Managing in the Next Society essay
With the advancement of technological development, all the spheres of life have undergone huge changes, and most of terms have had to be re-defined. This especially involved such sensible field as knowledge, its understanding and its significance. [1]Traditionally, the definition of illiteracy means the ability to “read, write, spell, listen, and speak”. Nowadays, the number of people who cannot read and write is decreasing annually and [2]makes no more than 0,5% of population in most developed countries, whereas the number of people who share the symptoms of functional illiteracy, i.e. those who cannot keep up with modern technological development, is rapidly increasing. No matter now or in the future, “learning how to learn” stays the issue people ever need to face. Knowledge has always been infinite, hence never stop learning is the living duty of people that can motivate individuals’ potential and enable them to achieve their goals. But never was it as urgent as today, in a globalizing world with unprecedented speed of communication and technological exchange.
Learning may occur as a part of education, personal development, schooling, or training. It may be goal-oriented and may be aided by internal motivation. Training and Development is one of the core areas in modern Human Resource Management, [3]aimed at maximizing organizational effectiveness, human potentials, individuals’ capabilities, and talents. In this essay will critically evaluate the evolving role of HRM in T&D regarding the urgent need of personnel for developing flexible skills to learn, unlearn and relearn.
Facing functional illiteracy of contemporaneity
Starting with Alvin Toffler’s statement from his book “Future Shock”, we want to stress the idea that the progress in science, technology and education has already forced most modern people master their ability to read and write. [2]While 50 years ago there were nearly 44% of illiterate people, in 2000’s this figure narrowed down to less than 20% worldwide. The definition of illiteracy has also been expanded along with that, and in some versions now includes graduation from high school or even university, as well as constant access to acquiring new knowledge and lifelong education concept.
In this regard, [4]Alvin Toffler says: “The new education must teach the individual how to classify and reclassify information, how to evaluate its veracity, how to change categories when necessary, how to move from the concrete to the abstract and back, how to look at problems from a new direction — how to teach himself.” Linking his words to the corporate reality, we see why the issue of training and development in HRM has received considerable critical attention. [5]Training and development exists to promote individual and organizational excellence by providing opportunities to develop workplace skills. That means it enables employees to constantly update their knowledge via skill development, keep up with the times, learn personal potential and the value of self-realization, away from workplace illiteracy.
In this perspective, knowledge theories share a multidimensional approach on “how to learn”, where a single loop learning emphasis is on the status of cognitive, while the double-loop learning makes an emphasis on reflection from different occasions. Essentially, single loop learning is aimed at maintaining normal behavior, but is not contributing much to the improved results and changes in organizational beliefs and values, thus creating obstruction to organizational flexibility and ability to adapt to the environment. In its turn, [6]double-loop learning is necessary if practitioners and organizations are to make informed decisions in rapidly changing and often uncertain contexts (Argyris 1974; 1982; 1990). Thus, while single loop approach may be essential for learning as such, double loop learning will be crucial for unlearning and relearning.
In support for the latter statement, Peter Drucker who is the leader in the development of management education argues that [7]we have to face a new era, as well as the vision forward, and we must forgot what we’ve known yesterday. For instance, facing new market realities, Sony known as a company specializing in the production of electronic products and home appliances business, suddenly turned to the production of electronic game play stations, and now uses it as the core of sphere of economic development. Having lost the competitive battle for the market of personal computers, with their rapid substitution with touchpad smart phones and tablet communicators, IBM switched its knowledge to developing software and consulting services. In both examples, the change of major activity helped companies to move form market losses to a new era of positive results. That means, when we are unlearning the old knowledge must also simultaneously relearn new knowledge, we need innovation and recreation, jumping off the original thinking paradigm.
Unlearn and relearn: Corporate training and development
Contemporary society presents multiple opportunities, sources and methods of learning. For instance, e-learning representing a new type of internet learning platform has become the best model for lifelong learning accessible globally. Today, those in search for new knowledge can attend universities and gain new professions virtually, from miles away from the server. Professional courses are accessed online, transmitted on expert portals and taught through Skype and Viber. Companies are also working hard to improve the interactive distance learning courses, and Corporate University is gaining high popularity. Organizational learning development provides employees with such specialized opportunities as training, coaching, and teambuilding. In its core, corporate training is aimed at implementing corporate goals through improving the ability of employees to perform work-related activities. These capabilities include knowledge, skills and job performance, representing the infrastructure of work process in human resource development which [8]leads to the enhancement of the workplace, organizational and personal growth, acceleration of flexibility, higher transparency, and finally recognition of employees’ abilities and skills. Corporate training is effective not only for stimulating the staff’s current potential, but also for providing more guarantees for enterprise’s future advance.
Above all, [9]training is concerned with the meeting of two inputs to organizational effectiveness, people and technology. Since organization can use training to help new employees master the technology of their task and meet skills gaps, it changes uninformed employees into informed employees who perform their work with maximum effectiveness. However, this ideal now often faces the lack of HRM professional knowledge and its transmitters, which results in the failure of corporate training system, as well as the fact that employees in one organization are typically not same level as in the other. Having received different corporate culture in the past, employees demonstrate significant differences in overall capacity and qualities, different level of desire to participate in corporate training and different ability for learning. But developing their training programs, many enterprises are not well qualified to understand the equal opportunity and diversity management. Still, older workers, for example, always show the need for taking longer time in training and relearning, which the young graduates should not be offered.
In this situation, modern managers should focus on the fact that diversity also means the variety of excellence, where each employee possesses one own respective advantages and achieves aspirations of one’s own value. The objective of company’s management is thus to unleash the individual potential of employees, help them achieve self-satisfaction, stimulate their enthusiasm and loyalty to the work of the organization, and at the same time take measure of unifying employees’ thinking and behavior towards achieving common organizational goals. To make this, [10]different management styles may be adopted to value diversity, all employees and each of them in particular, thus enabling equality action to be linked to the accomplishment of business goals. For example, Citibank, which is the broadest banking network in the Asia-Pacific region, uses e-learning software platform in order to implement regular online courses for employees of different levels.
Being designed to develop the quality of management and professional capacity, it also contributes to employees’ better adaptation to new technologies and product market changes. As a result, as Lengnick-Hall marks in his work on strategic HRM, [11]development can increase the value and contribution of key human “assets” to corporate success; it also can reflect part of a wider human resource strategy to develop, motivate and retain highly talented managers. Indeed, HR development [12]shows to enhance participants’ confidence, challenges their assumptions, and forces them to rethink their own and their organization’s traditional values and viewpoints. [13]Enhancing personal organization abilities and communication skills, contemporary managers move forward in their functional effectiveness, away from ‘functional illiteracy’ defined as inability to advance in learning, communication and management.
Conclusion
In summary, human resource training and development is the foundation of modern human resource management theory, grounded by the urgent organizational need for guaranteeing sustainable development of human resources in the rapidly changing market conditions. Pushed by the high pace of technological advancements, contemporary organizations are expected to introduce continuous training and lifelong learning, aimed at filling the knowledge gaps at various stages of education. These processes should be guided by the principles of equality and diversity management, assuming that human potentials are individual and precious in their multidimensionality. At the same time, relearning opportunities should be offered by organizations on regular basis, share individual approach on both personal and divisional levels, as well as view relearning as a strategic corporate advantage. Being designed to develop the quality of management and professional capacity, organizational training also contributes to employees’ better adaptation to new technologies and product market changes, as well as generally increases the value and contribution of key human “assets” to corporate success
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