Brilliant Checklists for Entrepreneurs, 3rd Edition

Be motivating: get the best from yourself and others 183

10 training opportunities most

overlooked

Training and personal development can make a tremendous difference to

the way people perform in their jobs. Don’t forget that this also applies to

you as the boss. However, if you thought that training had to involve spend-

ing lots of money, think again. Here are ten low cost options.

1 Share – if you’re a small business, club together with others to organise training ses-

sions. It will cost less and be more convenient than buying places on open courses.

2 Ask suppliers – they gain if you become more proficient. See if they have spare

places on in-house training programmes that your people can attend.

3

Teach each other – the best training happens in the workplace with your own experts

helping others catch up. Because this can happen spontaneously it’s often overlooked.

4 Work experience – supervising students who visit you to gain work experience will

develop the supervisory skills of those who do not usually manage people.

5 Become a school governor – becoming a school governor provides excellent free

management training. It makes people more objective in their own work.

6 Become a charity trustee – becoming a trustee enables people to develop their par-

ticular skill (for example, finance, HR or marketing) in a different context.

7 Become a non-exec director – if you work in the voluntary sector, why not become

a non-executive director of a ‘for profit’ enterprise? Bring social awareness and learn

about profitability.

8 Grants – there are many organisations able to give you training grants or provide

free training. Look at local economic development websites.

9 Read books – some people find it easy to learn from books. Set up a company

library – include training software and reward people who take items home to

develop their skills.

10 Online – the internet is packed with learning opportunities. There are online training

courses and web seminars you can attend virtually, and more.

To work out your organisation’s training needs, it’s important to compare the

skills you have with those your mission requires. Different organisations have

different needs.

184 brilliant checklists for entrepreneurs

To map out the skills in your team, you need to build a simple matrix

with ‘skills’ on one axis and your team members on the other (see below).

Compare this with your operational needs and you begin to see where there

are gaps. Aim not to be reliant on any one person for a particular skill.

Word Excel Sales French German Spanish

Judith

  

Michael

  

Tom

 

Ruth

   

It is also useful to assess the level of ability in each area. This enables you to

encourage the experts to spend time developing the abilities of those who

are less skilled.

Try also to identify skills within your team that are not currently needed by

the organisation. They may become useful in the future.

brilliant

recap

There are many training opportunities for you and your team. Unless you point

out that they have training value, people will not see them as training.