It is vital that employers continue to invest in skills, especially at this time of economic challenge. As well as increasing productivity in the short-term, we know that employers who don't train are 2.5 times more likely to fail than those who do.
The Government has taken decisive action to widen the package of support available to help businesses use training to meet the short term challenges, and to emerge stronger from this period well placed to take advantage of the new opportunities.
It is now easier and quicker for small and medium sized businesses to get advice and funding for the skills their business needs through the Train to Gain service.
Businesses can access:
- free 'bite sized' training for existing staff in subjects demanded by businesses including business improvement, business systems and processes, team working and communications, sales and marketing, IT user, IT support, customer service, new product design, finance and credit, cash flow and profit management, and risk management
- from January 2009 – fully funded Level 2 qualifications and partially subsidised Level 3 qualifications, regardless of whether the employee already has a qualification at this level
- funding for leadership and management training extended to businesses with 5-999 employees
- in addition, businesses with less than 50 employees can still receive a contribution to wage costs to cover the cost of time off to train
Train to Gain is a service that operates regionally throughout England. Train to Gain skills advisers offer free and impartial advice to business on how to identify and meet their training needs. You can use our contact us form to get in touch with a skills adviser or call Train to Gain on tel 0845 00 66 888.
Find out more about the Train to Gain offer.
Read our guide on how to improve the performance of your staff which explains how to assess your business performance, how to identify skills gaps that might be holding you back and where to begin trying to fill these gaps.
Further informationView our full range of guides on skills development and training.
Access to help and supportIf you would like to talk about investing in your peoples’ skills and training and how we could support your business, call the business adviser team on 0845 00 66 888 or use our contact us form.