3. Discuss the role of the training function and the role of the trainer in a learning organization.

Explain how will these roles change in a learning organization. Describe the knowledge and skill required by a trainer in a learning organization.

Training and Development (T&D) is a common term usually including all planned learning interventions where learning -- versus training -- is the primary purpose. In the 1990s the concept of learning organization grew when organizations realized that training is not enough that to continue training employees using general subject matter like a communications skills course was ineffective, inefficient and did not always achieve the expected result. The best description perhaps comes from Pedler, Burgoyne and Boydell as cited by Pickering: A learning company is an organisation that facilitates the learning of all its members and continuously transforms itself. 2 Organizations today, more commonly speak of learning -- with learning and development managers replacing training managers and the same being true of their departments. But there are real differences between training and learning. Training focuses on acquisition of new skills and knowledge. Training interventions are usually event driven, trainer led and often provide only short-term results. Classroom based training, workshops, and pure play elearning materials are all part of the training arena. Learning focuses on achieving permanent changes in behaviour. Learning interventions do not stand alone, but focus on the longer term to give individuals the chance to achieve and maintain changes by applying learning (of skills and knowledge from training interventions) or personal experience. Learning interventions tend to include coaching, mentoring, 360-degree feedback, action learning sets, etc.

One company, Structured Learning Ltd., illustrates the difference in Table 1.

Training Skills development Externally applied (done to all) Short term skill uplift Equips for known challenges Meets current

Learning Behaviour change Internally accepted Long term change Equips for ambiguous future

organisational Defines organisational future

requirements Focuses on the group Primarily structured Doing Table 1. Training v Learning Organisations will always need some element of training, but the focus should be on the learning that follows. Learning allows the individual, team and organisation to develop, and builds a platform and readiness for any amount of skills, knowledge and process development that an organisation will ever need. Much has been said in training institutes and education circles about the role of a trainer. There is a continuous discussion as to whether a trainer is a teacher or a facilitator of learning. A teacher has always been portrayed as an expert and one who could tell us whether our answers to problems were right or wrong. Thus it may not be wrong to think that a trainer would be someone who could give us all the right answers and teach us, so that we could eventually learn to provide them ourselves. But many management and real life problems do not have book solutions or right answers. Thus the trainer in real life is somebody who would facilitate us to reach solutions, which have been tested by practice and experience. He or she would assist us in selecting the best option from a welter of options available to us. Is focused by individuals Primarily organic Understanding

Teaching or training is not synonymous with learning. Training is basically telling someone something, however convincingly. Thus it, does not by any means guarantee that the message passed is well received, accepted and understood. Whereas Learning implies that there has to be conscious discipline and willingness on the part of the learner to acquire knowledge. It takes place when there is a practical demonstration.

In situations where a concrete and indisputable answer to a problem is possible, it may be reasonable for the trainer to adopt a teaching style, whilst learning by other means may be necessary when dealing with problems requiring a choice of workable options.

However, since learning is central to all training and a pre-requisite for success, if a trainer does not create a learning climate his/her efforts are likely to be abortive. Moreover, learning is a continuous process, human beings start learning from the environment right from the day they are born. Therefore, learning, to speak, is a more macro term than training.

Learning also implies a relatively permanent change in the behaviour of a person that occurs through insight, practice or experience. That is the reason why every organization today wants to be a learning organization. Learning comes from doing (experiential learning). Therefore, whatever is learnt is permanently incorporated in the mind. Thus, each organization should aim for learning instead of teaching for the growth and development of itself and its employees.

Any understanding of the role of the trainer needs to encompass both formal on-the-job learning as well as incidental and informal learning that takes places as part of the normal course of work.

Role of the trainer is shaped by the work of the particular enterprise. Within real estate enterprises, trainers tended to be focused on an individual. Much of the learning is undertaken in a self-directed manner (that is, the learner works through a section of a module and then consults with other staff to monitor their progress etc.). This seems to mirror the individualised structure of work in the industry where each employee has a portfolio of properties that he/she manages fairly much independently from others. In contrast, learning within the IT industry is often team-based because work is organised around projects. Individual members of the group who have expert knowledge in an area share this with other members of the group, with

the support and encouragement of a trainer who often is also a team leader or supervisor. In some instances trainers complemented the learning undertaken in these small groups with more formalised training programs such as an enterprise-wide mentoring program for newly appointed staff.

Roles of Trainer Although many classifications of trainer roles exist, the one used here is presented by Shandler D (1996) This contains five key roles, namely:

The trainer; The provider; The consultant; The innovator The manager.

Two of these roles (trainer and provider) are concerned mainly with maintaining levels of performance. Another two (consultant and innovator) are more concerned with training for change. The fifth the manager - is concerned with integrating the activities and behaviours of other roles. These roles are not distinct packages of activities, behaviours and responsibilities. Each has a clear focus but relates to the other.

The trainer: This role is primarily concerned with actual direct training. It is the role that involves the trainer in helping people to learn, providing feedback about their learning andadopting course designs to meet the trainees needs.

The provider: This role is primarily concerned with the design, maintenance, and delivery of training programs. It involves training needs analysis, setting training program objectives, designing courses, and choosing appropriate training methods, testing out and evaluating the programs, and finally helping the trainers to deliver training.

The consultant: This role is primarily concerned with analysing business problems and assessing/recommending solutions, some of which may require training. It involves liaising with the line managers, identifying their performance problems, advising on possible training solutions, working with trainers to establish the training programs, etc.

The innovator: This role is primarily concerned with helping organizations effectively to manage change and solve performance problems. It will involve working with managers at senior/middle levels, providing support and help to managers in coping with change, facilitating change and advising the training function on how it can best help in the change process. Such a role can be called change agent or a catalyst.

The manager: This role is primarily concerned with planning, organizing, controlling and developing the training and development activity or function. It will involve setting training goals, policies and plans, liaising with other departments and with senior management about the contribution training can and should make to improving performance, ensuring that appropriate training activities are designed, developed, delivered, and evaluated, acquiring and developing training staff, etc.

Organizations cannot survive and improve themselves with their previous knowledge and need to learn in order to strive hard to overcome the chaotic and changing conditions. Changes in organizations, the changing nature of work, changes in the workforce and changes in how people learn, are forces compelling organizations to shift to learning organizations. In order to keep in the organizational memory all the learning that takes place, it needs to be acquired by systems. Learning organizations always seek to find ways to capture the learned concepts in order to go on to function even if a highly mobile, temporary workforce fails to function well. Moreover, the organizations need to defuse all that is learned to even highly dispersed workforce, irrespective of how far they are located. According to Senge (1990) a learning organization is an organization where people continuously expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning how to learn together. The learning organization can be viewed as a system, i.e. seeing parts in relation to the whole. A learning organization helps to facilitate the learning of all its members and consciously modifies itself and affects its context .Additionally, learning organizations comprise embedded systems to capture and share knowledge so that the organization may continue to progress and develop competitively.

The fundamental role of the trainer is to ensure that effective learning takes place. By effective learning is meant not only that the desired level of expertise or competence can be demonstrated by the learner (as in traditional behavioural objectives or contemporary statements of competence), but also that the learner can demonstrate a thorough understanding of the underlying principles. The learner should further experience an awareness of growth in his/her own self development through reflection on the processes inherent in the learning process itself, thus developing an increased sense of personal control, empowerment and autonomy. There is significant evidence to suggest that the context of the trainers role is changing. Humanware the human element will be the core of everything in the future according to Minolta Europe GmbH Director Akio Miyabayashi. If people stopped wearing clothes, says Benetton Chief Financial Officer Marco Polo, we have an organization that is smart enough and flexible enough to start producing umbrellas in many different colours tomorrow (Keohan, 1995). Focused intelligence, the ability to acquire and apply knowledge and know-how, is the new source of wealth (Handy, 1994).

Required Characteristics, Attitudes, and Skills of Trainers

The literature paints a picture of the trainer as having certain personal characteristics. First among these are authenticity-a person who relates to others as being real and genuine, with qualities of openness and frankness. In addition, trainer need to be perceptive and insightful, and exhibit sensitivity and empathy with those insights (Casey, 1991). Equally important is an overwhelming desire to see others learn (Casey, 1991) and the curiosity and patience to watch that learning occur through the action learning process (Marsick, 1990). A Trainer must be persistent in the pursuit of his or her own knowledge (Marsick, 1990) and be willing to learn from both the participants and the process (Sewerin, 1997). Finally, there is a need to have a willingness to examine oneself critically in order to be aware of ones motives in being a learning coach (Sewerin, 1997). One characteristic that respondents in ONeils (1999) study stressed is the need for maturity. This maturity can come from age and experience, although those are not the only sources. What was agreed on was that for someone to be a trainer, he or she needed to be able to separate his or her own needs and feelings from that of the group, put aside those needs, and focus on the needs of the group.

Apart from the personal characteristics of trainer, there are certain skill sets that are considered to be a prerequisite to becoming a learning coach. Group Process Skills One of the skill sets that a learning coach needs to develop is that of a process. Reddy (1994) defines the role of a process consultant as reasoned and intentional interventions, into the ongoing events and dynamics of a group, with the purpose of helping that group effectively attain its agreed-upon objectives. Schein(1988) goes on to say that the relationship between a group and a process consultant plays itself out through interventions that are made from an ambiguous power base, in the midst of ongoing work. Through these interventions, the process consultant builds involvement and commitment, and gains acceptance for the importance of looking at the process. Similar to process consultation, coaching action learning takes place in a group or team context. A trainers activities are reasoned and intentional, and are intended to help the group or team attain its agreed on objective of learning through solving an actual problem. Interventions are made in the midst of ongoing work (ONeil, 1997). Lawrence (1991)

says that every one of the skills that a process consultant must employ can also be used by a learning coach.

Although process consultation skills are important in performing the trainer role, the role is more than that of a process consultant. The primary purpose of the learning coach is to help the group learn. This is in contrast to the purpose of a process consultant, whose primary charge is generally facilitating a groups work on its task. One implication of this difference is that a process consultant often intervenes to keep a group out of process difficulty, while a learning coach seeks to help the group learn from its difficulties. Among other things, this affects the timing of interventions. Systems Thinking Some coaches use systems theory to help frame their work, and view thegroup and the action learning program as systems. For example, one coach uses a triangle to represent parts of a system-in this case thegroup, the sponsor, and the learning coach-and demonstrates how theinteraction among these three elements in action learning can mirror the pull on the participants among the various elements within the organizationalsystem (ONeil, 1999).

Included in this system view is some basic knowledge of the environment in which the learning coach practices. All learning coaches need to have an understanding of learning processes in individuals and groups or teams (Pedler, 1996). Those who practice action learning within business organizations also need an understanding of organizational learning processes, an ability to have a systems or big-picture view, and some breadth of business experience. Personal Competencies It seems almost to go without saying that learning coaches need good

personalcompetencies that enable them to be effective when working with an action learning group, among them, keen powers of observation (Sewerin, 1997); the ability to give help, advice, and assistance; the ability to question, support, and challenge; and the ability to facilitate teammembers in giving and receiving help and feedback from each other (Pedler, 1996). The training that learning coaches receive should include the development and verification of these skill sets and competencies. One characteristic that experienced action learning practitioners all

agree they did not want in a learning coach is someone who presents himself or herself as an expert.

However, above all else, a learning organization must encourage individual learning and development. Even though CEOs, presidents, and corporate managers are all interested in large scale corporate learning, there is no corporate learning without individual learners. Grand, expensive programs are not necessary for the learning organization transformation to begin or to be sustained. Simple, incremental steps toward organizational learning will succeed in helping you and your organization learn faster than competitors and transform your manufacturing organization into a learning organization.