Learning in the company: mandatory or voluntary?

More and more companies are offering continuing education, training and mentoring programs for their employees. However, research results show that benefits for employees and companies only arise if these programs are mandatory.

In its current issue (September-October 2022), the U.S. magazine "Harvard Business Review" looks at mentoring programs under the title "Why Your Mentoring Program Should Be Mandatory". As a personnel development tool in companies, mentoring refers to the activity of an experienced person (mentor). She passes on her professional knowledge or experience to a more inexperienced person (mentee or protégé). Mentoring is thus a form of internal company training and development.

Now, a study of 603 newly hired salespeople at a U.S. inbound call center, referenced in the Harvard Business Review, shows: "In the first part of the study, 110 randomly selected salespeople were assigned to a mandatory four-week mentoring program, which consisted of structured discussions with their mentors in which they shared their answers to standardized questions and received feedback. In their first two months on the job, they averaged 19 percent more daily sales than 171 employees without mentors, and this increase was sustained: more than 90 percent of the sales increases were maintained over six months. In addition, mentored employees were 14 percent more likely to stay with the company for at least one month - a significant gain, considering that turnover is notoriously high among new sales hires."

So, as Harvard Business Review summarizes, "More than 70 percent of Fortune 500 companies offer some form of mentoring to their employees in hopes of boosting performance and promoting employee retention, among other benefits." However, there has been little concrete evidence that companies are reaping these benefits. New research shows that mentoring programs can indeed provide valuable benefits to employees and companies - but only if they are mandatory. That's because when mentoring is voluntary, the people who need it most tend to turn down the opportunity."

This translates well to the general practice of in-house training and development. On the one hand, companies need to ensure that their employees fulfill their legal obligations, for example in the areas of compliance, occupational health and safety. On the other hand, the focus is on topics that companies should address with the claim of being a "Modern Company". These include, above all, future-oriented issues relating to awareness, cyber security, communication, sustainability, cross-cultural management and diversity. Companies cannot operate successfully without a high level of expertise in these areas, and employees expect to receive targeted training in these sectors anyway.

This raises the question: Should companies make their continuing education and training programs mandatory for their employees or offer them on a voluntary basis? In favor of mandatory learning within the company, one can draw on the results of the U.S. study, in addition to a number of other arguments. If mandatory mentoring programs have a performance-enhancing effect on employees, the same can be said for topic-based training and education programs. Knowledge and information advantages help employees and therefore also companies to face current and future challenges and to respond to them professionally.

Of course, this applies above all to learning programs for which there is no legal obligation. After all, mandatory training courses are part of everyday business life. They are required by law and must be carried out regularly. Typical topics include occupational safety, emergency training, health and data protection. But what about topics such as diversity management, sustainability, change management, cyber security, communication and more? These are not subject to any legal obligation, but are suitable for developing employees and thus a company in a targeted manner. For example, a major German university is planning to introduce diversity management as a mandatory training course for all new students and employees and even to award a credit point for it under the European Credit Transfer System.

Companies should therefore consider whether and which learning programs they should make mandatory for employees - over and above the legally regulated mandatory instruction. These pros and cons must be weighed up in order to provide employees with the information and competencies in a targeted manner and thus increase their performance.