Organisational change and the management of training in Australian enterprises

Abstract

This article presents the findings from a study of the impact of the introduction of new management practices on the organisation of training in Australian enterprises. The study investigated the impact of five common new management practices: teamworking, total quality management, lean production, business process re-engineering and the learning organisation, as well as a number of other organisational factors. The incidences of these practices were modelled against eight measures of the organisation of training in enterprises. The results confirm that organisational change, as represented by the five new management practices, has had a significant impact on the organisation of training. However, the most significant impact on the way training is organised appears to be on the extent to which training and human resource policy are integrated with business strategy.

Modelling the reasons for the use of vocational training in Australian enterprises

“…Key papers analysing the determinants of enterprise training include: Smith et al. ; Boheim and Booth ; O'Connell and Byrne and Neirott and Pailucci . Dependent variables analysed typically relate to the expenditure level on training, types of training conducted (formal vs informal), percentage of employees who receive training and training duration.…”

“…Most of this existing literature (for example, Neirott and Pailucci ; O'Connell and Byrne ; and Smith et al. ) has developed empirical models which infer the determinants of organizational training from measures of training activity and their expected determinants. For example, variables measuring the use of management practices (such as lean production), the degree of unionization and the use of (and expenditure on) certain training types are employed to assess the determinants of training choices from survey data.…”

Why do firms train? Empirical evidence on the relationship between training and technological and organizational change

“…Companies may also restrict training on only few job profiles because of the complexity in assessing the returns of training (Berge, ; Guerci et al ., ) or because of the preference towards ‘grafting’ competencies from outside when programmes of developing competencies and human capital internally may be particularly long and risky (Kor & Leblebici, ; Sirmon et al ., ). Drawing on studies that analyse the nature of ‘modern’ managerial practices (Osman‐Gani & Jacobs, ; Smith et al ., , ), a plausible explanation for the limited propensity of many firms to invest in training may also lie in the preference for decentralized and informal training when these firms use certain practices (e.g. total quality management) or implement some organizational changes such as ‘lean enterprise’ principles.…”

Training in Portuguese non‐profit organizations: the quest towards professionalization

“…Those with a training policy, established performance objectives and quality certification also secured more in‐house training hours, confirming expectations from previous research regarding professionalization (e.g. Hwang & Powell, ; Smith et al ., ).…”