Mode One: Intensive/Off-Site Programs
This form of training and education is often considered the Rolls Royce of employee development. It is very expensive and typically reserved for only the upper-level administrators of an organization. The training or education program may be held at an elegant hotel or even a resort. I worked for many years with a large energy company that conducted training programs for its senior administrators at beautiful resorts and spas in the Ozarks of Arkansas or at the Woodlands in Eastern Texas. Typically, these sites come fully equipped for the vacationing learner with golf courses, exercise facilities, and catered, gourmet meals.
Among those who work in nonprofit and governmental organizations, these off-site programs are more likely to be offered at less-expensive retreat sites or church camps. I have often worked with human service agencies that hold their training programs during the off-season at summer camp facilities. Participants cook their own meals, clean their own dishes, and provide their own evening entertainment. Much of this may occur around a fire in the wood-burning stove or fireplace—there being no other sources of heat! While these latter facilities are much more Spartan, they often generate a greater sense of camaraderie and provide fewer distractions and typically more intense learning than is the case with the much more luxurious corporate resorts. Regardless of the location, be it swank or sparse, this form of development is costly. Time must be allocated for these off-site programs. Furthermore, expensive trainers, educators or facilitators are often hired to conduct these programs.
Typically, the new administrator is sent off to either an educational program run by her parent company or to a program that involves administrators from many organizations. The internal executive program, run by the parent company, is particularly popular in very large international corporations. In smaller organizations, and in many nonprofit and governmental organizations, the new administrator is sent off with newly minted executives from other organizations to a regional or national institute. Programs of this latter type have been offered for many years by independent training institutions such as The Center for Creative Leadership and The NTL Institute, as well as by many respected graduate schools of management, for example, Harvard University, Stanford University and UCLA. In recent years, upper -level executives from other countries, such as Taiwan and Thailand, have come to the United States to engage in similar inter-institutional educational and training institutes. In many cases, these programs offer graduate degrees to compliment the rich inter-institutional and cross-cultural learning that occurs.
The internally run executive programs often last for several weeks. They are lengthy because in most instances they are designed to accomplish multiple goals. For instance, I conducted high-level management development programs for many years with a major high-tech company. The participants were all men and women who had been appointed during the previous three months to the position of vice president in one of the operational units of the corporation. These participants received training in strategic planning, making use of a computer-based simulation prepared by a prestigious business school. They also learned in how to work effectively in cross-disciplinary and cross-cultural teams.
