More
than a quarter of private sector employers have cut their spending on training
in the past year in response to worsening economic conditions, according to new
research.
The Chartered
Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) study reveals that more than half
of private sector firms reported deteriorating trading conditions in 2002, with
28 per cent cutting training budgets in response, 55 per cent maintaining
training spend and 17 per cent increasing it.
In
the public sector, 38 per cent of employers say the economic outlook has
worsened over the past year. Of these organisations, 26 per cent report an
increase in spending on training, 54 per cent said it remained steady and only
20 per cent saw a reduction.
The
study reveals that an increasing proportion of the training budget is being
spent on the websites and organisation intranets, which have both doubled in
use during the past five years.
The
survey also shows that 60 per cent of organisations provide diversity training.
Most
diversity training is provided to HR, middle and junior managers (more than 85
per cent), with technical, clerical and manual staff receiving the least (45
per cent).
Only
around half of the respondents carried out monitoring on equal opportunities
training uptake. This figure varies across sectors with public sector
organisations reporting a significantly higher incidence of monitoring (68.9
per cent) when compared with the private sector (39.3 per cent).
The
survey also shows that only half of the respondents have had contact with their
local Learning and Skills Council (LSC), with larger organisations and
manufacturing and public administration organisations being more likely to have
made contact.
The CIPD
adviser on learning, training and development, Jessica Rolph, said: "The
survey findings are good news and show that HR professionals are doing a good
job of convincing their colleagues and boards of the need to preserve training
budgets if they are to weather the economic storm.”
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