a bigger proportional burden, are sometimes reluctant to train their staff, as they fear they will be poached. This is borne out, at least superficially, by the number of job adverts that are seen looking for qualified people against the number that advertise jobs with training.

In fact, human resource research shows that although this does sometimes happen, in fact training staff on the whole makes them more likely to stay with an organisation. And although some commercial qualifications, such as specific IT skills certificates, can cost thousands of pounds, there are many other less expensive sources of training.

Training Options

At the entry level, many local colleges offer part-time courses in a number of formats. The course might be completely in the evening or it could require one day per week in college (day-release programmes), which might be more acceptable to an employer than losing staff members for weeks on end. Qualifications that might be offered in this way are BTECs, which are similar to GCSE's and A levels but based on business and more practical, or NVQs (SCQs in Scotland), which are very practical and have 5 levels of competency.

Covering a slightly higher level are HNCs and HNDs, Higher National certificates and diplomas, which sit between alongside the higher levels of BTECs and NVQs, between A Levels and Bachelor's degrees. These, and the higher levels such as Bachelors and Masters degrees, are not so easy to get while being employed. Many people give up work in order to gain a higher level qualification, as a mature student, that they feel will advance them in their chosen profession, or, quite often, drive them in a different direction.

Degrees

Some degree course are part-time and are funded by employers, high-end MBAs in particular, where an employee is expected to return to the funding company and take on new career challenges. But in general, unless someone is a valued employee of long standing, this is the exception, not the rule. At least if the course is part-time, such as one week in six with evening study work in-between, then there's a better chance of getting help from a company than if the course is full-time.

Where to Find Advice

Aside from the usual sources, such as careers advisors at schools and colleges, and the Citizens Advice Bureau, there are a number of other bureaux that can help people choose the right qualification, in the right subject, and at the right level. Most of these are available on the internet and have telephone advice lines.

The Trades Union Congress funds an organisation, known as unionlearn, which collates information about all courses at public learning institutions in the UK in a searchable database. They have advice on obtaining education funding through the union system. Their funding system is not open to individuals, however, but to unions, in order to fund education projects run by the unions. This might be worth pursuing for those who are active in a union.

These are not the only sources, just a couple of examples. Local libraries will be good places to start as they will have the course prospectuses for the offerings at local colleges and universities and many from further afield too.