5 ways to reduce staff training costs

Business finance writer, Sarah Iqbal identifies the average cost of employee training in the UK and outlines 5 ways businesses can reduce their staff training costs without compromising on the quality of the training provided.

It’s no secret that the benefits of training employees can include employees becoming more productive, motivated and efficient than staff members not trained properly to carry out their job roles. This means that effectively training employees is critical for business development, especially for growing small businesses. But what happens when you need to reduce staff training costs but you don’t want to see a dip in the quality of employee training?

This blog post identifies the average cost of staff training in the UK and outlines 5 techniques that businesses can adopt to reduce company staff training cost without compromising on quality of the employee training provided.

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The average cost of staff training in the UK

According to the UK government, the average cost of staff training is £1530 per employee per year. That means employers in the UK invest a total of £42 billion in staff training every year. If these numbers seem alarmingly high, don’t worry. There is no one size fits all amount or minimum investment. It definitely depends on the individual requirements of your business. Individual businesses can calculate the average training cost per employee to determine how their company employee training costs compares to the national average.

5 ways to reduce staff training costs

Reducing training costs without impacting workplace productivity and staff satisfaction requires careful thought. Here are five top tips for reducing the costs of staff training without comprising on quality:

1. Make your training resources scalable and repeatable

When it comes to onboarding new employees, it’s likely the training requirements will be the same for everyone that needs an introduction to your business and your standard housekeeping rules, policies and procedures.

Companies can create something that can be scalable, sent out time and time again, that will save valuable time and money. Additionally, businesses eliminate the necessity of time-consuming induction sessions traditionally carried out by the business’s line managers or HR team.

2. Choose an online training provider

Cut out instructor-led courses and instead opt for online training courses, and you can cut your training costs significantly. By opting for online training, you also avoid the many indirect costs associated with hosting the training, such as travel, accommodation, catering etc. In addition, online training can be carried out from anywhere and has been known to save businesses around the world billions.

Online training can be delivered in manageable chunks from almost anywhere, making it easy to learn and the employee’s own pace. Online training doesn’t have to be a passive experience either. Many online training provider now have quizzes or knowledge tests at the end to make sure the employees understand the course material. The results of these tests can be recorded directly in an employee’s training log or HR file.

3. Utilise the skills of your existing employees

Look around you, its likely that you already have access to a pool of incredible employees who are skilled at their job. Consider setting up employee-led training sessions or introduce a mentoring programme where you can share the knowledge and skills already within your business so employees can learn from the best talent your company has to offer.

This cannot replace all the formal learning, but it is excellent for on-the-job training and could significantly reduce your training cost per employee average.

4. Replace workshops with webinars

If video and online pre-recorded training doesn’t cover all your needs, consider taking your live workshops online with webinars instead of face-to-training. Employees will still get all the benefits of an interactive training experience but without the need to travel, booking rooms and arrange catering.

The other benefit of running training webinars is that if someone is unavailable for training, they can rewatch it when they are available, meaning there are no additional costs for having to go over the same training material again.

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5. Assess your employees training needs

A good business owner knows training is one of the essential foundations of a business’s success. But knowing where to start with training can be a little more challenging. So before deciding how to streamline your training programmes, you should conduct a thorough assessment to discover the gaps in knowledge, so you don’t waste time training employees on what they already know.

To conduct a training needs assessment, you will first need to approach each team and its supervisors to see where they believe the biggest knowledge gaps are in their department. Once you know what is missing, you can set appropriate goals and plan training around the insights gained.

If you are faced with the tough decision to cut staff training costs, it is important to do it in a way that doesn’t compromise the quality of training your staff receive. Training is one of the key foundations to any business’s success.

Written by Sarah Iqbal

Sarah Iqbal is a fully CIM qualified marketing executive and copywriter who specialises in business and finance writing. She regularly writes about how businesses can make profitable investments and use strategies to save on costs and boost revenue.