Simpson Plastering Focuses on Educating Employees

Corporate spending on training has dropped 21 percent from 2007 to 2010. The training budgets have risen about 2 percent by late 2010. With this drop, a challenge remains of how to maintain effective employee education in the struggling economic times. Cloud computing provides easy access to networks, services and software. This is a great alternative to the previous on-site meetings where travel was required and specialist and facilitators had to be hired. The school now uses online training tools to deliver the tutorial and training tools on a large range of software packages. This makes the education and training more manageable for everyone involved.

Simpson Plastering continues to spend $50,000 to $60,000 a year on training although the market is down. In order to keep a competitive company, companies have to keep a trained and skilled workforce. The 100 workers for Simpson are acquiring technical skills, staying abreast of the safety requirements, and developing managerial skills. Richard Riley, the President of Simpson speaks of the training he has for his employees. They launched Simpson University which has cut the training costs in half. The employees work an extra Saturday and receive a raise upon completing the course.

Senior management takes on the job of preparing and teaching the classes. By bringing education in-house it cuts costs, but it is an involved task. They have to write the programs and put 200 slides together. Richard Riley says his company has hired someone before, but they prefer to write the program because it saves on travel expenses that come with having someone come in. Riley states that investments in training must continue despite the economy. When the economy rises again, Simpson will have workers who are more skilled and do better work. As the economy rises people will have a choice of who they want to complete a job, and hopefully it will not be just choosing the cheapest person. Riley is preparing and planning for the future.

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