Training and development

Managing ability in organizations

1.Employee selection

Identify tasks to be accomplished Identify abilities needed to accomplish tasks Develop accurate measures of abilities Select the individuals who meet the requirements

2. Placement (P-E fit)

Match workers to jobs to capitalize on their abilities

3.Training

The systematic acquisition of skills, concepts, or attitudes that results in improved performance in another environment

Training: Systematic acquisition of skills, concepts, or attitudes resulting in improved performance in another environment

Training increases probability of learning, and learning increases probability of better job performance.

Training Needs Analysis

! 3-step process to develop systematic understanding of where training is needed (organizational), what needs to be trained (task), & who will be trained (person)

In general, organizations benefit from investing in learning and development programs:

! Improve the bottom-line performance of the organization by giving employees the skills needed to perform well.

! Reduce external recruiting costs by preparing current employees for greater tasks or leadership roles.

! Increase employee retention by visibly demonstrating to employees an investment in their career development and growth.

Grim example: Need for assertiveness training

[note: deze afbeelding uit het college is door de WorldSupporter redactie verwijderd wegens vermoedelijke inbreuk op het auteursrecht] 

Impact of trainee characteristics, e.g.:

1. Ability Mental ability (“g”) Metacognitive skills (understanding one’s cognitions)

2. Self-monitoring

3. Self-theory (perceptions about self)

4. Achievement goals (performance/mastery)

5. Feedback seeking behavior: Self-enhancement vs. selfimprovement

[note: deze afbeelding uit het college is door de WorldSupporter redactie verwijderd wegens vermoedelijke inbreuk op het auteursrecht] 

Learning: Social Comparison Theory

Festinger (1954): There is a “drive” within individuals to gain accurate self-evaluations to (i) reduce uncertainty about the self and (ii) learn how to define the self.

Theoretical advances (1970’s – 1980’s):

• Self-evaluation: If motivation is accuracy, then choose a comparison target similar to oneself • Self-enhancement: If motivation is to increase positive self-regard, one might Interpret, distort, or ignore information when making self-evaluation

• Upward and downward social comparison: Choosing a comparison target of people better/worse off. - opposing effects for self-improvement - opposing effects for self-regard

Vicarious Learning: Learning that occurs when one person (the learner) learns a behavior by watching another person (the model) perform the behavior (e.g., “watch and learn”, imitation, social contagion)

Learning: Contagion Effects

Goals, motives, values, and beliefs are socially contagious Achievement motivation (and apathy) is socially contagious Burnout spreads among teachers & medical professionals. Media exposure facilitates “mass shooting contagion”

In 2013, scientists at Facebook showed massivescale emotional contagion by manipulating news feeds to include more positive (vs. negative) posts from friends.

Benchmarking: Putting Social Comparison and Vicarious Learning into Practice

Benchmarking involves selecting a high-performing individual, group, or organization and using this target as a model.

Types of benchmarking (in business);

1. Best practices: Look to someone you aspire to be like (and then imitate)

2. Peer Benchmarking: Look to someone doing similarly to oneself (e.g., to stay competitive) 3. SWOT: Gather data by looking at strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats (to understand their climate)

4. Collaborative benchmarking: Sending data to an external organization to create benchmarking and best practices for all members

Learning: Reinforcement theory

- Premise: People learn to perform behaviors that lead to desired consequences and learn not to perform behaviors that lead to undesired consequences.

- Hence, linking specific behaviors to the attainment of specific outcomes can motivate high performance and prevent behaviors that detract from organizational effectiveness.

[note: deze afbeelding uit het college is door de WorldSupporter redactie verwijderd wegens vermoedelijke inbreuk op het auteursrecht] 

Learning: Behavior modification

Behavior modification: The systematic application of

 reinforcement theory for teaching and managing behavior in organizations.

[note: deze afbeelding uit het college is door de WorldSupporter redactie verwijderd wegens vermoedelijke inbreuk op het auteursrecht] 

• Experimental design
  • Random assignment of participants to conditions
  • Conducted in a laboratory or the field
  • E.g. pretest posttest control group design (p. 296)
• Quasi-experimental design
  
  • Non-random assignment of participants to conditions

Performance standards:

1. The salespersons should stay within 3 feet of displayed merchandise

2. When customers request assistance, they should be assisted within 5 seconds.

3. The shelves should be filled to at least 70% of its capacity (if product is in-store)

[note: deze afbeelding uit het college is door de WorldSupporter redactie verwijderd wegens vermoedelijke inbreuk op het auteursrecht] 

Contingent Rewards: Good or bad?

Reward options: rewards have to be interesting to employees

Contingency factors: rewards should promote the desired performance outcome (e.g., number of sales, not number of calls)

Effectiveness: System should be structured so the rewards are attainable (and enjoyable to attain)

[note: deze afbeelding uit het college is door de WorldSupporter redactie verwijderd wegens vermoedelijke inbreuk op het auteursrecht] 

Do extrinsic rewards undermine intrinsic motivation?

!Not if the reward is inherent to the activity ! Betting money on coin tosses

!Not if people do not attribute their behavior to the reward. ! People can still love a job they get paid for.

Intrinsic work motivation

!Evidence from 1970’s-2000’s (e.g., Sansone & Harackiewicz, 2000):

• internally generated

• not driven by external rewards

• liking is inherent to activity itself

• serves fundamental needs (Deci & Ryan, 1985, 1991)

Off-site training methods

• Lectures and instruction
• Simulators
• Distance learning
  
  • Can occur across multiple sites at once
  • More affordable, learning-tailored alternative to live instruction
  • I-O research just beginning
• Computer-based training
  
  • Allow trainees to individualize their learning experience
  • Trainees have more control over instruction
• Cross-cultural training
  
  • Sensitize expatriates to values, norms, and beliefs of host culture.
  • Assumptions:
    
    • Use information to understand behavior
    • Transfer knowledge into new behaviors
    • Increase satisfaction
    • More productive
    • More effective interactions

Training criteria: Kirkpatrick’s model

[note: deze afbeelding uit het college is door de WorldSupporter redactie verwijderd wegens vermoedelijke inbreuk op het auteursrecht] 

Training Evaluation Design

!Strongest training evaluation designs include:

• Random assignment of participants to conditions

• Control group

• Measures obtained before & after training

!Pretest Posttest Control Group Design

Take home messages

• The success of training depends on characteristics of the trainee
• Social learning theory and reinforcement theory principles can be successfully applied to training and development context
• Extrinsic motivation need not undermine intrinsic motivation