Question

Hi HR Professionals,

My management wants to set some training criteria for employees who request to attend non-work related training like language courses.

Could you please share with me if your company allows employees to attend language course? Are there any conditions they need to fulfill?

Lee Ling

Reply 1

If it is not work related, individual could use their skill future funding for such course.

Dan

Reply 2

The default way for most companies is to not support any non-work related training. But another way to see it is to make the employee feel - "if the company is interested in my personal growth, its a good company and I'm more willing to stay and work harder for the company." Companies spend money on employee benefits, dinner and dance, family day, recreational activities etc... that are technically not work related too, i.e.they do not need these benefits to do their work. But providing good benefits and environment gets the employees more committed to the company. So similarly, non-work related training can be use to enrich the employee, and make him/her feel good about the company and thus become more committed to the company. .

So I think rather than having criteria for approving non-work related training, the company can do some components of the following:

1. If the company has a fixed budget, allow say up to 30-40% to be used for non-work-related training.

2. For the more progressive companies, consider allowing employees to use any proportion of the budget for non-work related training, but emphasize that they should responsibly lean towards prioritizing work-related training.

3. Impose a co-share for non-work related training. But make the employee share small - less than 25%.

TayCH