Benefits of employee education reimbursement programs
Highly trained employees who are interested in bettering themselves can be an incredible asset in the workplace. This is one of the reasons that so many companies, large and small, actively support their employees’ decisions to go back to school. Continuing education can be a win-win proposition for individual employees and their employers alike. Many employers are so committed to their employees’ professional development that they offer full or partial employee education reimbursement programs for various types of training.
Benefits of Employee Education
Investing in advanced education for employees benefits employers in several ways:
Highly Skilled Employees
There are intrinsic benefits associated with having well-educated and highly trained employees. Assuming that your employees are pursuing training that is related to their job, your industry, or general professional development, the company will be better off as a result of their advanced studies. Educated employees are likely to bring new ideas and increased creativity into the workplace, which can have a positive impact on many different aspects of any business.
In some fields, such as Information Technology, ongoing certification-oriented education is a necessity. IT employees have to engage in constant professional development to keep pace with new technologies and applications. They often become technology innovators within the organisation and can serve as internal trainers, bringing other employees up to speed as end-users of technology.
Even in fields where advanced training isn’t mandatory, it can certainly have a positive impact on the workplace. Whether employees are seeking advanced degrees, professional certifications, or attending single-subject courses, employers can benefit when employees complete additional education.
Keeping Up with Technology
The workplace is changing at a rapid pace and organisations that hope to keep up with the changes that are yet to come are well served by making sure their workforce is ready. Employees must continually strive to develop new skills to keep up with the evolving business world.
Identify the gaps between the skills of your workforce today and the skills that will be required to maintain a competitive advantage in the future. The more technology impacts the workplace, the greater the skill gap between what current employees know and what they are going to need to know. When employees choose to pursue advanced training, they play a role in bridging that gap.
For example, with the growth of healthcare informatics, clinical medical personnel, who once had a very limited need for computer skills, are now required to master complex data entry, electronic recordkeeping, and insurance claims processing systems. Healthcare providers are well-served to encourage their clinical personnel to pursue education related to computer technology and medical billing and coding.
Those employees who choose to pursue advanced field-related training can apply their new knowledge in the workplace and help other employees adapt to new job requirements. The end result is that employees become catalysts in helping their employers meet the needs of their long-term staffing needs.
Impact on Retention and Satisfaction
Employers who invest in employee professional development also tend to reap rewards when it comes to employee retention and job satisfaction. Organisations that encourage their employees to pursue advanced education and training are viewed as being caring and supportive. In such an environment, employees are more likely to stay for the long haul and to have positive attitudes toward their jobs and their companies.
Bottom Line Impact
Employee continuing education can have a direct, beneficial impact on the bottom line of any business or organisation in several ways. For example, employees who have a high degree of job satisfaction and who feel loyalty toward their employers are likely to exhibit a high degree of productivity, which can contribute to improved financial performance for the organisation.
Additionally, the fact that investing in employee education can improve employee retention and job satisfaction also means that it can reduce turnover costs. Turnover is expensive, so keeping good employees who might otherwise have left can have an immediate positive impact on the bottom line.
Further, employees who complete certain types of training might also learn valuable techniques for improving efficiency and streamlining operations, which can help employers reduce expenses.
Identification of Tomorrow’s Leaders
Employees who actively seek continuing education tend to be career and advancement-oriented. Those who are interested in bettering themselves through education, and who take active steps toward doing so, are often excellent candidates for promotion opportunities.
Investing in employee training can be an important investment in an organisation’s long-term staffing plan.
This is more important than ever in the 21st century, as the baby boomer population advances toward retirement age. Making sure that current employees with leadership potential are trained and ready to step in to higher level jobs is an important component of succession planning.
Potential Drawbacks of Employee Education
Employers who are hesitant to invest in employee education are often concerned that employees will leave and seek employment with a competitor as soon as they complete their advanced degrees or certifications. While this is always a possibility, employers who treat their employees well and have a solid plan for retention aren’t likely to experience significant issues in this area.
It’s important to consider the implications of not supporting employee training. A company that doesn’t provide educational opportunities is likely to have much more of a retention problem than one that does support its employees growth and development wishes. In the absence of training opportunities, turnover may occur even faster because employees may perceive the company as uncaring and with little commitment to them.
Employee Education Considerations
Employees who chose to continue leaning and growing throughout their careers can be valuable assets. Employers are well served to remember just how valuable their employees really are. George Wright, owner of WrightOne Consulting says, “Your employees are the only asset you have that walks out the door every night. And they don’t have to come back the next day.”
Sources:
adulted.about.com
back2college.com