Published Dec-18-2008
The Employment Department periodically asks employers for their views on a variety of workforce related topics such as their ability to find skilled applicants, the benefits they offer their workers, and the types of training they provide to their workers.
The 2008 Oregon Employer Survey covered three employment themes that are related to the career span of a typical worker: recruitment, retention, and retirement. Of course, employer involvement in training can occur at any stage of a worker's career. The first step after a worker is hired is new employee training, which is usually required to bring workers up to speed on industry or organization specific skills. Workers who stick with one employer long enough are usually retrained at some point to help them adapt to new technologies or business models. Some workers who are eligible to retire may decide to stick around a while longer or embark on a new career path. For those workers, employers are sometimes willing to provide training to help them work past traditional retirement age.
To get an employer's perspective on workforce training, we asked employers in all industries around the state about the training they provided to their employees during the 12 months prior to the survey. Employers who decided not to provide training were asked about the factors that contributed to that decision and the types of training they would take advantage of, if available locally at a reasonable cost. We also asked employers if they were preparing for the aging of the workforce by providing training for workers who want to work past the traditional retirement age.
In the 12 months prior to the survey, just over half of Oregon employers sent their managerial workers to professional seminars or workshops, the most common way to train managers. One-half of employers also used other workers from the organization to provide training to managers. Training by co-workers was the most common form of training for non-managers last year, with 67 percent of employers providing this sort of training. Employers were less likely to send non-management workers to seminars or workshops – 41 percent of employers did so last year.
Training by suppliers about products or services used by the employer was the next most common way to train, followed closely by independent study using company-provided manuals, videos, and training materials. Employers provided these forms of training about equally to both managers and non-managers.
Distance learning is increasing in popularity as a way to provide training to workers. Nearly one in four employers provided training to managers last year using distance learning of some sort (such as correspondence courses, video conferencing, or Webinars) and almost one in five used distance learning to train non-management workers. The percent of employers reporting the use of distance learning as a training tool in 2008 increased compared with results found by Oregon employer surveys conducted earlier in the decade.
Private career schools were used by 15 percent of employers to train both managers and non-management workers last year. Employers provided management and non-management workers with training at community colleges at about the same rate last year (10% for managers and 11% for non-managers). Five percent of employers even sent their managers to attend a course at a university, and 4 percent sent non-managers. Eleven percent of employers said that they trained non-management workers through a formal apprenticeship program last year, and 5 percent used such programs to train managers.
The most common reason was because their current group of workers already had the training and experience needed to get the job done. This reason was given by 29 percent of employers who did not provide training last year. These employers are able to focus their attention on other issues until they need to hire new workers, or until technology or business practices change to the point their workers need additional training.
Another reason for not providing training was that some employers felt training did not provide any measurable benefit to the organization. Seventeen percent of employers gave that reason for not providing training to their workers. These employers are perhaps willing to provide worker training, but apparently the type of business they work in does not benefit from the sort of training available. This response was most common among employers in the natural resources and mining, and leisure and hospitality industries. With 30 percent of employers listing the lack of measurable benefit, it was the number one reason for not training cited by employers in the natural resources and mining industry. Thirty percent of employers in the leisure and hospitality industry also cited the lack of measurable benefits, but the cost of training and high worker turnover were more often listed by employers in those industries.
Training costs and employee turnover rates are important factors that employers consider when deciding to train or not to train. Almost one in four employers who did not train last year said that the high cost of training contributed to their decision. Employee turnover rates were not too high to justify training for most employers – only 12 percent cited turnover as a reason for not training. It must be a bigger issue for employers in the leisure and hospitality industry, however, because 31 percent of those employers listed high turnover as a reason for not training.
Other employers wanted to provide training to their workers last year but were unable to do so. Seventeen percent said that there was not enough time available to train their workers. Eight percent of employers felt that trainers were not available in their communities, and the lack of qualified staff on hand to perform the training was a reason for 7 percent of employers.
For the most part, employers responded to each reason for not providing training at about the same rate no matter what area of the state they operated in. However, the rate at which employers listed that a lack of training providers was a factor, did vary significantly by region. In general, employers in mostly rural regions were more likely to say that they did not provide training to their workers last year because they felt that outside training providers were not available in their communities.
Figure 1 shows the workforce region boundaries and each region's percent of employers that said "training providers are not available in my community." Only 4 percent of employers in the Portland area (Clackamas, Multnomah, and Washington counties) said that trainers were not available there, but 28 percent of employers in the northwest corner of the state (Baker, Union, and Wallowa counties) said that training providers were not available in their community.
We asked employers what sort of training they would likely provide to their employees if it were available locally at a reasonable cost. Their responses are shown in Graph 3.
One-half of employers would likely (or very likely or definitely) use workplace or occupational safety training if it were available locally at a reasonable cost. The next highest demand was for supervisory, managerial, and leadership training, which 48 percent of employers would likely use.
Just over 40 percent of employers would likely (or very likely or definitely) use teamwork and interpersonal training, basic computer skills training, or problem solving and critical thinking skills training.
One step that employers can take to prepare for the aging of the workforce is to help accommodate workers who wish to work past the traditional retirement age. Providing training to upgrade the skills and knowledge of retirement age workers is one way that employers can do this. Of those that have taken steps to prepare, 35 percent said that they do provide training to accommodate workers who are not ready to retire.