Career Management at AusBank - Essay Example

Running head: Workforce Planning: Career Management- AusBank Case Study Workforce Planning: Career Management- AusBank Case Study Insert Insert Grade Course Insert Tutor’s Name December 2, 2011 Workforce Planning: Career Management- AusBank Case Study Introduction Workforce is important to an organization especially in realizing set goals and objectives (Kormanik and Rajan, 2010). Nevertheless, to have the objectives of the organization realized, there is need for the right workforce with necessary talents, skills, and knowledge. In most cases, these vital aspects may not be present when workforce is recruited and therefore, majority of workers will be encouraged and motivated to undertake career development programs. AusBank is one institution where various career development and management have been initiated and facilitated with the aim of developing the right body of workforce. Hence, it is necessary to establish the suitability of the various workforce management programs at AusBank. Question One: Pros and cons of workforce management programs When analyzing AusBank, it becomes evident that the bank has initiated some kind of career development and management programs. From the moment Susan enters the bank through graduate traineeship program, it is possible to conclude that this is one of the programs that the bank has put in place to tap the best talents from fresh graduates from the university. Once in the bank, Susan is put into various job rotation programs, and it is from this that one is able to ascertain that job rotation and training is another workforce development program in the bank. The job rotation provides ample chance for Susan to undergo numerous job training techniques, orientation, and familiarization, and through this, she is able to sharpen her management skills. Nevertheless, she is put under the guidance and supervision of a senior manager in the bank, where she is introduced into the various job roles and duties in the bank, an aspect that leads to conclusion that mentorship programs constitute another workplace development program in the bank. Career mentoring is reinforced through coaching, where Susan, together with other graduate trainees, are provided with an opportunity to learn various job aspects and roles in the bank through coaching activities under guidance of senior managers in the bank. Career development is another notable program in the bank, and this has been due to opportunities individuals in the organization undertake to further their education and knowledge. Moreover, moving and being able to work in different locations and stations can be perceived to be a way that employees are motivated to develop their careers by being exposed to different work environments. The challenges employees experience and exposure to different roles and duties in the organization enable them to advance and develop in their careers. On-the-job training constitutes another program that is prevalent in the bank and this can be linked to numerous trainings graduates trainees are exposed to in the bank. Through this, the graduates under supervision and guidance of senior employees in the bank are expected to learn and gain experience on various job roles, requirements, and many more. In short, the main workplace development programs one is likely to find at AusBank include graduate programs, mentoring and coaching, career development, job rotation, and on-the-job training. Workplace development programs, as in the case of AusBank, can be viewed to possess numerous advantages and benefits. Organizations in the modern world face competition and increased pressure to improve in service delivery (Dessler, Lloyd-Walker and Griffiths, 2007). As a result, the right workforce is needed to execute and fulfill the emerging business needs. Workers need exemplary skills, knowledge and experiences that will enable them to attend and address the increasing demands in the most appropriate way. As a result, training and development is vital and important in enabling AusBank to realize its objectives more efficiently (Dessler, Lloyd-Walker and Griffiths, 2007). Moreover, the modern day business environment requires leadership skills of managers who have thorough understanding of their jobs, exhibit sophisticated skills and competencies in problem solving, and are able to adapt to the ever changing and dynamic business environments with great easiness (Dessler, Lloyd-Walker, and Griffiths, 2007). With regard to career development programs at AusBank, it can be concluded that, through the job rotation programs, the new graduates coming to the bank are able to carry out assignments in various departments under guidance of senior managers. In this way, the bank has the opportunity to develop necessary techniques among the graduates that enable them to enhance their leadership and knowledge skills that are necessary for the development of the bank and realization of its objectives. On the other hand, mentoring programs in the bank provide the graduates and all those involved an opportunity for the new members to productively integrate in the bank. In this way, the graduates are able to learn various aspects, both tangible and intangible, that in turn enable them to adjust well and smoothly to the dynamics in the bank (Kormanik and Rajan, 2010). Moreover, through mentoring, the new members are able to gain confidence, are able to identify their key strengths, and are able to improve on their weaknesses. Moreover, the mentors are able to positively encourage the graduates, leading to development of strong confidence and determination for rapid career advancement. On overall, mentorship programs in the bank are meant and function to equip new members with both soft and hard skills necessary to execute key and demanding roles in the organization while remaining confident. Graduate programs, career development, and on-the-job training programs on wholesale are just essential to the bank in many ways. Through graduates programs, the bank is able to identify the right and potential trainees for the various roles and functions in the bank. Moreover, the bank is able to identify those particular unique skills and competences among the graduates, which can be exploited in enhancing realization of the bank’s needs. On-the-job training enables the bank to test the suitability of trainees in different roles and duties that they perform in different departments. This may be necessary especially when assigning the graduates new roles and duties after the training experience. Nevertheless, career development programs at the bank are likely to end up not generating the required and anticipated benefits. In this way, the programs are viewed to accrue disadvantages instead of benefits. There are numerous occasions and instances the programs may be totally ineffective in the bank. First, when there is total lack or absence of clear framework of needs analysis in the bank, the packaging and compositions of career development programs may not be based on the actual needs of the bank. In this way, the bank is likely to facilitate training and development programs that are ‘offside’ the needs requirements of the workforce. Accompanying the absence of needs assessment and analysis framework is the likelihood of lack of clear training and development plan. Any meaningful training and development initiative should be based on a clearly formulated plan that acts and functions like a ‘blue print’ for the training programs in the bank (Dessler, Lloyd-Walker, and Griffiths, 2007). As a result of having training and development plan, the bank is able to identify the most essential and necessary workforce needs, which in turn can be incorporated and integrated in the training needs. Other disadvantages of training and development programs are likely to originate when the bank does not have a formulated vision that guides career development programs, a situation that later leads to lack of clear understanding of problems facing different units and departments in the bank. As a result, it becomes impossible for the bank to envision the right training needs it can formulate and integrate through the training programs for the graduates. Moreover, other disadvantages of career development programs as initiated by AusBank include the fact that fuzziness relationships may be witnessed when the mentor and the graduate have no clearly defined roles and responsibilities, and do not have a clear guiding plan. The end results of training and mentorship of these relationships may be outside the envisioned goals of the bank. Furthermore, the programs are only likely to succeed when graduates are given opportunity to voluntarily choose the kind of mentors they perceive can be of great benefit to their training. Question Two: Improvements to make training and development programs more effective First, AusBank has to realize that it operates in an environment that is based on competition, performance, and quality delivery needs. In this way, it has to understand the overall environment it operates in, and thereafter, how well it can exploit available opportunities (Kormanik and Rajan, 2010). What is meant here is that, AusBank has to initiate and conduct business environment scanning programme that will enable the bank to identify the most pressing needs its workforce demonstrates (Kormanik and Rajan, 2010). Through environmental scanning, the company will be able to learn from its competitors, how their workforce training and development programs are packaged and implemented, as well as what has been a successful result of such programs. After the business environment scanning has taken place, AusBank should now embark on a program that aims to identify the workforce needs of the organization, which in turn will enable the organization to formulate the right and productive training and development programs. Needs assessment program has the advantage of enabling the organization to carry out human resource auditing in the bank, which in one way or the other will enable the bank to establish what exactly are the training and development needs its workforce should undergo or acquire. Strategic planning is the mother and avenue of all success in the modern world. Organizations keen on achieving their objectives and goals are much involved in designing and implementing effective strategic planning frameworks that have capacity to enable the organization achieve its goals (Kormanik and Rajan, 2010). Analyzing the case of AusBank, it is evident that designing and implementation of career development programs suffer from presence of an effective strategy-planning framework. By having human resource strategic plan, AusBank will be able to identify the most appropriate training needs that will respond to its demands in the bank, as well as be able to select the right candidates for the programs (Kormanik and Rajan, 2010). Moreover, by having human resource strategy plan in place, the bank will be in a position to identify appropriate goals and objectives that can be achieved within the available resources and ability of the bank. In other words, in developing the training and development programs for the workforce in the organization, the bank is supposed to link the training and development needs to the overall bank’s vision, strategy, objectives and goals. When there is no clear link to the overall vision of the organization, as in the case of AusBank, then the training and development programs are likely to achieve less if not ‘missed’ priorities for the organization (Kormanik and Rajan, 2010). Training and development programs are sometimes designed with no clear understanding of the market, the workforce dynamics, and overall human resource needs in an organization (Dessler, Lloyd-Walker and Griffiths, 2007). The tendency of graduate trainees to leave the bank after a short period of time indicates the existence of invisible problems with regard to priorities that the programs aim to facilitate and achieve. First, it seems the design of the programs does not put into consideration, the long-term aspirations of graduates and also does not incorporate long-terms objectives of the bank. Therefore, graduates are subjected to training and development programs without clearly establishing the future progress or the future role. Therefore, in order to achieve positive results from the programs, it is paramount for the bank to have in place, a long-term plan for the training and development needs, where the needs and requirements of graduates are adequately formulated and incorporated in the organization. Another aspect impacting negatively on AusBank training and development programs has to do with lack of organizational culture with regard to training and development of workforce. Presence of strong culture that members in the organization and those undertaking training can identify with is vital to the realization of positive results from the training programs (Dessler, Lloyd-Walker, and Griffiths, 2007). What exists in AusBank is training programs based on achieving ends for the organization but no keen attention to establish training and development programs as culture for the bank. By having in place strong culture in regard to workforce training and development, the bank will be able to create a pool of trainees that feel part and parcel of the organization and exhibit strong sense of belonging to the organization. In this way, the possibility of leaving soon becomes rare, since trainee’s loyalty, trust, and confidence tend to be high. Another aspect affecting AusBank can be linked to absence of motivating and reward strategy that the trainees can find acceptable once they are through with their training experiences and requirements. What is always important is that, as an organization, the workforce expects or aspires to be positively recognized, and if possible, rewarded appropriately after going through the training process. The process and strategy of rewarding and motivating needs to be flexible in that, it should incorporate and integrate the trainees’ needs and desires, while at same time addressing the potential and ability of the organization to execute such activities. After training, the trainees normally have a strong feeling that what has been acquired is great, and it is going to benefit the bank positively; hence, they should be rewarded appropriately. Thus, AusBank needs to develop a comprehensive training and development program plan that incorporates motivational and reward systems that satisfactorily address the needs and desires of graduate trainees. Moreover, AusBank seems to be overly inclined to training and development programs for the incoming of new trainees (employees) and disregarding the old employees in the bank. Analyzing the case of Alex, who has worked for the bank for a long time, it seems the bank has inadequate training and development programs for the old employees in the bank, a factor that has led to majority of them to become demoralized and de-motivated. Special attention in terms of training seems to be accorded to ‘outsiders’ and even competition for the available opportunities in the bank seems to favor outsiders. Thus, the old employees like Alex feel insecure, de-motivated, and discouraged, and therefore, their level of loyalty to the bank is minimal. What is needed is that, AusBank needs to design and develop comprehensive training and development plans that integrate the needs of new and old employees in ways that satisfy both groups. Question Three: evaluation of training and development strategies of AusBank Training and development programs should be evaluated continuously, and this is aimed at ensuring set objectives and goals are achieved or re-packaged to ensure end results are satisfactory (Dessler, Lloyd-Walker and Griffiths, 2007). In conducting training and development evaluation, the process should be based on clearly outlined and formulated benchmarks (Dessler, Lloyd-Walker and Griffiths, 2007) that the bank perceives to be vital in achieving. In the case of AusBank, evaluation of training and development can be conducted based on whether the set goals and objectives have been achieved, whether changes in the workforce have been realized, whether the behavior of employees have changed due to undertaking training in the programs, and whether the bank is in a position to realize and establish some level of improvement. The first way evaluation of training and development programs can be carried out involves conducting both quantitative and qualitative impact of the programs to overall realization of the organization goals. In this way, percentages can be generated with regard to the number of successful graduates and employees that have accomplished the training programs. The number of promotion realized as a result of the programs and whether the input of those promoted for the bank is productive. Moreover, the number of graduates the bank has retained can also be the basis of quantitative evaluation, together with the amount of resources that have been channeled towards the success of the programs. On the other hand, qualitative evaluation can utilize aspects such as behavior change of those who have been initiated through the programs, the modification in roles for those who have undertaken or trained through the programs. At the same, perception of those who have gone through the programs and its subsequent impact can be analyzed and evaluated, and from that be able to ascertain the influence it has on workforce roles and performance. Performance benchmarks can also be the basis upon which AusBank can conduct evaluation of its training and development programs (Dessler, Lloyd-Walker, and Griffiths, 2007). Evaluation of performance benchmarks can incorporate aspects such as the number of successful assignments the trainees are able to accomplish, the number of innovations in carrying out bank’s activities trainees are able to initiate, the number of losses the bank is likely to reverse after the training programs have been conducted and also the number of targets the trainees are able to achieve successful in any given period. Furthermore, performance benchmarks can also be based on the number of new customers the bank is able to realize after trainees have gone through the training programs, the number of increased loyal customer base, the number of new products and services initiated by the trainees and also the increased and improved financial base of the bank as a result of the training experience. Other evaluation benchmarks include the improved or increased value of the loyalty level and confidence level that those who have been trained are able to exhibit, and this can be realized through administering well-structured questionnaires. Moreover, the improved intra and interpersonal relationships among the employees can be another avenue to ascertain the value of training and development programs for bank, the reduced level of turnover, and reduced cases of violation of deadlines and targets limits can also be the basis upon which evaluation of the training and development programs for AusBank can be carried out. Conclusion There are numerous aspects and dynamisms affecting organizations in modern world. When this happens, the workforce is likely to be affected, and this in turn is likely to lead to inappropriate realization of organization goals and objectives. As a result, training and development programs are gradually evolving into powerful tools organizations can use to equip and improve their workforce. However, in analyzing AusBank training and development programs, it becomes clear that it conducts the activities in absence of clear strategic human resource management plan. This aspect is likely to lead to improper and inappropriate realization of objectives. Therefore, AusBank, as an organization that aspires to derive positive results from training and development programs, should design and initiate appropriate human resource development strategy with regard to training and development. References Dessler, G., Lloyd-Walker, B & Griffiths, J. (2007). ‘Human resource planning and business success’, In: Human resource management: Theory, skills, application. Australia: Pearson Education Australia. Kormanik, M. B & Rajan, H. C. (2010). ‘Implications for diversity in the HRD curriculum drawn from current organizational practices on addressing workforce diversity in management training’. Advances in developing human resources, Vol. 12, No. 3, pp. 367-384. Read More