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Company Plays Up Training
By: Crissa Shoemaker Debree
October 8, 2006 - Bucks County Courier Times
Employee training isn’t a game, but that doesn’t mean businesses can’t play games to train their employees.
That’s the philosophy at The Learning Key, an Upper Makefield company that specializes in designing instructional programs and consulting with businesses on employee training.
Until now, the company has targeted big businesses, which have more money to create employee- training programs. Starting next week, the company will begin offering programs through its Regional Business Alliance, a member-driven training and development consortium offering the same programs for less money.
“Some of our customers are quite large; they have the resources,” said Learning Key founder Liz Treher. “But some of the companies we work with are quite small and really don’t have the resources. They may only have had three people who needed to develop leadership skills.”
The alliance will “equalize the playing field” for small businesses, giving them the same resources as big businesses, she said.
The cost to join the alliance varies by what services a business wants, said Ed Demski, who handles sales and marketing for the alliance. The basic package starts at $2,500, but the final cost is determined by the client’s needs.
“We structure [the program] around what they want,” Demski said. “We take from the organization what they would like to incorporate.”
The regional business alliance will give smaller companies an edge, Demski said.
“One of the benefits to this is the fact that it is an affordable way for a smaller- to medium-sized company to have a bank of resources with The Learning Key,” Demski said. “They have ideas they would like to implement in their company specifically, and we can work with them.”
Besides training, the Regional Business Alliance will provide networking opportunities for members by telephone and an Internet-based message board, Treher said.
“Today, people are even more stretched [for time,]” Treher said. “People, from the convenience of their office or their home, can actually meet colleagues in other industries in similar roles and share ideas.”
Treher, a former chemist, founded The Learning Key in 1990. In addition to training programs, she has developed board games for the pharmaceutical, banking and manufacturing industries.
“People aren’t learning from 400 PowerPoint slides,” she said. “We take materials and translate them and package them in a way that people are learning to apply the information. One of those ways is through board games, where people actually experience what it might be to carry out a process or what it’s like to work in a specific industry.”
Other organizations, like the Lower Bucks County Chamber of Commerce, also provide training programs for businesses. Treher said the alliance isn’t meant to replace those programs, but to enhance them with one-on-one meetings and a curriculum tailored specifically to alliance members.
“Our mission is to help people and companies learn and grow,” she said, “in a different manner than they may have not considered before.”
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