Despite the economic downturn, small businesses are still investing in staff training. Research by the CIPD has revealed that those companies that continue to invest in training when conditions are difficult are more likely to survive than those that don't and staff are more likely to remain at a firm that invests in their development.

While all firms should use a form of staff training what are the most effective methods? The 6 Cs of SME learning:
  • Communicate
  • Calibrate
  • Cascade
  • Collaborate
  • Chunk
  • Coaching
Communicate
People need to know that learning can deliver both for them and the business. Sometimes the business benefits of learning and development is not communicated, resulting in it being perceived as a chore or an obligation. Learning and development activity can be expensive in both resources and time, so it is essential to communicate and captivate the interest of people in learning and development.

Calibrate
There are many effective methods for delivering learning and development.People used to assume that learning and development meant delivery in a classroom, but there is a diversity of provision. However, whatever the method, it has to be relevant to the business. In effect, these learning and development interventions need to be calibrated with the needs of the organisation. For example, detailed technical and ‘compliance' knowledge, which requires recall and familiarity such as health and safety, product knowledge for sales people and hygiene regulations can all be taught well in classrooms initially. Unfortunately, competence can't be proved in a classroom. The key is to calibrate the learning so that it is adjusted to the business need, so that the firm gets the full value.
The average attention span before we start to wander is around ten to fifteen minutes, after which we need stimulation

Chunk
There is some debate in psychology and neuroscience over people's optimum attention time-span. However, we do know that people switch off and ‘zone out' periodically. This is something that every business leader tempted to assault people with a 90-slide PowerPoint presentation should bear in mind. The average attention span before we start to wander is around ten to fifteen minutes, after which we need stimulation. It thus follows that, especially in our world of hyper-stimulation, we need to break things down into chunks of information in order to absorb them.

Cascade
One way of maximising the deep learning which can take place in a classroom setting is to use those who undergo classroom training - for instance in customer service or a specialist technical skill to ‘cascade' their knowledge throughout the rest of the organisation. This works especially well with small businesses employing between ten and 50 people, where the cascade can rapidly reach colleagues. It's a cost effective and scalable method of ensuring that the people who learn help others to learn. Anyone who has helped children with homework knows that teaching others can be a very effective way of reinforcing your own learning.

Collaborate
Another way for people to work and learn effectively is in learning groups and teams. Teams can be set up to solve a problem using a technique known as an Action Learning Set (ALS). For example, a group of employees can be set up into an ALS and encouraged to meet a certain number of times in a specific time period. At each meeting they have a set task but decide among themselves how to achieve it using teamwork and previous learning. This is a very effective method of learning, although it does sometimes require facilitation. The value is to effectively pool people's expertise and use that expertise to solve a problem or generate a solution. This method is often used effectively for leadership development in small businesses.

Coach
Coaching is quite often the best way of ensuring that people link learning properly to their jobs. So if a small bespoke engineering business sends someone on an expensive quality management programme, a mentor might ask them something like, "How have you used the learning obtained, and how can this be applied more widely?" They can also then become mentors to others in the business.

For more information please visit www.cipd.co.uk/default.cipd