Newsletter No. 152

CUHK Newsletter No. 152 19th October 1999 3 New Initiatives for Staff Training and Development What's STDU? There is now a new unit to train staff in administrative skills from telephone manners to how to use the one-line budget. The Staff Training and Development Unit (STDU), as it is called, has recently been established under the Personnel Office to enhance and coordinate the University's staff training and development activities. It is overseen by a Staff Training and Development Committee, whose members are well versed in resource management, staff training and development, information technology, language teaching, and industrial psychology. The committee is responsible for formulating policies on staff training and development for the University, reviewing applications for training from departments and units, giving support to training activities, and handling other related matters. A Training Manager, Mr. Daniel Chow, has been recruited to run the unit with a Training Executive, Ms. Kitman Lee. Staff Training and Development Committee Chairman: Prof. Liu Pak-wai Members: Prof. Andrew C.W. Chan Mr. Terence C.W. Chan Prof. Richard M.W. Ho Prof. Eva Lai Prof. Lau Chung Ming Prof. Leung Kwok Mr. Philip Leung Director of Personnel Secretary: Training Manager Training Manager Mr. Daniel Chow Mr. Chow obtained his BBA from The Chinese University and his MA in marketing management from Macquarie University in Australia. Before joining the University as training manager, he worked for The Hong Kong Management Association as well as a multi-national transportation company where he was senior human resources development officer. Why the Need? Staff development services of different types have always existed at the University. The University Library System, the University Safety Office, the Computer Services Centre / Information Technology Service Unit (CSC/ITSU), the Personnel Office, for example, have been organizing workshops and training sessions for staff. So why should the University devote valuable resources to such a venture? Prof. Liu Pak-wai, chairman of the Staff Training and Development Committee, said that the need to coordinate training activities was identified after the launch of an internal management efficiency review of administrative units in early 1997, just prior to the management review of local tertiary institutions conducted by the University Grants Committee (UGC). Both reviews prescribed good management practices, one of which was targetted at staff training. Prof. Liu, himself also chairman of the University's Task Force on Management Efficiency, said, 'The management of the University, its departments, and units are faced with decreasing resources and manpower, and increasing workload and accountability. Productivity will need to increase. Reengineering is one way of achieving that. Boosting the performance of individual staff members is another and this necessitates first identifying areas in their performance that need polishing. On the other hand, staff themselves need to know how to handle increased workload and stress. Society is continuously advancing. The nature of the work may not have changed, but the best method of doing it has. Staff members should keep abreast of the latest changes. Their attitude towards the use of information technology, for example, may need to change.' Staff training and development services, which in his view are important for improving job performance and increasing productivity, fall in line therefore with the general direction the University is moving. While previously responsibility for these services is left to individual departments and units, they are now coordinated under the STDU, rendering their provision more organized and systematic. 'The problem with leaving staff development to individual units is that they may not all give it equal importance and they may not all have enough resources to do it. The unit heads themselves also need to be familiarized with things such as the operation of the one-line budget and the University's personnel policy, but familiarization work has so far been piecemeal. Centralization and coordination should have been introduced earlier but it isn't too late now,' Prof. Liu said. How Does It Work? However, certain types of training, especially those requiring specific or context sensitive knowledge, will still be carried out by the units that can best do the job. For example, training related to the mastery of information technology remains under the domain of the CSC/ITSU, while that related to library skills remains under the domain of the University Library System. In other speciality areas, STDU's role is to help source appropriate training programmes, trainers, or materials for departments or units. Information on selected external programmes will be published on the web-page of the Personnel Office. The STDU's services are mainly for non-teaching staff but opportunities for managerial development for department chairs are also provided. Teacher training, however, does not come under the jurisdiction of STDU. No charges are levied for STDU's services as long as they are prescribed by the University. Advisory services are also provided free of charge. But courses tailored for the specific needs of departments and units at the latter's request are offered at a fee. Who Will Benefit First? The STD Committee has identified four focus areas to be given priority for the 1999-2000 academic year. They are performance management, customer service, communication / interpersonal skills, and staff induction. Training courses begin in October with induction for department chairpersons. This will be followed by induction for newly appointed staff members of other ranks, workshops for middle-level management, for frontline staff, for administrative and professional staff, and finally executive assistants. Cultivating a New Culture Attendance of the training courses is largely voluntary and needs the prior endorsement of the supervisor of the staff member in question. Prof. Liu said that though staff training may be recommended by the supervisor in his/her appraisal of a staff member, he hopes that in most cases, it is the staff member who proactively recognizes his/her needs and puts in a request for training. He also hopes that both the staff and their supervisors w i ll be supportive of staff training and development. He is slightly worried that 'when there is a lot of work to be done, supervisors may be unwilling to let their staff take time off for training and, on the other hand, staff members themselves may not be able to see why they need training', especially since, he says, the culture of staff training and development is not as prevalent at the University as, say, certain commercial firms. Therefore he urges all to see such activities as a key to enhancing productivity and cost-efficiency, and a factor affecting their career prospects. Feedback in the form of descriptive assessments w i ll be solicited from the participants some time after their training about the applicability of the programmes to day-to-day work. Post-training performance will be observed to see if CUHK staff have benefited from the training and become better mannered, better skilled, and more productive. Piera Chen