4 Reasons to Invest in Employee Development and Learning – and How to Do It

Your employees are the lifeblood of your business; without them, you can't operate a successful company. When motivated and excited, your employees are more likely to help your business thrive, even in non-customer-facing roles. Conversely, when employees are not engaged and lack enthusiasm or overall motivation, your business will struggle because they won't perform as well; some may even act as bottlenecks that prevent work from getting done as they look for new opportunities.

One way to encourage engagement and improve satisfaction is by investing in employee development and learning. Giving your employees the tools and skills they need to do their jobs well and learn new skills to help them grow in their careers can provide them with the opportunities they need to stay engaged at work.

What Is Employee Development?

Employee development allows you to invest in your employees, and business leaders must consider opportunities for internal growth. By investing in employee development, employers can help their workers improve their skills and knowledge. These new skills may include training on new technologies used in the company such as a hospitality CRM, a supply chain management tool, or providing skills-based training to help employees reach their development goals. For example, a social media manager in the marketing department might take a writing workshop to improve their writing skills to become a copywriter.

The ultimate goal of employee development is to upskill employees and improve employee retention rates. There are many potential benefits of employee development for the employees, but it also allows your company to have the best of the best by properly training its employees. Additionally, investing in employee development and learning means investing in your employees, which is something they'll appreciate.

Benefits of Investing in Employee Development

Investing in employee development creates a better workforce. Here's how employee development and learning impact your company:

Attracts High-Quality Employees

Your business is only as successful as its employees, and your employees should be your top priority. Having a comprehensive employee development program can help attract top talent. People who want to grow in their careers are attracted to companies that invest time and money into their skills. In addition, one of the most common reasons people leave their jobs for another is to acquire new skills, so if your employees are learning new skills at work, there's no reason for them to leave.

Improves Performance

Most employees enjoy performing well at work because it gives them satisfaction, which is crucial for employee retention. Unfortunately, poor performance can be frustrating for business owners and employees. Employee development can solve this problem because employees aren't always aware of how they should perform. Investing in development tools ensures employees are well-trained and can do their work efficiently and accurately. With the right employee development program, they can learn the skills they need to improve their overall performance and give them a self-esteem boost along the way.

Of course, employee development won't solve every performance issue. Employees can be low performers for various reasons, so it's important to determine the root cause.

Increases Engagement

Employee engagement is crucial. An engaged employee is happy to be at work and can perform their duties efficiently and effectively. Additionally, engaged employees are less likely to have safety incidents and tend to stay loyal and productive. Employee engagement is complex, but you can find new ways to engage your employees every day, including using employee development.

When employees focus on their career development, they're more likely to want to learn more about the business's daily operations, which can help them stay interested in the company and want to climb the corporate ladder. This makes them more optimistic about their job outlook within a specific company, allowing them to focus more on their work and less on other, less-productive activities.

Trains Leaders

Employees need a good leader who can communicate effectively and manage projects. While you always have the option of hiring outside the company, promoting from within is always better, cheaper, and more productive. Employee development enables you to train future leaders to help you learn more about the goals and skills of the people you already have working in your company.

As soon as you notice the qualities you look for in a leader, you can begin training staff by investing in development to help push people into the right roles at the right times.

How to Invest in Employee Development

There are several ways to invest in employee development, but proper planning is crucial to ensure all of your employees have the opportunity to succeed. Creating employee development plans with each employee can give them a blueprint for the steps they need to take while helping your company outline the different types of training or learning experiences required. Then, you can offer several types of employee training, including in-person and online courses that allow them to learn new skills essential to your business. For example, a digital marketing assistant could take a course on email marketing, while an HR manager could learn more about local laws and regulations.

You can also provide mentorship opportunities that allow employees to work directly with managers to learn about their positions and the various skills required of them. Then, once management changes positions or leaves the company, you'll already have a list of qualified individuals ready to fill the role.

Developing Employees for a Better Workforce

Developing employees doesn't just serve the business; it can attract top talent and retain high performers while motivating employees of all types to work harder and learn more. Most workers don't want to sit behind a desk doing the same thing every day; they want to grow within an organization. If you can't provide them with opportunities to learn and grow, you may lose them to the competition.

Before implementing an employee development program, consider working with HR to determine what types of training you can provide and talk to employees to determine if they'd be interested in learning more about specific roles within the organization. Then, create development plans for each interested employee and set a training schedule to help them learn what they need to know.

For more tips on employee development and learning, head to iHire’s Employer Resource Center.