HR is still struggling to be recognised as central to business success,
according to research by Internet consultancy Click2learn.
Over half of the senior managers surveyed never speak to the head of HR at
their company or meet to assess training objectives. A quarter of those
surveyed only met with their HR chief once a year.
The research reveals a gap between what HR believes its role to be and the
reality for managers.
Martyn Sloman, CIPD adviser for training and development, said, "This
is a matter of concern, as one of the biggest problems facing HR is to put
across its contribution to business performance.
"It’s clear from these findings that HR is under-appreciated and it’s
our job at the CIPD to prove the relationship between HR and business
performance."
Employers are also failing to adopt online training, with the research
showing that only 8 per cent of employers have fully introduced e-learning.
Over half of the employers surveyed admit they use it to mainly teach IT
skills.
Sloman said, "I don’t believe that any employers have fully implemented
e-learning. We are living in the age of technologists when e-learning is being
delivered by IT staff. We need to look at e-learning from a training point of
view."
Of those employers embarking on e-learning, 58 per cent of them don’t have a
formal strategy with clear goals in place.
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The survey of 100 managers, which included 50 HR managers, also reveals that
58 per cent failed to receive any kind of training via their PC in the past 12
months.
When questioned over why they were not using e-learning, 42 per cent of
employers blamed the cost of the initial investment.
