培训新员工值不值？

    年轻人对于自己的第一份工作总是会抱有许多浪漫的幻想——比如薪水、工作内容等等。但或许最令人心酸的错误想法是，雇主会花时间培养他们的能力。

    埃森哲公司（Accenture）最近的一项调查发现，2013年即将毕业的大学生中，77%的人期待在第一份工作中接受正式培训。但在2011届和2012届的毕业生中，报告接受过培训的却只有48%。

    埃森哲公司人才与组织业务常务董事凯瑟琳•拉威尔说：“雇主希望毕业生们来到公司时已经具备相关的能力，但期望与现实之间总是存在差距。”也就是说，很少有毕业生在来公司报道的第一天就已经将掌握了具体的工作技能。更糟糕的是什么？“由于经济条件限制，许多雇主都已经打算削减开支。”而培训是最容易被削减的预算项目。

    但也有公司招聘年轻人后会进行大量培训，还表示只要员工集中发展自己的能力，就值得公司对其投资。事实确实如此，从长期来看，拉威尔发现，接受过培训的员工“不会很快辞职”，而且即使在新招聘人员入职的前几周内，这种培训也物超所值。

    大多数大型投资银行会将新员工培训外包给一家名为Training The Street的培训公司，它会提供为期两周至两周半的培训课程，重点培训财务能力。公司创始人兼CEO斯科特•罗斯坦称公司的课程“非常即时、非常注重实践、非常实用。”要问最受欢迎的练习是什么？罗斯坦表示，想要成为银行业者的培训生们会收到一份“令人厌恶的”财务数据电子表格，他们需要对它进行格式化。讲师们会“系统讲解让表格变得更完美的具体步骤。”这个过程通常需要15分钟时间。而在整个培训过程中，学生们还要经常重新拿出电子表格进行不断尝试。培训结束时，“大多数学生都能在两到五分钟甚至更短的时间内完成表格的格式化。”

    罗斯坦认为，这种练习与体育有相通之处。“比如我们要把这些人训练成世界级的运动员，肯定就要去体育馆，让他们展开训练，让他们的肌肉记忆保持协调。”

    银行出资进行财务能力培训的好处在于，银行可以聘用聪明的文科学生，就算他们以前从来没有学习过会计或商务课程，而这将扩大人才储备的范围。此外，新员工们参与第一个项目时，也不会因为不懂息税折旧摊销前利润（EBITDA）是什么意思，怎么在Excel中排列数字这些问题来浪费老员工们的宝贵时间。

    确实，许多提供培训的公司一直在努力压缩培训时间。由于年轻人可能会频繁跳槽，“有效培训和过度培训只有一线之差，”拉威尔表示。

    但也有许多公司仍然坚持提供培训。汽车租赁公司Enterprise凭借大量培训而成为最受大学毕业生欢迎的雇主。新员工会先在课堂中学习几周，然后会有8 – 12个月的时间参加一个结构化的培训项目，学习如何管理Enterprise的租车点。公司人力资源副总裁玛丽•阿蒂姆说：“整个过程非常透明。新员工们会看到损益表，了解哪些因素会影响到损益表。”管理培训生会学习和练习调度、客户服务与会计等能力。“它是一个整体。”

    Young people have many romantic notions about their first jobs -- what they'll be paid, what they'll do. But perhaps the most poignant misconception is that employers will invest time in developing their skills.

    A recent Accenture survey found that 77% of those set to graduate from college in 2013 expected to receive formal training in their first jobs. But only 48% of those in the classes of 2011 and 2012 reported being trained.

    "There's a disconnect between employers' expectations of grads entering with relevant skills and the reality," says Katherine LaVelle, a managing director in Accenture's talent and organization practice -- which is that few college grads have job-specific skills on day one. Adding to the problem? "Given economic constraints, lots of employers have looked to cut back." Training is an easy budget line to trim.

    But some companies that hire young people train extensively and claim that if you focus on skills, it's worth the cash. That's true not only in the long run -- LaVelle notes that trained employees "don't quit as quickly" -- but sometimes even in a new hire's first weeks.

    Most major investment banks outsource a chunk of their new employee training to a company called Training The Street, which runs two- to two-and-a-half-week programs emphasizing financial skills. Founder and CEO Scott Rostan describes his program as "very real time, very hands on, and very practical." One popular exercise? Would-be bankers get a spreadsheet full of financial data "that is basically ugly," Rostan says, and needs to be formatted. Instructors "explain how to do it, step by step, methodically, all the keystrokes to make it better." This usually takes about 15 minutes. Then, during the course of the program, students keep coming back to the spreadsheet to try again. By the end of the program, "most of them can do it in two, three, four, five minutes or less."

    Such drills have a parallel in sports, Rostan says. "We're training these people to be world-class athletes, so it's about going to the gym and getting the reps down and getting your muscle memory in tune."

    The upside for a bank is that by paying for financial skills training, the bank can hire smart liberal arts grads who haven't taken accounting or business courses. This expands the pool of potential hires, but keeps these new staffers from draining the expensive time of senior people on their first projects with questions about what EBITDA means and how to line up numbers on Excel.

    To be sure, many companies that do train have been trying to find ways to compress training into less time. With young people likely to switch jobs frequently, "there is a fine line between what is effective training and what is overkill," says LaVelle.

    But others are holding the line. Enterprise, the rental car company, has become a top employer for new college grads because of its extensive training. After a few weeks in the classroom, new hires spend 8-12 months in a structured program learning to manage an Enterprise location. "It's very transparent," says Marie Artim, vice president for talent acquisition at Enterprise. "They're seeing P&L statements, and learning what it takes to make an impact on them." Management trainees study and practice scheduling, customer service, and accounting. "It's business as a whole."