Economic Opportunism: Learning & Training for the Future During Financial Crisis

Smart businesses know that economic downturns are a time for investing in the future, so when conditions improve they have the skills needed to grow and thrive once again.

This is perhaps in juxtaposition with the austerity measures being taken, which mean training budgets are being slashed. However, the idea is not to train more, but rather to train smarter.

ROI of Training

Running training like a business involves targeting the funds for workforce development towards those areas which are likely to yield the greatest results and boost to productivity, while streamlining those which are of least value.

For those who need a little encouragement about the ROI of training initiatives, the figures speak for themselves. Research from the University of Pennsylvania found that for every 10 percent of revenue spent on capital improvements productivity increased by 3.9 percent.

In comparison, spending the same amount on human capital yielded an 8.5 percent increase in productivity.