Training and Development in a Requisite Organisation

Developing staff members at all levels of an organisation is imperative to optimise employee engagement through the usage of the training and development tool. Recently my colleagues and I had an off site to discuss change, communication and how to increase motivation within the workforce. Don’t get me wrong, our results are stellar, achieving +50% increase in sales in all channels in the past 3 years. However, we lack trust among the management team and this had lead to a silo mentality within the department.

This off site revealed that staff engagement was lower than what management expected and that a number of action items would be explored including communication sessions, training and input into decision making.

This lead me to think about learning and development and some of the changes that will occur in my area over the next few months and how a higher view of requisite organisation and the training and development tool could assist me in optimising employee engagement within the Sales and Marketing department.

Requisite Organisation is a set of management principals based on research done in 15 countries over a period of 55 years. Dr Elliot Jaques, the originator of Requisite Organisation, defined “requisite” as “required by the natural order of things.” In the Requisite Organisation, managers make decisions on the basis of research-proven principals that enable employees to work effectively toward a common goal based on common values, standards and procedures.

Within this framework employees are empowered to contribute the creativity, skills and knowledge needed to sustain the innovation that gives the company the edge. Learning and development is an important Requisite tool as it enables engagement.

According to Jaques and Clement there are three sources of training need. The first is basic training in products, services and processes to be efficient and effective. The second source of training flows from analysing problem areas, especially skill deficiencies. The final source is related to people development and planning for the firm’s talent pool.

If an organisation wants to optimise employee engagement at all levels then there needs to be a focus on training and developing staff. There are two elements to this.

1. Providing product, service and process training to the front line staff

2. Organisational development to help develop capability within the talent pool

Novus International (animal health and nutrition program firm from the USA) has adopted Requisite principals and has developed a learning system to support the organisation in moving forward:

• Induction Training - Provides all employees with knowledge about the company
• Departmental Training - Provides fundamental knowledge about product, services and processes to enable effectiveness
• Professional Development - Assisting individuals to develop additional skills and new knowledge to support their career growth
• Manager Training - Help managers to learn how to effectively lead their people in support of the companies long-term strategy

When this is compared to how training will be delivered in the future within the organisation induction, professional development and manager training is the role of the Strategic HR Development Manager. This enables the brand of the training (the delivery style and the underlying concepts) to be delivered in a consistent manner. This should reside within the Strategic HR Department of any organisation.

The Departmental Training resides within the relevant department with a dotted line to the SHRM team to ensure delivery consistency within the leadership framework. By being embedded within the department, next to the people selling the products and services and close to the system owners ensures that the training is timely and constant. In these Level 1 roles it is imperative that constant coaching and training is completed in order to adapt nimbly to changing market conditions. With being embedded in the team the trainer becomes aligned to the results and has direct participation into the outcomes achieved as a result of this training.

Novus, by developing these categories of training and development, has seen a growth in the sales results of the organisation. Standardised protocols combined with a nimble training philosophy have ensured that Novus can bring in new products and services quickly in reaction to market needs.

This training system has also developed a side benefit of helping to develop their future managers. It is expected that the next generation of sales managers will be promoted from within, therefore linking the growth of the company with the professional growth of the staff. By being requisite and having invested in training tools and delivery programs has lead to a sales growth combined with a higher staff retention rate and the over growth of the organisations capability and success.

This knowledge of requisite training and development can enable a manager to create a training structure that can deliver the outcomes experienced by Novus.

For me this will help me to develop the right structure, understand that my boundaries are within the Departmental Training quadrant and to work closely with the SHRM team to input into the SHRD quadrants.

The example at Novus International has shown that if done ‘requisite’ that a strong training and development program can increase staff motivation and engagement. This is now my challenge!