ROLES OF TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT
IN ORGANIZATIONS
(A Case Study of Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria)
At The 22nd conference For The International
Information Management Association (IIMA),
New Orleans, USA.
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ROLES OF TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT IN
ORGANIZATIONS (A Case Study of Federal Airports Authority of
Nigeria - FAAN)
ABSTRACT
This study is on the Role of Training and Development in Organization: A
Case of Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria.
It seeks to study the role of training and development to in the Aviation
Industry with particular reference to Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria,
recommendations and finding which could be used to achieve effective
training and development in organizations were arrived at.
The roles of training and development in Federal Airports Authority of
Nigeria are used to depict what is happening in the Aviation industry in
general. The roles of training and development cannot be overemphasized.
Training and development is necessary to improve and induce certain
behavioural changes in the employees.
The hypotheses tested in this study support that training and development
improves productivity and performance in organization. It also shows that
there is a positive relationship between training and development
BACKGROUND
Staff training in any organization, public or private is an important aspect of
human resource management. It is an indispensable and relevant tool which
every organization must adapt especially with the present day changes in
technology and new work procedures and methods of doing things. In
support of the above, stoner et al (1987), assert that the most important
resources of an organization are it human resources, i.e. the people who
supply the organization with their work talent, creativity and drive. Thus
among the most critical tasks of a manager are the selection, training and
development of people who will best help the organization to meet its goals.
Without competent people at all the levels, organizations will either pursue
inappropriate goals or find it difficult to achieve appropriate goals which
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they have set. In other words, it is important for any organization to design a
training programme to improve the skills of its employees.
According to Cole (1996), training usually implies preparation for an
occupation or for specific skills, it is more narrow in conception than either
education or development, it is job oriented rather than personal.
The introduction of computer to enhance stock and control of payroll
activities in an organization, for instance, could lead to the displacement of
some workers engaged when such jobs were manually done.
Therefore, training of workers is an act in an organization that enables the
employees to learn new techniques of processing data with the used of
computer, a new and modern day equipment that should be at the disposal of
very organization.
Little wonder Arnoff, J. (1971), explained that training and development
programmes foster the initiative and creativity of employees and help to
prevent manpower obsolescence, which may be due to age, temperament or
motivation, or the ability of a person to adapt himself or herself to
technological changes.
Objectives of the study
Training is said to be a continuous activity to keep employees in good shape
so as to be able to carry out assigned tasks. It has many objectives/purposes:
-
To identify the high performance of the employees.
-
To impart knowledge, skill and capabilities to new and old employees
-
To broaden and equip employees to carry out future expected roles.
-
To bring about team spirit and high morale in the organization
-
To encourage employees to go for the gold in furthering their careers
to meet individual aspiration.
-
To help in adapting to changing work environment and technology
-
To bridge the gap between existing permanence ability and desired
performance .
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LITERATURE REVIEW
INTRODUCTION
Training and development activities in organizations have increased
tremendously in recent years. However, many organizations carry out
minimum of staff training and development preferring as a matter of
policy, to recruit already trained or qualified people for the job. Such
organization is prepared to pay handsomely for skilled staff. In this way,
there are speed made on recruitment drive, selection and pay benefits, rather
than on training and development.
This policy accounts for the establishment of the industrial training funds
(I.T.F.) by Decree No. 37 of 1973.
In Nigeria and industrial training board on Britain , in an effort to ensure that
all organizations in this scope of straining contribute to total training costs.
However, a large percentage of organization, have positive policy on
training and development although this may be restricted to expression of
company intention, the policy may refer comprehensively to the various
actions taken by the organization.
It will take to ensure not only a regular supply of skills, but also a high
degree of personal motivation.
BRIEF HISTORY OF FEDERAL AIRPORT AUTHORITY OF NIGERIA
(FAAN)
The Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) was established by
decree 45 of 1975 as Nigeria Airport Authority (NAA) meant to be a
parastatal under the Ministry of Transport and Aviation. The Authority was
charged with the functions of:
*
Developing and Maintaining all the necessary facilities and services
for safe operation of aircrafts in Nigerian airports.
*
The provision of accommodations and other facilities for effective
handling of passengers and freights.
*.
The responsibilities of providing for the surface transport with the
airport.
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*
Creating a condusive atmosphere for smooth and most efficient
manner of air transport and services connected to it.
Saddled with these enormous responsibilities, the authority took off in 1978
with a handful of staff but today FAAN has the strength of over six thousand
staff. The staff profile includes Managing Director and Chief Executive,
General Manger and other categories of managers, senior and junior staff
respectively. The office of the Managing Director controls four units
directly. They are; legal, special duties, public affairs and units. The other
distance operational department have executives as the heads.
These directors are:
*
Director of finance and administration
*
Director of airport operations
*
Director of engineering services
*
Director of commercial and investment
Based on the contributions of the management and staff of FAAN towards
the airport, it has encouraged audition industry in the country to grow from
strength to strength. Currently, the numbers of local and foreign airlines in
the country are on the increase.
TRAINING AND MANPOWER DEVELOPMENT
Training and development activities are integral and important part of
human resources management. The activities make it possible to adjust and
enhance the skills of the workforce - from the Managing Director to the least
employee. All organizations should be alive to the training and manpower
development needs to their workforce without serious productive efficiency.
Training according to Crawford (1984), refers to the way in which specific
knowledge and skills necessary to perform a specific job are taught and
learned. He defined development as implies a parallel process in which
people acquire more general abilities and information, but in ways that
cannot always be tied directly to a particular task they perform.
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As stated by Mcfarland (1998, P.292), training is the term used to describe
the process through which organizations build the skills and abilities of nonmanagerial employees, while development on the other hand, includes the
process whereby managers and executives acquire not only skills and
compliance in their present jobs, but also capacity for future managerial
tasks of increasing difficultly and scope.
OBJECTIVE OF TRAINING
In the view of Adewunmi (1992), he states that training objectives may be
that of enabling an old employee to learn new techniques or acquire new
skills required for his/her job.
This is necessitated usually by changes in technology and in the method of
doing things.
The philosophy of staff training and development was first mentioned by
Chief Anthony Enahoro (1970), when he directed employers of labour in
Nigeria to train their employees to enable the nation overcome the bonds of
economic backwardness.
The objectives are as follows:
*
To provide initial training for new employees, professional, technical
and other skilled and semi-skilled personnel (induction training).
*
To train new employees without specific skills, like in form of
apprenticeship training and remedial training
*
To fulfill specific manpower needs.
*
To retain employed workers to perform new and changed job. This
may be necessitated by technological changes or introduction of new
products in service trainings.
*
Training may be aimed at solving operational problems viz; to reduce
accidents (e.g. training in proper use of equipment and in safety
attitudes), inept supervision, poor/inefficient service, and poor work
methods.
*
To bring supervisors and managers up to date on the techniques of
management.
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*
To increase organizational flexibility and stability as relates to ability
to adjust to short run variations in volume of work while stability
can
sustain corporate effectiveness despite the loss of some key personnel.
IMPORTANCE OF TRAINING
Training as was discussed earlier is of great importance. The importance as
derived from the exercise by both the organization and the employee are as
follows:
*
To increase productivity and efficiency
*
To reduce industrial accident, wastage and cost of supervision and
overall production processes.
*
To have employee that are hard working and dedicated to the
organization.
*
To cope with new technologies and adjust to changes in the work
place.
*
To have a virile and healthy organization.
*
To realize organizational objectives and goals.
*
To provide a platform for human resources planning purposes and
have enough self-motivated staff at anytime for expansion and
replacement of workers.
*.
To increase his job performance, morale and productivity.
*
To encourage staff or employee motivation.
*
To create opportunity for promotion and self-actualization.
*
To encourage and enhance workers in the organization.
*
To reduce the volume of industrial accident in the workplace.
*
To increase or encourage job specification as a result of skill
acquisition.
TYPES OF TRAINING
Some of the methods utilized for training in the organization are:
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INDUCTION TRAINING
An employee whether newly employed, promoted or transferred from the
department to another must be formally introduced to his specific job
environment, other employees with whom he will be working with and of
course, to the organization’s policies and objectives that concern him.
According to Fajana (1997), no induction training can intimate the new
employee about everything he needs to know concerning the information he
is to work with. The significance of some of the information might not be
appreciated by the new employee.
ON THE JOB TRAINING
This is a popular method of training employees. As Beach (1980), puts it,
“the vast majority o all training carried out is of the on-the-job variety” it is
the function of the manger or supervisor. The trainees are treated to a stepby-step review and demonstration of the job operations.
Bottenley (1983), is of the opinion that on-the-job training is not something
that is done to train because each time the trainer gets the employee to
adhere to directions or discusses a problem, the instructor is variably
training. In effect, this type of training is seen as a continuous process.
OFF –THE-JOB TRAINING
This is a type of training where trainee or an employee has his work
environment in another place or location with a view to acquire necessary
skills, attitude, and behavioral patterns needed for good job performance.
This type of training could be in organizations especially consultancy outfits,
classrooms, vocational schools and establishments, etc.
VESTIBULE TRAINING
This is a type of simulation where an employee or a trainee is trained to use
prototype of a particular machine or equipment before being allowed to use
the real one. For example , pilots in training and drivers in training, schools
using modern but locally made prototype of an aircraft and vehicle.
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Boone, et al (1990) observed that “vestibule schools are the facilities of
actual work areas.” In this type however, emphasis is usually on learning
rather than production.
CONCLUSION
In any establishment, the importance of training and development cannot be
over-emphasized
Training is necessary to improve quality and quantity of works productivity
and to induce certain behavioural changes in the employees. Development
improves their capability to plan, diagnose problems, proffer reasonable
solutions and generally to improve their decision-making skills and
competence (Bankjoke, 2000).
In accordance with the findings in this paper presentation, it can be
concluded that effective training and development in any organization is a
positive impact on productivity and performance, in terms of addressing
productivity and performance, provision of training and development which
is a crucial development too to the organization and a source of motivation
especially as a core management value in the organization. This corroborates
Weihrich and Kontz (1997).
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
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