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How Leadership Training Shapes Future Managers
Why Most Workplace Training Programs Are Missing the Point: A Wake-Up Call from the Trenches
The training industry has become preoccupied with buzzwords and ignored about actual humans.
Having worked in learning and development for the better part of two decades, and honestly? Half the stuff we're promoting these days would make my old supervisor laugh himself sick. In the old days, you learned by working alongside someone who actually knew what they were doing. Unstructured, sure. But it worked.
Now we've got Learning Management Systems that cost more than my first car and engagement surveys that monitor everything except whether people actually know what they're doing. It's insane.
What the industry won't tell you is that most training programs are created for administrators, not learners. Just recently I watched a company spend four hours teaching people to use software that any teenager could figure out in ten minutes. Everyone was talking about seamless integration while people battled with basic functions.
The Issues Everyone Pretends Don't Exist
Companies are pouring cash into learning programs without thinking about outcomes. According to some report I read lately, companies spend around $350 billion globally on learning and development. That's a huge number. Yet studies show people forget most of what they're taught within days.
I was working with a mining company in Perth last year. Incredible workplace, the kind of safety culture every industry should aspire to. The formal training requirements were a complete waste of time. Online courses that people completed while doing other work. Actual knowledge transfer occurred in casual conversations.
That's when it hit me. We're teaching people how to pass tests, not how to do jobs.
The manufacturing sector gets this better than most. I've worked with several facilities around Geelong where apprentices learn by doing actual work, not sitting in classrooms pretending to care about theoretical frameworks. The magic happens when knowledge gets passed down through hands-on experience.
But try explaining that to a corporate training manager who needs to defend their LMS investment.
Simple Solutions We Keep Overlooking
Mentorship beats classroom sessions hands down. I've seen it happen constantly across different industries. Match knowledge holders with motivated learners and the results are remarkable.
The big banks like Westpac have figured out peer learning in their retail operations. Basic concept: pair veterans with rookies on real work challenges. The results speak for themselves: better retention, faster skill development, higher job satisfaction. Simple stuff that works.
Still, businesses carry on with presentation style learning that achieves nothing. Why? It's simpler to track and report. Administrators love the data : attendance records, certificates, completion rates.
While experienced workers leave without sharing their expertise because we haven't created systems for knowledge transfer.
Got this completely wrong in my early days. Assumed I could build one size fits all programs. Wasted countless hours building supposedly perfect welcome modules. Fancy graphics, participation exercises, embarrassing pretend scenarios.
Total disaster.
Turns out people learn uniquely, need different things, and respond to different approaches. Who would've thought?
The Emotional Intelligence Craze
Don't get me started on emotional intelligence training. Half the training requests now include emotional intelligence parts. Somehow people think you develop empathy through digital modules.
Don't get me wrong, EQ matters. Obviously it matters. But the way we're approaching it in corporate training is completely off. You develop emotional intelligence through experience, feedback, and genuine human interaction. Not through digital quizzes that label your behaviour patterns.
Saw an organisation waste big cash on feelings workshops. Expensive consultant, flash location, extensive materials that gathered dust. Six months later, their employee engagement scores were exactly the same. Turnover actually increased.
Want to know what might have worked? Training supervisors to genuinely connect with staff. How to listen without planning their response. How to be honest about their knowledge gaps.
But that's harder to package into a neat training module.
The Tech Industry's Learning Lies
The ed tech industry keeps promising that AI and machine learning will transform workplace training. Individual learning journeys, responsive materials, targeted knowledge delivered instantly. Sounds amazing in theory.
Fact: the technology fixes non problems and creates new ones.
I watched a company install a "smart" learning platform that was supposed to identify skill gaps and recommend relevant training. Expensive exercise that consumed months of effort. The system recommended basic computer skills to experts while ignoring critical service deficiencies.
While this was happening, successful teams held impromptu training during meal breaks. No technology required.
The real innovation in workplace learning isn't coming from Silicon Valley startups. Innovation comes from businesses that build environments where knowledge sharing happens naturally.
What I'm Seeing That Actually Works
Certain businesses understand effective learning, thank goodness.
Bunnings runs brilliant product education programs. Rather than classroom courses, vendors deliver practical workshops to employees. Physical items, honest questions, practical issues. Employees develop skills to serve clients better, not to satisfy bureaucratic requirements.
Trade training that blends theory with practical mentorship beats academic only approaches. TAFE courses that partner with industry employers create pathways that actually lead somewhere.
It's consistent: training linked to actual jobs, mentored by experienced workers, with direct practice opportunities.
Yet somehow we keep defaulting to classroom style delivery because it's familiar and measurable.
What Nobody Wants to Hear About Training Satisfaction
Training providers won't like this: happy participants don't necessarily learn anything. Facilitated workshops that people loved but that changed nothing about their work performance. Conversely, run training that participants hated initially but that genuinely improved their capabilities.
The best learning often feels uncomfortable because it challenges existing assumptions and requires people to change established habits. Yet difficult learning experiences get negative reviews, causing us to drop them.
Development programs prioritise positive feedback over meaningful behaviour change. Similar to evaluating fitness centres on entertainment value rather than health improvements.
The Way Forward
No magic bullets exist for these challenges. Truth is, the entire industry is struggling with this. Workplace training emphasises processes and measurements rather than its core purpose: building useful capabilities.
Perhaps the solution isn't improved courses. Possibly it's designing environments where skill development occurs organically through job structure and human connections.
Maybe we need fewer formal training modules and more opportunities for people to learn from each other whilst doing actual work that matters.
It might be that effective development requires less control over the learning journey and more faith in people's natural ability to gain skills with suitable assistance.
Could be I'm just ageing and romanticising an era when development involved shadowing competent people and incrementally building expertise.
Regardless, current approaches fail the majority of learners in most situations. And pretending otherwise won't fix it.
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