Training? Why, wasn't college enough?

A news story in rediff today says that IT companies consider employee training low priority. I agree. My experience has been that a new employee is expected to 'just know' everything that is required for his job. Often there will be some technical training in the domain of the project, but that is pretty much it. The larger companies even have a couple of months of training sessions, which are supposed to bring even non-computer science graduates up to speed on IT, after which they join alongside their CS-grad brethren in projects. I don't doubt that the technical training they get is decent enough and comprehensive enough to work on the outsourced projects. (Remember my thesis that it is the fringe and 'simpler' part of any project that generaly gets outsourced.)

The area where training usually falls short is the Culture training. I don't mean stuff like which-hand-to-hold-the-fork and what-dress-code-to-be-followed. The working culture of a professional organization is very different from the cool, somewhat laidback environment of a college. The ground rules for interaction with colleagues and customers are more formal and rigid, even though they may not be spelt out explicitly. But these details are usually explained through informal sessions with senior employees in the project, not through any formal training. And this is where new employees usually trip up. Remember that the only way customers know the project team members is through their phone conversations, emails and chat. Special care needs to be taken in this respect. Yet these issues are skipped over entirely in the training sessions, and usually there isn't even any documentation explaining the details that experienced people take for granted.

I will list out the particulars of the unwritten codes of conduct in the next few posts. Comments and additions to the list are always welcome.