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Appraisals, Restructuring and Retention
In common with a lot of employers nowadays, you may have yearly appraisals of staff. This is hopefully not to weed them out, but to retain happy workers.
You may not need your technical staff to have high verbal ability. On the other hand, people writing instructions need to express themselves in concise English. Confusion may arise unless wording is clear.
An example of an anomalous message would be
'Instructions are on base of product - do not under any circumstances turn product upside down'.
This is a genuine example!
A brochure we picked up recently features a sentence containing 48 words. It is an expensive booklet advertising a premium product and must have cost a large chunk of marketing budget. But the message is lost in a sea of words with poor punctuation.
Your website or business card may be the first written information a potential client reads. With such fierce competition in every sector, a business needs to make the most of its employees' strengths.
If a member of staff is happy and productive, there would be no reason to move them. But if they are unproductive and unhappy, their resulting profiles may well reveal the reason. A slight 'tweak' to their job, some retraining, or pairing them with a mentor, might make all the difference. Simply being aware of problem areas may be all that is necessary.
Summary
After testing, our aim is to provide a profile of strengths and weakness with regard to ability and literacy. If a loyal employee is struggling after a department has been restructured, s/he may need help. Work is increasingly computer-based and the person with average or above literacy skills can cope with this. |
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Someone with depressed literacy scores may fare better on a computer. If literacy is a real problem, however, a keyboard can be just as daunting as pen and paper. Instead of losing a skilled and experienced employee, training can be given to focus on his or her area of need.
A learner profile could illuminate the way ahead. Without such intervention, the situation may break down irretrievably. If an employee was struggling to cope with new technology, s/he would be sent on a training course. At Access Testing, we want you to help your business fulfil its potential. Placing people in work areas appropriate to their skill set is what we hope you’ll achieve, with the help of our learning profiles.
People are often loathe to admit they are having problems with literacy, for fear of losing their job. The resulting stress lowers literacy levels even further and their performance in general. Even their life outside work is likely to be adversely affected.
In other countries, literacy tests are standard. Norway found that introducing literacy tests for 'shop floor employees' led to increased productivity.
Managers were at first excluded, but increasingly, testing is proving to be a force for good. Our profiles are even more positive as they will show peaks (as well as any troughs) in performance. America has recently introduced literacy testing for would-be politicians. This is an interesting development!
Discovering your literacy skills are under par is an opportunity to improve them. If people are happy as they are, then that is fine. But with such low standards, a sub-literate population is a problem for everyone living in the UK.
The way forward is to start by improving the literacy of individuals. We have every confidence that our service will benefit your business. Should you wish to discuss your requirements, please call or e-mail. |
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