Designing a training program which delivers results quickly!

A well‐designed and executed training program minimizes new employee “on‐boarding” time and time‐to‐first‐contribution. This paper presents considerations for the design of a two‐phase training program for new employees – an initial program (addressing training requirements of a general group), and a detailed program (requiring skill mastery by individual functional area). A process involving frequent employee‐leader reviews and employing the skills of peer coaches and mentors is proposed. The effectiveness of the training program can be more accurately assessed via a leadership team review of expected versus actual progress against the training program objectives. After initial cycles of this process at Solutia Inc., learnings and next steps have been identified.