The Prism View Technique: A CIO’s Framework for Designing Successful Organizational Training Programs [Cutter]

Most CIO see training need of the organization at a very macro level, a unit under the training  department ; a set of common goals in the annual appraisal form of the employees, and so on. This traditional ‘push strategy’ of training , where HR designs and pushes the training needs to the employees based on some broad understanding of the organization training  requirements, needs to be replaced, in this current era of knowledge economy,  with a forward looking ‘pull strategy’ where employees will help design the training program ecosystem and evolve along with it, with the HR and higher management providing only the necessary guidance and resources.

To achieve this  CIO’s needs to have a deep understanding of the roles, responsibilities, expectations and aspirations  of the various stakeholders and entities that are part of the training landscape of the organization. One of the techniques that will help CIO to build this understanding and design a successful long term training programme is to visualize the training programme through the view of a prism. When white light passes through a prism it scatters into different colors ; each color having its own identity , characteristic and place. Some colors are bright , while others look dull based on their inherent characteristic, the property of the Prism  and the surface the light is projected on.

Imagine the current training programme as the white light. Now scatter it through the view of a prism , what do you see? May be the top most color  violet is the training department, Indigo the employees, Blue the competitor environment, Green the system requirement for training. Just jolt down what ever entity that comes on top of your mind in that order. Now that you have got a complete list of all the entities time to introspect about each in detail just like each color has its individual position, identity and characteristics. What is the input , output and expectation from each entity. Are they in sync , is the top expectation from training department and a employee in sync , if not is this a gap that needs to be bridged? Do you think that your training department is not strong as compared to the training system you have procured? Imagine the color violet as little weak and green a bit strong  in your view.

The prism is the meta model of current strategy of your organization and the surface on which the scattered light is projected is the current organizational landscape.

Published in: Cutter International IT Journal

Read Full Article: Cutter IT Journal