Clinical research organization Health Decisions, CRO+ identified possible operational cost savings by boosting efforts to promote work-from-home arrangements within departments (where work and job role permitted). Executive leadership (HR director and head of Strategy) believed that the movement to increase work-from-home opportunities required training and approached the Corporate Training department to create training to support this initiative. Using ADDIE (analysis, design, development, implementation, evaluation) methodology to analyze business and training needs, it was decided that training should be focused on two areas—manager training and employee training—in order to promote leadership development and to save on operational cost.
The managers required a focused presentation on the company’s telecommuting expectations, along with coaching on how to identify and manage positive candidates for telecommuting. The training also needed to include a walkthrough of the process that was to be used to manage and monitor this initiative.
Employees needed a summary of company requirements for telecommuting, along with documentation of the review of these requirements and the opportunity to discuss department-specific question with their front-line managers. Dividing participation in this manner also provided $2,700 savings in employee operational cost.
Program Details
The end product was a blended learning approach that began with front-line manager training delivered 30 days prior to the start of general employee training. Eighteen direct line managers attended a workshop authored by Corporate Training and delivered by the director of HR. This one-hour class focused on the reasons for change and provided case scenarios to coach managers about positive and negative employee qualities for telecommuting. It also provided a practical walkthrough of the new documents and process that would be used for reviewing and monitoring employee telecommuting.
After completion of the manager training, 78 total employees were presented with a series of electronic documents that required independent review and signature—this effort was tracked through the internal learning management system (LMS). Upon completion and acknowledgement of this documentation, employees were required to meet with managers to review department-specific requirements in a one-on-one setting. If they agreed to accept telecommuting responsibilities, they then co-signed the expectations documents, as well as a series of telecommuting checklists so the employees and the company were able to equally acknowledge and sign off on responsibility. Some 29 of these signed documents were submitted to HR for data storage.
Approximately one week from the initiative deadline, the LMS was used to distribute a tracking report for managers who were made aware of employees who had not yet completed their independent assignment.
Results
Approximately 41 percent of the company today is telecommuting with a signed set of expectations for performance and employee safety. To conclude the project using ADDIE methodology, the Corporate Training team distributed surveys to managers at the 90-day post-training mark to assess effectiveness of telecommuting preparedness and training execution.
