- Time: Workers have to accomplish organizational goals and projects throughout their workday. New items get added to staff’s to-do list, last minute meetings, deadlines; all these items discourage time for training and learning.
- Cost: If it involves formal training (e.g. university programs, consultants, MBA programs, off-site trainings), all these can be costly. Too often, CEOs and upper management cannot see the return on investment (ROI) value in this form of training and development and may want to find another (often less effective) way to train staff.
- Attrition: Employees enter and leave organizations throughout the year. This is a common part of the workplace. When management is addressing tasks that generate revenue, they do not feel they should spend dollars or shift resources to train employees.
- Performance Issues/Lack of Production: Performance of the employee will be lower if the employee does not know enough to perform their jobs confidently. Often times, untrained employees will spend considerable time asking for help from coworkers. As a manager, I have also seen some employees will not say anything and try and complete the tasks to the best of their understanding but to the harm of the company.
- Unsatisfied Employees: I believe most employees are interested in performing their jobs at a high level. Employees look to enter a new organization with a sense of gratification for a job done well and aspire to advance. When training does not occur, employees have little to no knowledge on how to properly perform their roles. If employees do not understand their task as an entry-level employee, how are they going to learn new tasks and flourish in an advanced position? The result is low morale among workers. Eventually, they are out the door, looking for another opportunity. If they do stay, unsatisfied employees can be a toxic cancer for your company regarding recruitment, retention, and organizational culture.
- Unsafe Work Environment: OSHA, OSHA, and OSHA; need I say more? The Occupational Safety and Health Administration punishes companies severely if a work related accident occurs and lack of training is part of the cause. In industries where equipment and safety are important, the consequences can be severe – even fatal. There have been many work-related accidents that have caused fatalities involving heavy-duty machinery, hazardous materials, or improper work behavior due to lack of company guidance. The punitive damages can cripple a small business. Under the Top 10 fines for small companies list for 2013, Training Requirements and Training were numbers eight and nine on the list for fines. It is not worth the risk to have untrained staff working.
- Increased Expenses: Untrained employees will make more errors, cause injuries, reduced production and efficiency, defective products, incorrect services, and going over project budget costs. Oh, did I forget to mention the liability of defending your organization against lawsuits?
- Loss of Clients: A lack of training for an employee will not produce high-quality services and products. This will result in longer production/service times, upset customers, and eventually they will stop using your company, thus affecting your sales. The worst part is that your former customer will be now using one of your competitors.