Companies use training to survive the recession

During the recession many companies have cut their staff training in their bid to survive the economic downturn.

Companies such as Jaguar Land Rover have taken a different approach to surviving the recession. The troubled brand may have decreased staff numbers, but they look to the future as they invest in a new high tech training academy.

David Smith Chief Executive of Jaguar land rover commented earlier this week in an interview that the company is trying to avoid further redundancies, and is doing so by reducing costs. Smith states the last thing we want at the moment is to lose our skilled workforce.

Even though the economy is tough and businesses are being forced to make cut backs, Jaguar Land Rover proves that training is not an area that should be dismissed.

Mark Wright Director of Customer Services said “Jaguar Land Rover is passionate about delivering an outstanding customer experience, the academy is an example of how we are ensuring we deliver that in all our markets”.

The benefit of training is having high quality staff, enabling you to deliver an outstanding customer experience, resulting in repeat sales. This is not the first time that Jaguar Land Rover has been on top with their training methods.

“Over 1,000 young people in the last decade have participated in Jaguar Land Rover’s advanced apprenticeship programme. In May 2008 Warwick academy was awarded training quality standard certification by the Learning and Skills Council”.

In a recent interview Tony Woodley’ Joint General Secretary of the Unite Union commented that he believes that the difficulties in our economy are merely short term, if jobs are lost Jaguar Land Rover would be unable to meet demands when the market improves.

Companies perceive training as an expensive burden, fortunately there is a new business being launched in the next couple of weeks that can help with this. theTrainingpod is an online network that matches companies to training providers and trainers, that meet their training requirements for free, allowing companies to compare trainer prices and reduce costs in time spent searching for professional trainers. 

Katherine Lockwood