*On-the-job* methods of training

Training and its two broad routes

Training is any process that raises the aptitudes, skills and abilities employees need to perform particular jobs. Its methods fall into two groups. On-the-job methods are used at the workplace while the employee is actually doing the work, so the employee learns while doing; off-the-job methods are used away from the workplace, so the employee learns before doing. The study text names four on-the-job methods: coaching, job rotation, apprenticeship programmes and internship training. Each is discussed below.

Coaching

In coaching, the superior acts as a coach who guides and instructs the trainee. Coach and trainee agree on goals; the coach suggests how to reach them, reviews the trainee's progress from time to time and suggests changes in behaviour and performance. The trainee works directly with a senior manager, who takes full responsibility for the coaching. Often the trainee is being prepared to take over from that senior manager and to relieve him of some duties, which also gives the trainee a chance to learn the job. A regional sales head at a consumer-goods distributor in Kolkata who works alongside a newly promoted area manager, reviewing her market visits each week, is coaching her.

Job rotation

Under job rotation, a trainee is shifted across departments, or across jobs, in turn. The trainee gains a wider understanding of every part of the business and of how the organisation works as a whole, takes a real part in each department's operations, and can test his or her own aptitude and ability. Meeting people across departments makes later cooperation between departments easier, and an organisation that trains people this way finds promotions, replacements and transfers easier to handle. A bank's management trainee who spends a few months each on the loans, deposits and foreign-exchange desks of a Chennai branch is being trained by job rotation.

Apprenticeship programmes

An apprenticeship places the trainee under the guidance of a master worker and aims at a higher level of skill. People seeking skilled trades, such as plumbers, electricians or iron-workers, are often required to serve an apprenticeship, spending a prescribed period working with an experienced guide or trainer. The training period is the same for everyone, so fast and slow learners train together, and slow learners may need extra training. A young electrician working beside a senior lineman of a power distribution company in Jaipur for a fixed term before working alone is an apprentice.

Internship training

Internship is a joint programme in which educational institutions and business firms cooperate. Selected candidates continue their regular studies for the prescribed period and also work in a factory or office to gain practical knowledge and skills. An engineering student who spends a semester at a car plant near Chennai while remaining enrolled in college is doing an internship.

Why on-the-job methods matter

Because these methods use the real job, what is learnt is applied at once. Training of this kind brings the benefits the study text lists for the organisation and the employee:

• it prepares future managers who can step in during an emergency;
• it is systematic learning, better than trial and error, which wastes effort and money;
• it lifts employee morale and cuts absenteeism and labour turnover;
• for the employee, better skills lead to a better career and higher earnings, and a trained worker handles machines more safely and is less likely to have accidents.

Conclusion

Coaching and job rotation prepare people for wider and higher roles, while apprenticeship and internship build practical skill in those entering a trade or a profession. Used together, on-the-job methods turn the workplace itself into the classroom.