Learning And Development Program For Red Telecom's Customer Resolution Team Leaders

RISE also seeks to increase diversity within Red’s workforce by setting the following workforce targets to be met by 2020:

• Increase women’s representation in senior leadership roles from 11% to 25% (50% representation by 2025);
• Increase LGBTIQ representation across all roles from 2.5% to 8%;
• Increase disability representation across all roles from 0.7% to 5%;
• Increase CALD representation in senior leadership roles from 9% to 15% (25% representation by 2025).

Importantly, Red hopes that D&I will be ‘business as usual’ by 2020. To facilitate this transition and improve ‘buy in’ from across management, RISE sets Red’s broad D&I strategy, but different departments have discretion in how they implement the strategy. General managers are expected to work with Red’s HR department to develop specific programs to increase D&I within their work teams. Red’s HR department will ensure that the department-specific programs are aligned to RISE.

Importance of Learning and Development Program

According to Döös, Johansson and Wilhelmson, (2015) in order to develop the skills and capabilities of the team leaders the learning and development interventions would comprise of three types of learning specifically conventional learning, contemporary learning and futurist learning interventions while the methods fitting the learning and development needs are on-the-job training, lectures, coaching/mentoring, simulators, technology based learning, role playing, case studies and group discussions. According to Hasson, von, Holmstrom, Karanika-Murray and Tafvelin (2016)The nature of the different learning and development interventions that have been proposed for Red Telecom is immensely beneficial, effectual, interactive and intriguing further upholding the interests of team leaders throughout the learning events besides appropriately addressing their knowledge and skill gaps. Learning and development will benefit Red Telecom in improving employee motivation and satisfaction, retaining them at much lower costs, developing working practices aligning to the organizational goals, increasing productivity and effectiveness, effectively responding to changes besides getting adaptive to ever-changing and highly competitive  market

According to Arghode, Brieger and McLean (2017) the proposed learning and development plan presented to Red Telecom for improving the skills and knowledge of the team leaders of the Customer Resolution department intending to attain the desirable results besides driving them towards meeting the General Manager’s goals. Adult learning and cognitive learning theory has literally given base to the learning proposal tabled to the management. Any single theory is not applicable over all adult and over the years a wide range of models, assumptions and principles, theories, and explanations have created a knowledge base for adult learning. Adult educators ‘familiarity with this knowledge base increases the effectiveness of their practices further making them more responsive towards the needs of adult learners. Compared to children there is a vast difference in how an adult learns and according to Hagen and Park (2016) this numerous facets of learning like problem centred or content centred learning, active participation of learners, a mutual learning environment amidst the learner and instructor, collaborative nature of learning rather than authoritative, experimental learning activities, sharing of past experiences for re-evaluating the experiences with new evidence and evaluation outcomes, assessment of needs and interests for redesigning the new learning activities are recognized by the Andragogy or adult learning theory while cognitive learning theory according to Hariharan and Vivekanand (2018) revolves around problem-solving and thinking skills, memory retention, and the perception towards things learned and is widely used for explaining the mental process that is  influenced by intrinsic and extrinsic factors ultimately bringing learning within an individual.

Types of Learning Interventions

According to Postu?a and Majczyk (2018) there are certain competencies requisite in playing the role of a team leader that revolves around possessing strong ethical standards within their decision-makings and individual behaviours with intent to promote safer and trusted working spirit amidst the staffs further driving them towards social participation and creativity. Being visionary is also critical competency for team leaders to define the goals of team and ability to communicate them besides giving them direction thereby, driving employee engagement. Change management and implementation is also a core competency for team leaders in anticipating the adverse effect of change on team morale, controlling the period of change and identifying alternative strategies. Another competency according to Nafiisa Sobratee (2018) is human capital management for building and managing teams aligned with the goals and needs of organizations followed conflicts management competency by gaining social intelligence through observing and comprehending group dynamics, determining the potential factors giving rise to conflicts and implementing measures of prevention. Technology Management and communications are also some competencies team leaders should posses for remaining updated about evolutions is technology and assimilating them into workplace practices besides maintaining accuracy while messages are communicated to the team members. Additionally, customer focus is also a key team leader competency for keeping their customers engaged apart from building long-term and committed relationships for securing their loyalties. Finally, according to Kunnanatt (2016) the most important competency team leaders should have is resilience for promptly bouncing back and remaining positive even in difficulties.

According to Csete and Evans (2013) for improving the organizational performance of Red Telecom getting a learning and development program implemented for team leaders (target learning group) of Customer Resolution department is an important area where the management who is audience of the proposal should immediately place their focus intending to effectively address the issues the team members are experiencing while working. This L&D proposal will make significant contributions in accomplishing the company’s initiative of redirection and incorporation. Besides helping in the improvement of the team leaders’ skills and knowledge, the learning program will largely influence their core beliefs and thinking process. According to Hilliard (2015) on evaluating the training needs it has become apparent that the issues team members are experiencing regularly revolve around zero job security, performance evaluation, female members’ hesitation in approaching the male team leaders and negative perception about disabled team members’ further surfacing de-motivation negatively effecting the fulfilment of company goals and initiatives. For immediately dealing with the skills gap identified within the team leaders, different learning and development interventions should be adopted by the management to enhance the overall teams’ productiveness.  Skills and knowledge development according to Harrison, Burnard and Stuart (2018) will empower the team leaders to uplift the team members’ morale, design performance evaluation measures, improve female staffs’ participation ratio and practices for managing disabled members. Methods like On-the-job and resource based training, informal learning (e.g. interaction with colleagues, seniors and peers for gaining relevant experiences) will be incorporated within the L&D program for facilitating the skills development of team leaders. Moreover, according to Becker and Bish (2017) the proposed learning plan will be based on 70:20:10 model for learning and development to ensure that the team leaders obtain 70% of their knowledge through the experiences gain from their job roles, 20% by interacting with others and 10% via participating in different learning sessions. The primary focus of the 70:20:10 model for learning and development revolves around transmitting knowledge and skills to the learners, in case of Red Telecom the team leaders of Customer Resolution department through different job experiences interaction with other peoples.

Competencies Required in Team Leaders

Conclusion

At the end it can be concluded from the given case study of Red Telecom that the team leaders of its Customer Resolution department have certain gaps within their skills and knowledge, which is adversely influencing the workings and motivational levels of team members further affecting the overall performance and productivity of the company. Hence, adopting a well designed learning and development program is its need of the hour. It has been observed that the different types of learning and development interventions that have been incorporated within the proposed L&D program will eventually make significant contributions in improving the plans efficiency and effectiveness. Since, the gap identified within the skill and knowledge of team leaders is not similar, it is important that the management recognizes and comprehends that learning and development program is not based on a specified intervention rather adopting multiple approaches of learning and development will be highly benefitting in successfully fulfilling the goals of Red Telecom’s General Manager with the help of formal and informal learning processes.

References

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