Hi,

I am looking for the best practices on the development methods for R&D employees.

Actually, there are two different approaches to the employee development, one is the training and the other one is the work related acitivities.

How to develop R&D employees in order to make them the technical expert? I am especially interested in the methods through the work and project

Please let me know the good practices or specific cases to develop R&D employees.

Thanks in advance.

Hi Jen:

I suggest that instead of focusing on the type of people (R&D employees) that you focus on the type of content that needs to be taught. For developing training on a technical subject, Ruth Colvin Clark does an excellent job of addressing how to approach the teaching of principles, procedures and process in her book Developing Technical Training: A structured Approach for the development of Classroom and Computer-Based Instructional Materials (1989, Addison-Wesley Publishing Co.).

For the work and project aspect I recommend you to a general WEB search on the topic of on-the-job training. You should find plenty of information and/or take a look at The Structured on-the-job Training Workbook by Rothwell.

Good Luck!

Cj

Hi Cj,

Thank you very much!

Jen,

Based on my former experience as an engineer in R & D, I can tell you that if you are in HR - forget about it. HR typically has no credibility with R & D types. The training they offer is of no interest to these folks and they consider it a huge waste of time and just more corporate crap they have to stomach.

However, if you are one of them, you're in a terrific position to do much good work. But you will have to put the employees in the driver's seat and have them concentrate on actual work-related projects, probably in teams. They will need to do their own needs identification with the help of a good facilitator. As for their professional development, there are plenty of professional conferences, seminars, and college courses for them to take.

I too like Ruth Clark's work very much. It's right on target.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: KaliKo,

quote:

How to develop R&D employees in order to make them the technical expert?

Experts?

Taking a light-hearted look at this, think of the definition of an expert:

x = the unknown quantity
spurt = a drip under pressure

quote:

Having loads of experts in R&D is all very fine but surely it is the sharing of the knowledge between these people, and at least equal importance, with others with less knowledge. Who has set the goal to make them technical experts? Or is the goal that they become competent within their fields?

Another poster remarked about the kudos needed in order to train R&D staff -- how about challenging their assumptions?

It's always dangerous to think in terms of BEST Practice since this tends to be context specific -- as the Irish management guru Charles Handy says learning is not finding out what other people already know but is the process of solving our own problems.

What type/field of R&D are you working in?