Vision
for Training and Development in India
Y N Kaushal
Potential for Training
•
India’s
Population is above 125 crore.
•
If we restrict
ourselves to working people, the number is about 50 crore. (Govt. of India
figures)
•
In organized
sector, in well performing and forward looking companies and organizations,
every person is now getting training of one week every year. This includes
Central Government. (One week is interpreted differently from 5 days
to 7 days.)
•
In medium and
small companies, NGOs and state government the intensity of training is poor.
•
In unorganized
sector, it is non-existent.
•
Unorganized
sector is large. 6% working people are employed, 94% are self-employed,
semi-employed or unemployed. This composition is not likely to change much over
coming decade.
Our Vision
•
We believe that
we need to achieve seven days’ training for every person every year. This
includes unorganized sector and farm sector as well.
•
This means 50x7
crore participant days of training every year.
•
If each training
group has 25 participants, this means 14 crore training days.
•
One trainer can
normally provide 140 days training in a year.
•
Hence we need 10
lakh direct trainers in India who can provide classroom training.
•
We also need to
make master craftsmen as on-the-job trainers and coaches. My guess is that this
number would be 20 lakh persons.
•
The task in front
of the sector skill council is to develop training skills amongst these 30 lakh
trainers and coaches over say next 10 years and assess them and certify.
Challenges in
achieving T&D Vision and suggested directions
- Availability of Trainers: Good quality trainers
are in short supply. While
everyone who can make a presentation, believes that he/she is a good
trainer, this is indicative of poor understanding of the role of a
trainer.
- Result Oriented Training (Quality): Quality of
Training needs large improvement. Large part of training is seen as
imparting knowledge. Focus of training has to be competency improvement
and consequently performance improvement. More trainers have to be trained
to use experiential learning methods.
- Making Training affordable: High quality training
is costly as it is in short supply. Low cost training suffers from poor
quality. To popularize training, we need to make high quality training
available at affordable cost.
- Legislative measures: Training is antidote to
obsolescence. Regular and relevant training keeps a person employable and creator
of economic value. Hence, we need to have an Act of Parliament making regular
training mandatory for every employed person as Provident Fund is
mandatory for every employee.
- Fiscal Measures: To encourage expenditure on
training, every employer should be allowed to deduct 1.5 times of the
expenditure on training. Every self-employed person should likewise be
allowed to deduct 2 times the expenditure on training for self and
associates.
- Content development: There is need for
development of model content for training programmes. Course packs,
exercises and videos need to be developed in various Indian Languages.
- Creating Training and Personal Development
Culture in society. Creating an eco-system in the country that all
components of T&D grow well.
Revised version published on 6 September 2016.
