ELS Assignment Success Workshop October 2017 What is Critical Analysis anyway? How can you use theoretical ideas in an essay for critical analysis?

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1 ELS Assignment Success Workshop October 2017 What is Critical Analysis anyway? How can you use theoretical ideas in an essay for critical analysis? What is a theoretical concept about? 1. Defining key terms. 2. Describing a theoretical idea. Who agrees / disagrees AND WHY? 3. Supporting a theoretical view. (Firms are reluctant to invest T&D) 4. Countering a theoretical view. (Firms should invest T&D) Why is this important? 5. Interpreting a theoretical idea or empirical study to show your understanding of its implications. How does this relate to real life? 6. Applying the theory to business situations. Where do you stand on all of that, and why? 7. Summarising one s own position in the debate. Note the number coding system in the essay extract below is used especially for this exercise. You should NOT include these number codes in your assignment. Training and development is said to be beneficial for both firms and employees. Why then, are some organizations and individuals reluctant to invest in training. Training and development may benefit both firms and employees. Employees become more competent to survive in today s increasing competition. These trained and skilled employees in turn improve the performance of firms. However, according to Keep and Rainbird (2000), most of Britain s companies invest little in training and development. So it is deserved to find the reasons Page 1 of 6

2 why UK firms are reluctant to train and develop their workforce (5 & Interpreting the essay Q). This essay will firstly explore what training and development mean in the context of HRM, and then look into the issues of why firms may have less interest in the investment of these. Training and development are two different human resources management processes. Training, as defined by Neo (2010), is the organizational planned effort to assist employees to learn competencies of a specific job (1). This kind of job-specific training manages to improve the productivity of a current work role (Warr 2002) (4). Whereas development activities indicate the longer-term process relevant to the personal growth and career planning (Laird 1985; Warr 2002) (1). The trade-off between long-term work demands and the short-termism could explain the dilemma many firms are confronted by (Bowden and Maltby, 1998) (3). Although training and development is beneficial for firms, some employers are still reluctant to act for their own benefit (Keep, 2000) (3). Indeed, there are some reasons why organizations or employers are not willing to train their workers skills. One common view is that some companies may worry about the possibility that competitors will poach their well-trained employees (Hendry 1991) (3). Therefore, firms tend to decide not to train employees but pay more emphasis on recruiting experienced and competent workers from the competitive labour market (5). However, according to the research of Rolfe et al. (1993), employees will be more likely to consider job-hopping if their firms fail to provide enough training and development activities (4). Moreover, Liberman (2013) argued that staff turnover to some extent is healthy and desirable as the mobility of labour would bring vitality and new ideas to companies (4). These have been referred to as learning organization by Slater and Narver (1995), and they argued that the production of a learning organization is the foundation for competitive advantage (4). As Page 2 of 6

3 has been demonstrated above, the worry about job-hopping should not be a suitable explanation for the training and development failure (7). In addition, Streeck (1989) cited the temptation of the present profitability as a reason for underinvestment in training and development (3). Many firms and employers prefer to cut training and development budgets to take short-term profits at the cost of their future profitability (5). Greenhalgh and Mavrotas (1993) suggested that the factors of market failure, such as imperfect information or lack of access to resources, could result in employers ignorance on the huge economic returns of training and development (3). In the situation of market failure, there may be minimal motivation for firms and employers to provide training and development (5). The common standards should be established to regulate companies training and development and the government should provide small firms with public subsidies which effectively encourage more structured training and development (Storey and Westhead, 1997) (4). Research suggest that large firms are more likely to invest in training and development compared with small firms (Brown et al 1990; West Midlands Business Survey 1995) (2). Lynch (1994) found that companies only can recover their training and development investment after a long time (2). But it is harder for small firms to survive in the modern competitive world compared with their large counterparts (Storey, 1994) (3). So, for small firms, the benefits of training and development are outweighed by the short-term benefits (5). Marshall et al. (1995) agreed that training and development cannot work effectively in some very small firms (3). Therefore, it seems rational for small firms to choose not to invest in training and development (7). In conclusion, this essay attempts to explore the reasons why some organizations and individuals are reluctant to invest in training and Page 3 of 6

4 development. Appropriate training and development can help employees to adapt to changing employment situation and enable firms to establish the competitive advantage. However, there are still various factors that hinder firms from investing in workplace training and development, such as short-termism, market failure and firm size. The employees age, the degree of education and gender are also correlation with the opportunities of training and development. In the short run, some organizations and individuals may fail to realize that training and development could successfully improve their performance. But in the future, they will find it is increasingly necessary to carry on training and development activities for employees to meet the enterprise development needs. (7) (778 words) Disclaimer Note that the References list is excluded in the handouts, to be environmental friendly. But it is important to always include that at the end of your assignments. Each citation in the essay should have a corresponding Reference with full details in the References list. Page 4 of 6

5 References Booth, A., & Snower, D. (1996). 'Introduction: does the free market produce enough skills?' in A. Booth and D. Snower (eds) Acquiring Skills, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bowden, S. & Maltby, J. (1998). 'Under-performance, short-termism and corporate governance: the City and the British Motor Corporation, ', Financial History Review, 5, Brown, C., Hamilton, J. &Medoff, J. (1990). Employers Large and Small, Cambridge, Mass, Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Greenhalgh, C.& Mavrotas, G. (1993). 'Workforce training in the Thatcher era: market forces and market failure'. International Journal of Manpower, 14, Hendry, C. (1991), 'Corporate strategy and training', in Stevens, J. and Mackay, R. (Eds) Training and Competitiveness, London: Kogan Page, Keep, E. (2000). 'Learning Organisations, Lifelong Learning and the Mystery of the Vanishing Employers', SKOPE Research Paper no 8, Coventry: SKOPE. Keep, E. & Rainbird, H. (2000). Towards the learning organisation in Personnel Management. S. Bach and K. Sisson (eds). Oxford: Blackwell. Laird, D. (1985), Approaches to Training and Development, Wiley, New York, NY. Liberman, K.(2013). 'Turnover Rising? ', Credit Union Management, 36,1, 30. Lloyd, C. (1999). 'Regulating employment: implications for skill development in the aerospace industry'. European Journal of Industrial Relations, 5, 2, Page 5 of 6

6 Lloyd, C. (2002). 'Training and development deficiencies in 'high skill' sectors'. Human Resource Management Journal, 12, 2, Lynch, L. M. (1994). 'Introduction' in Training and the Private sector: International Comparisons in L. M. Lynch (ed). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Marshall, J. N., Alderman, N., Wong, C. & Thwaites, A. (1995). 'The impact of management training and development on small and medium-sized enterprises'. International Small Business Journal, 13, Noe, R. (2010). Employee Training and Development, 5th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill. Rolfe, H., Christie, I., Lakey, J. & White, M. (1993). Developing Technical Skills in Electronics, London: PSI. Slater S. F. & Narver J. C. (1995), 'Market Orientation and the Learning Organizaiton', Journal of Marketing, 59, 3, Storey, D. J. (1994). Understanding the Small Business sector, London: Routledge. Storey, D.J. and Westhead, P. (1997). 'Management training in small firms - a case of market failure? ' Human Resource Management Journal, 7, 2, Streeck, W. (1989). 'Skills and the limits of neo-liberalism: the enterprise of the future as a place of learn-ting'. Work, Employment and Society, 3, 1, Warr, P. (Ed.) (2002), Psychology at Work, London: Penguin Books. 'West Midlands Business Survey' (1995). West Midlands Business Survey, Birmingham: Price Waterhouse. Page 6 of 6