The Training Ripple Effect

By Madelyn Yucht

What if I told you that you could not only motivate your employees but also improve your relationships with your customers just by implementing an employee training program? Not that simple you say? Well, let me ask you this: When was the last time your team got together for training? Has it been a year? Possibly longer?

A recent case study published in Chief Learning Officer discusses a customized employee training program that Linkage created for FMC Technologies. One of their regions experienced rapid growth, which was obviously good news, but it led to some customer satisfaction issues. The employees were simply not prepared to adapt to the changes taking place. The goal of the Strategic Customer Management program was to better equip employees to handle the growth and turn their sagging customer satisfaction numbers around. And that’s exactly what it did. The program had such tremendous results in terms of customer satisfaction that FMC Technologies is now rolling out the program company-wide with over 1,000 associates enrolled.

Are you surprised that training could have such an impact? All employees, especially those who are customer-facing, can benefit from learning how to be strategic thinkers with improved problem-solving skills. Also improving communication and the ability to anticipate the needs of customers has a huge impact on the quality of your employees’ relationships with customers – whether those customers are internal or external.

Participating in team training is an important part of your employees’ individual development plans. It helps reinforce that they are important to the organization while providing the support and leadership that employees need in order to excel.

Does your company offer regular training programs? What types of programs have been the most successful? Are there unexpected areas of the organization that have been positively impacted by the training?