Career Development Plan II
Training and Mentoring Program
HRM531
June 12, 2011

Career Development Plan II – Training and Mentoring Program
The merger between InterClean and EnviroTech has sparked a new strategic direction. Consequently, the merged companies will be introducing full-service cleaning solutions for organizations in the health care industry. To facilitate the company’s new direction, management has assembled a new sales team and development plan to help the team be successful at implementing the new strategy. The new sales team will be consisting of Jim Martin, Vice President of Sales, Tom Gonzalez, Sales Manager, and Outside Sales Representatives, Susan Burnt, Eric Borden, Ving Hsu, and Terry Garcia. Additionally, the next step is to create a training program for these employees. This training and mentoring program is designed to prepare the new team to carryout the objectives of the company. Furthermore, when creating a successful program, management must first identify the new training and mentoring needs, objectives of the program, performance standards, delivery methods, contents, time frames, evaluation methods, feedback, and alternate avenues for those who require further development.
Assessing Needs and Objectives
When selecting members for the new team, management focused on specific skill sets that would be significant to the success of the organizations new strategy. Notably, employees from both entities were evaluated and chosen because they presented high levels of proficiency in key areas such as communication, customer service, problem-solving, leadership, innovation, and critical thinking. Although members from either entity exhibit strong success skills, there seem to be some inconsistency. For example, members from InterClean have excellent sales strategies and are aggressive in meeting and exceeding sales goals. However, they are not accustomed to working in a team environment; therefore, require training in customer service and team building. On the other hand, members from EnviroTech possess excellent customer service skills and focus on creating long-term relationships with their customer. They also have experience with working in a diverse team environment but can benefit from training in sales strategies. The goal of the training program is to ensure all team members are experts in creating and maintaining long-term relationship with customers when providing world class customer service. In addition, team members must be creative when devising solutions for the customers’ problems, demonstrate leadership, and effective critical thinking skills while collaborating as a team.
The objectives of this training and mentoring program are to make certain employees are equipped with the tools to (a) increase customer satisfaction ratings through the formation of business relationships (b) enhance the rate of recurring business while maintaining a growth in new customer’s business, (c) encourage teamwork, (d) assist the smooth evolution from old practices to new strategies.
Performance Standards
Primarily, performance standards are the conversion of the job requirements into levels of acceptable and unacceptable practices. As explained by Cascio (2006), performance standards specify how well work is to be done. These standards can be quantitative or qualitative and plays an essential role in the performance of the company. The basic performance expected states that employees should:
(1) recognize how his or her performance influence the goals and objectives of the organization
(2) sustain a high level of respect for each customer and coworker
(3) be capable of identifying problems, provide creative alternate solutions, and evaluate consequences
(4) demonstrate professionalism, exercise sound judgment, and creativity whereby representing the organization in an optimistic manner
(5) contribute 100% in achieving personal and departmental goals
(6) be accountable for delivering results
Delivery Methods
Various training methods are used to enhance the learning experience of team members. Notably, management will devise a course that incorporates information presentations, simulations, and on-the-job training. Additionally, the training program will consist of both computer-based and face-to-face training. Moreover, E-learning is integrated because it allows sales associates to learn at their personal pace to facilitate better understanding. The lecture method can be used to provide sales associates with a general understanding of the purpose for the training and setting ground rules. Particularly, decision-making skills, planning, interpersonal skills, and critical thinking techniques can be effectively learned through the use interactive learning such as games and role-playing. Some case studies will be incorporated to develop analytic skills and higher level principles.
Because members of the new team have varied skill sets, on-the-job training (OJT) will be used as a means of sharing best practices. Additionally, OJT is an effective method for presenting job-instruction technique, apprenticeships, coaching, and mentoring (Cascio, 2006). Furthermore, mentoring will accelerate the process of redeploying team members into their new lines of work. This program is expected to improve team members technical aspects of performance, increase job satisfaction, decrease turnover, provide career growth, and reduce frustrations with new processes.

Contents and Time-Frames
The training content will consist of materials relevant and meaningful to the change in strategies, production, and service to our customers. Cascio (2006 p. 300) explains meaningful as it refers to material that is rich in associations for the trainees and is therefore easily understood by them. The training material will include contents as highlighted by the Sales Academy (2002):
Sales Boot Camp
Trainees will be required to perform and develop expertise. This session will cover topics on building rapport, setting appointments, negotiation, account management, marketing, listening skills, objective handling, sales terminology, and closing. This course will be covered in two days, each session lasting eight hours and conducted in house.
Sales Negotiation
Trainees will he educated on how to spot opportunities and remain focused. This session will include topics on bargaining skills, seller positioning, handling deadlock, objection handling, listening skills, buyers’ tactics, win-win scenarios, outcome management, discovering negotiation variables, and dealing with professional buyers. This training session is expected to be completed in two days, each session lasting eight hours and conducted in house.
Presentation Skills
This course teaches trainees how to prepare themselves for a presentation, how to source material, how to structure and deliver presentations, and how to manage diverse audiences. This session will cover topics on rehearsals, relaxation techniques, building confidence, types of presentations, delivery skills, types of audiences, and handling questions. This training session is expected to be completed two days, each session lasting eight hour and conducted in house.
Time Management This course is will cover strategies for relieving stress and taking control of every hour of the day. Trainees will learn how to deal with interruptions, work-life balancing, energy and efficiency, the power of focus, planning, coordinating time, completing work on time, downside to misusing time, and dealing with ‘time stealers.’ This training session will be completed in one day and conducted in house.
Large Account Management and Development This training session enables trainees to be strategic and tactical when forming better relationships and larger revenues from customers. The course will cover topics on defining large accounts, forming lasting relationships, major account characteristics, major account qualification, creating proposals, positioning InterClean as a major supplier, and the value chain of a large account. This course will last two days and completed in house.
Evaluation Methods and Feedback
Evaluation of the employees’ performance is extremely essential and will help the company identify areas to improve upon. Evaluation will be completed based on The Kirkpatrick Model (2011). The four levels evaluated will be reaction: the level of favorable reaction to the training, learning: the skills and levels acquired by the trainees, behavior: skills demonstrated by trainees once they return to the job, and results: the results of applying new skills to tasks. Further, end of training surveys will be issues to evaluate the training sessions to identify areas for improvement.
According to Cascio (2006), feedback is essential both for learning and for trainee motivation. Therefore, feedback will be given consistently throughout the evaluation period. Trainees will be given feedbacks based on performance and practices. In addition, sales associates will be encouraged to share feedback with peers so that best practices can be noted and strategies altered to increase production.
Alternate Avenues
In some cases, team members may require or request additional training. Consequently, training will be administered on an individual basis or a mentor will be assigned for further coaching. The individual team member will be responsible for identifying areas that requires improvement. However, management will continually evaluate performance to identify such areas. Individual training and mentoring sessions will be specially formulated to address areas needing development. Upon completion of the individualized training, evaluation period will be employed to ensure training success.
Conclusion
In summary, management has devised training and mentoring program for the members of the new sales team. To ensure a successful training program, the training and mentoring needs have been assessed. In addition, objectives of the program, performance standards, delivery methods, contents, time frames, evaluation methods, feedback, and alternate avenues for those who require further development were formulated. This training and mentoring program was implemented so that the new team is properly equipped to carry out the new strategic direction of the organization. The entire program will last six to eight weeks and incorporate the major points covered in this program.

Reference
Cascio, W. F. (2005). Managing Human Resources: Productivity, Quality of Life, Profits (7th ed.). Columbus, OH: The McGraw-Hill Companies.
Sales Academy. (2002). Training Courses. Retrieved on June 12, 2011 from http://www.thesalesacademy.com/training-courses
The Kirkpatrick Method. (2011). Retrieved on June 12, 2011 from http://www.kirkpatrickpartners.com/OurPhilosophy/tabid/66/Default.aspx