Innovative tools for training experts on the road

Trainings and the enhancement of transversal skills have assumed a strategic role for employees and freelancers. In fact, in order to compete with organizations, there is the need to improve the level of general and individual knowledge of their collaborators. On the one side there is a growing offer of initiatives and activities aimed at stimulating learning and strengthening transversal skills. On the other side, the time that each person devote to a training is always poor, with tangible results and compatible with professional and personal needs. In particular, business professionals travel often and have the opportunity to devote themselves to training in their spare time and when they are in places and circumstances that are very different from the traditional classroom. The need therefore arises to enhance the quality of the offer in the training sector, identifying or developing innovative solutions and strategies that make more effective the learning of employees in the business sector, while responding to their professional and personal needs.

Description

Training events and transversal skills for business sector, managers of organizations already established on the market, start-up representatives or freelancers performing their business, are gradually acquiring a central role in company strategies. Once it was possible to keep separate the training time, the school, from employee work or freelance, as if they were two different moments of life, today this is no more possible. Employees or freelancer activities are getting more continuous because organizations need to improve the level of general and individual competence of their collaborators to compete. These objectives are now easily pursued thanks to a growing offer of initiatives and activities aimed at stimulating learning and strengthening transversal skills.
However it is less the time that each person can devote, with tangible results, to a training compatible with professional and personal needs. Experts, because they are always on travel, learn in places and circumstances that are different from the spaces where training is traditionally carried out. The need therefore arises to enhance the quality of the offer in the training sector, identifying or developing innovative solutions and strategies that make the training of employees in the business sector more effective, while responding to their professional and personal needs.

Target

Improving professional and managerial skills is a priority for companies in order to develop human capital, consolidate and generate new competitive advantages based on know-how and international openness. The need of change management is increasingly affecting the ability of training to act as a business lever. In this context, there are frequent integrated projects where are cooperating business managers, HR managers, training managers, management schools and consulting companies. The latest surveys and industry operators show that managerial training is recovering.
A recent survey conducted by the Manageritalia Observatory, shows that among 770 managers the most significant skills are the management, development and evaluation of people and the ability to manage costs and budgets. Based on results of interviews, a special attention deserves leadership, negotiation and strategy vision. In general, the need for a new approach to marketing, negotiation, persuasion and leadership strategies emerges which look to the most innovative and effective techniques for acquiring new customers and promoting products.



Innovation

The innovation in learning methods is necessary above all for business experts who have little time available to devote to training and strengthening transversal skills. Experts, are always on travel, learn in places and circumstances that are very different from the spaces where training is traditionally carried out. To meet this challenge, the innovation should pass through products, processes, services, allow to learn more effectively and at the same time respond to the professional, personal needs and rhythms of the customer segment. Innovative mentoring and learning contents and strategies could be developed to be included in the supports that appear to be more functional to the client's needs, such as paper texts, video book summaries, smart phone apps, software, video courses, audio courses and podcasts.