I watched an online advertising video recently where the Sales Consultant said to a CEO, “I’m sure you are aware that your sales process is broken, so when you want to fix it give me a call.” I chuckled at that approach because it began with such a big assumption that the CEO already knew about a problem and was doing nothing to fix it. And then I began to wonder how many CEOs would really be in the dark about operational problems. The more I think about this, the more I doubt that any CEO is completely clueless about areas of deficiency within their organizations.
I have spent the better part of the past decade helping organizations improve the return on investment in their employee development functions. In every case I have approached these organizations with the assumption that they had no idea what a healthy training function should look like, because otherwise wouldn’t they have fixed their own training function?
Most of my clients have either felt it was easier to go along with my assumption or not argue the point to save face. Either way, I am now questioning my entire approach and really wonder if most CEOs don’t already know their training functions are deficient. They simply don’t have the internal resources to fix it and don’t know who to call for help.
The advertisement approach I saw makes the assumption that the CEO knows about a problem in a way that allows them to simply answer, “Yes I do, I will be in touch soon.” It allows them to save face for whatever reason they haven’t fixed the problem and simply contact the consultant for help.
So as a way to kick start my new approach to fixing deficient training functions, I would like to say to all those reading:
“I am sure you are aware that your training function is not producing a return on the investment you are making each year. When you are ready to fix your training function, Contact me.”
Jim Hopkins
jim@jhopkinsconsulting.com
Author of:
“The Training Physical: Diagnose, Treat & Cure Your Training Department”
“Pointless Training: The Consequences of Inadequate Training Strategies” 
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