OJT Improves Performance

"Bob, this is Jim. Dave is a new employee in your department. Since you're a veteran, I'd like you to teach him everything you know."

If this scenario is happening at your company, you are missing out on a very powerful training method: effective on-the-job training (OJT). New employees are normally very eager to learn because they want to fit into the work group as soon as possible.

But at many companies, new hires are simply placed with a supervisor or veteran to learn as much as they can. But did anyone ever teach these veterans how to effectively pass on their knowledge and skills? Not usually. The assumption that doing a job well qualifies someone to teach that task is a faulty assumption.

If supervisors could implement a simple method for on-the-job training, they would not only increase the effectiveness of job skills training, but they could also instill an early commitment to Good Manufacturing Practice among new employees. This article will give supervisors and managers such a method.

The process is called "Job Instruction Training," or JIT. (Sounds alot like OJT, doesn't it?) The process is outlined in Dugan Laird and Ruth House's book Training Today's Employees.

Job Instruction Training is a simple six (6) step process as outlined below:

Job Instruction Training

1. Analyze the task to be learned.

2. Set the climate for learning.

3. Tell the learners how to do the task.

4. Show the learners how to do the task.

5. Let the learners do the task themselves.

6. Review their work in such a way that reinforces positive performance and sets goals for improvement.

A key document that an on-the-job trainer can incorporate into this process is the company's Standard Operating Procedures (SOP's). If written properly, a company's SOP's set the standards of expected performance. Instructors can use these SOP's when they analyze the task, explain and demonstrate the task, and even when they review the employee's performance of the task.

Company SOP's, however, have an added benefit when they are used during the JIT process. Well written SOP's have Good Manufacturing Practice as their foundation. The Standard Operating Procedure details not only the steps necessary to complete the task, but also how to do it in compliance with GMP.

By training employees to consistently follow their written procedures, we are also training them to consistently follow, and be aware of, Good Manufacturing Practice.

The goal, of course, is controlled performance. If on-the-job training is conducted effectively, employees will perform better and show more GMP awareness. This leads to higher quality products, increased company productivity and consistent GMP compliance.