Huston_Leadership Roles and Management Functions in Nursing,

Chapter 16 Educating and Socializing Staff in a Learning Organization

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If staff development activities are to be successful, it is necessary to delineate and communicate the authority and responsibility for all components of education and training.

In some organizations, the responsibility for staff development is decentralized. Some dif ficulties associated with decentralized staff development include the conflict created by role ambiguity whenever two people share responsibility. Role ambiguity is sometimes reduced when staff development personnel and managers delineate the difference between training and education. Other difficulties arising from the shared responsibility for the onboarding, education, and training of personnel may include a lack of cost-effectiveness evaluation and limited account ability for the quality and outcomes of the educational activities. These suggestions can help overcome the difficulties inherent in a staff development system in which authority is shared: • The education department must ensure that all parties involved in the onboarding, educa tion, and training of nursing staff understand and carry out their responsibilities in that process. • If a non-nursing administrator is responsible for the staff development department, there must be input from the nursing department in formulating staff development policies and delineating duties. • An education advisory committee should be formed with representatives from top-, middle-, and first-level management; staff development; and the Human Resources department. Representatives from all classifications of employees receiving training or education should be part of this committee. • Accountability for each area of the staff development program must be clearly commu nicated; follow-up on the process is essential. • Some method of determining the cost and benefits of various programs should be used. Learning Theories All managers have a responsibility to improve employee performance through teaching. There fore, they must be familiar with basic learning theories. Understanding teaching–learning theories allows managers to structure training and use teaching techniques to change employee behavior and improve competence, which is the goal for all staff development. Adult Learning Theory Many managers attempt to teach adults with pedagogical learning strategies. This type of teach ing is usually ineffective for mature learners because adults have special needs. Knowles (1970) developed the concept of andragogy , or adult learning , to separate adult learner strategies from pedagogy , or child learning . Knowles suggested that the point at which an individual achieves a self-concept of essential self-direction is the point at which they psychologically become an adult. Table 16.1 shows how pedagogical and andragogical learning environments typically differ. Adult learners are mature, self-directed people who have learned a great deal from life expe riences and are focused on solving problems in their immediate environments. Therefore, adult learners need to know why they need to learn something before they are willing to learn it. Adult learning theory has strongly influenced how adults are currently taught in staff develop ment programs. Based on the individual’s needs, a combination of approaches may be required. Display 16.3 identifies the implications of Knowles’s work for trainers and educators. Although most adults enjoy and take pride in being treated as an adult in terms of learning, there are some obstacles to learning for adults that do not exist in children. Because learning tends to become problem centered as we age, adults often miss out on opportunities to enjoy