Running head: TRAINING MODULE

Training Module: Teaching the New Ways of Old Business

Komal S Patel

Kathy Milhauser

Post University
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Training Manual: Teaching the New Ways of Old Business

Many companies have training manuals, and information for the new hires, and to be

used as reference material for seasoned employees. Companies like Southern Pharma have had

the same people working since it first opened, and have never thought of keeping a record of

pertinent information. Being a company that is assisting the general public with health concerns,

diet plans, and natural supplements, it is more than crucial that all customer facing employees

have the necessary information. The end of 2016 brought about change for the company

including several new hires, requiring that such information exist for current and future

reference. The recent new hires have been having a very difficult time getting up to speed and

keeping tracking of the correct policies and procedures as there is a lot of conflicting information

presented by word of mouth, by creating a comprehensive training manual, all parties can learn

and ensure the highest quality of service to the customer base for the company.

Stakeholders

Due to the very small nature of the company, every employee becomes a stakeholder in a

project like this one. There are 17 employees total, and each one needs to be aware of how all the

policies work, and can in turn affect their daily operational activities. Investopedia defines

operation activities as the core business activities, such as manufacturing, distributing,

marketing and selling a product or service (Unknown, n.d.). First and foremost the instructional

designer/project manager is a stakeholder in this project as it is their job and completing it

successfully is important to their livelihood. The other major stakeholders are the customer

service representatives, (CSRs), the CSR supervisor, and the two CSR managers. These

stakeholders revolve around why the training manual is being created. Many of the CSRs do not
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have the adequate reference material for how they need to do their jobs without error, and the

supervisors and managers are held accountable when something does go awry. The remaining

stakeholders are the quality control team (QC), shipping team, CEO, Owner and customers. The

QC and shipping teams need the CSRs to conduct orders, process returns and log complaints

properly so they can be handled quickly and efficiently, but if there are multiple ways to

complete these, it can cause confusion, and in turn affect the customers. The customers, are the

entire reason any of these people, and the company are able to do what they do. The CSRs need

to be able to take care of the customers to keep orders coming in and fueling the company,

currently the 4 CSRs give conflicting information to customers or treat them differently, and

sometimes it is the same customer being handled by all four, there is no uniform way to address

them. All of this comes back and the CEO and Owner, who are very hands on. By keeping

customers happy, it trickles up to the CSRs, then continually up the chain to the CEO and finally

the owner.

Technology Component

The technology component involves not only the software involved in the the contents of

the training manual, but how it will be delivered. The training will be presented on Google Docs,

and include video and audio components to allow for the learners to have different ways of

getting the information, they could read the manual, and rely solely on words, but also video and

audio to guide the different learners through using the software and conducting the operational

activities. Presenting it through a cloud-based program, like Docs, helps it to be accessible in

many formats. There is one CSR who refuses to read anything on a computer, and can print out

the document. A second CSR prefers written instructions rather than video, audio or powerpoint,
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so she can read the written information. The remaining two are very tech-savvy and are

comfortable learning by watching videos, listening to audio, reading and accessing materials on

the computer. The information will be shared through communal access points, email, and

Basecamp a project management cloud-based program. Email is already something that all the

CSRs are familiar with and can use comfortably. Basecamp is a place where information can be

stored for access at any time, the ability to email links to the documents so they can be accessed

easily.

Work Breakdown Structure

Project Scope

The main goal is to create a comprehensive employee training manual that covers not

only the basics, but all the intricacies of the systems used for daily operational activities.

The current main problem is the lack of communications between colleagues, and

department heads. Much of the pertinent information is compartmentalized and not accessible by

anyone. Part of this is that information is kept mentally, without proper logging of information,

there would be no record of it, if that person left the company. By creating a manual of all the

information needed for operational activities, and opening communications to all employees and

department heads the information can be gathered and added to the manual so all current and

future employees have one centralized location for information.

Requirements

In order to complete the project successfully there are several tasks and sub-tasks that

need to be completed, which will be covered later in the work breakdown structure (WBS). One

of the main issues with getting this project done in a reasonable time frame is that it it to be
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completed along with all the other daily and immediate responsibilities of a customer service

representative (CSR), this allows for maybe 2 hours, 3 on a slower day, of project work to be

done in a standard 8 hour work day. The information on what these tasks and subtasks are and

how long they are projected to take is outlined in the chart below.

TASKS SUBTASKS HOURS TO COMPLETE

Compile diet info Read and notate all 3 120

diet books on
pertinent information
scan/copy useful
charts and graphics
Summarize important
concepts

Compile product info Pinpoint buzzwords 60

create a quiz

Audio & written components Using the phone and 40

for phone calls voicemail system.
Greeting customers
and sign offs on calls
Taking orders

Video & written components Create videos for both 120

for order creation software programs on
creating:
Orders
Returns
Tracking
packages

Aside from knowing the basic product information, this is the most important part of the

training, as this is how the revenue is generated for the company, having the most ways for the

learner to get this information is critical, since it will be used for future employees, which are
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unknown factors for the project manager/instructional designer.

The cost of this project will be minimal, all the work will be done by a salaried employee,

as a side project, that would otherwise cost roughly $14,000 if paid the same rate to a separate

employee at a similar rate. All the elements will also be created within freeware software, saving

on costs that could vary greatly depending on how expensive software for video capture, or audio

capture runs. But a good estimate of that could be around $800 for all the software necessary.

Work Breakdown Structure

Below is the work breakdown structure, including all the task and their subtasks that need

to be completed for the project. Much of this information is compiled through a thorough task

analysis. Task analysis for instructional design is a process of analyzing and articulating the

kind of learning that you expect the learners to know how to perform (Jonassen, Tessmer &

Hannum, 2009, p. 3).

RESOURCE TASKS SUBTASKS

ER4YT book Extract written info Extract charts and images

LR4YT book Extract written info Extract charts and images

CYGD book Extract written info Extract charts and images

BT products Summarize functionality of Pinpoint buzzwords for each

products product

Targeted Products Summarize functionality of Pinpoint buzzwords for each

products product

GT Products Summarize functionality of Pinpoint buzzwords for each

products product

GURU software Detailed information on Get information on

inputting information into troubleshooting common
software customer errors/complaints
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Misc Resources Compile links and shared

login information for online
resources

Phone Create proper etiquette and Create sample calls for audio
phone procedures for components
handling customers

Orders Information on creating Create sample orders for

order, returns and tracking video components in both
packages in both softwares software
available for order
management

Project Components

Communication Plan

The environment of Southern Pharma is one that has been functioning with the same staff

for more than 8 years, until October of 2016 when they brought on their first of 3 newcomers. It

became apparently that within this environment there were certain things that will need to take

precedence while tackling the training material. One of these crucial elements is communication

plan, there is a lack of communication not only between the CSRs but the managers as well.

There did not seem to be any formal or informal means of ensuring every one was on the same

page regarding company policies, procedures, and even schedules. Effective communications

between managers and those under him/her is important because it helps to set the tone of how

work is conducted in the environment Siegall & Gardner, (2000), once a leader has established

open communication with followers and acted in accordance with the goal or mission to which

s/he has ascribed, thereby establishing perceptions of leader integrity, followers will be more

likely to feel empowered in their work (as cited in Smothers, Doleh, Celuch, Peluchette, &
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Valadares, 2016, p. 484). There are a myriad of other reasons why effective communication and

having a plan or method of communication is important. For this particular environment, being a

small pharmaceutical company, there are FDA policies and regulations that need to be followed.

If new hires, or even seasoned employees are not being told about these, or about policy updates,

it can cause significant issues for the company.

The communication plan for this company does not need to be overly complicated, as

there are not many people who even need to be regularly in touch, there are the 4 CSRs, and two

managers. Emails, while effective, do tend to get lost and forgotten about with the volume of

other responsibilities that the CSRs have, verbal conversations cause detailed information to

simply be forgotten by the limitations of the human mind. For this company, there is a

project/team management software available called Basecamp. This is a cloud-based software

where the CSRs and Managers can upload documents, have a combined discussion/chat, and

individual chat messages. The great thing about this software is that it can be set to regularly

email reminds, push notifications, and internal (Basecamp) notifications on items that need to be

taken care of or addressed. Having this automated system to remind the CSRs and managers of

tasks and document reviews might be exactly what is needed to ensure that everyone is on the

same page.

Schedule Development

One of the next components that is extremely important for DPN is schedule

development. For most projects that have been started within the company, there has not been a

strict deadline set, so these projects usually get either left behind, or pushed back until a person

remembers to implement it. For this training document it is important to set these deadlines and
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complete the project in a timely manner. There are more changes occurring in the company, two

more people have been hired since October 2016, and there plans for more changes in the

coming months. Cox (2009) discusses the steps that are important to developing a schedule, for

this particular environment and project the organizational-process assets, and activity list will

play a very important role. This is a solo project, where one individual is doing all of the

developing that needs to be assessed and approved by two managers. This sole project manager

needs to learn about the organizations policies, guidelines, procedures, plans, and/or standards

for conducting work(p. 91) as outlined for organizational-process assets, and set the activity

list, where she will outline all the scheduled activities to be performed for the project(Cox,

2009, p.92) and complete this after setting a firm schedule, and using the communication plan to

get the management to adhere to both that plan and the schedule.

Collecting Requirements

Though the task seems straightforward, create a training manual covering all information

pertinent to customer service representatives (CSRs), and their operational activities, there is still

much more to the project. The project manager needs to get, from her superiors, the information

relating to all project and product requirements... and that they are ...recorded and analyzed to

fully understand the needs and expectations of the sponsor, customers, and other stakeholders

(Cox, 2009, p. 66). For this project there are many different topics to cover that a CSR would

need to be able to handle. The company relies on these representatives to keep sales up, and

customers happy in order to drive profits. If they do not have all the information necessary to

carry out these daily tasks, it could spell disaster for the profit margin, and for the companys

existence.
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By completing these components the other parts of the project will fall into place and be

completed without much difficulty.

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References

Cox, D.M.T (2009). Project management skills for instructional designers: A Practical Guide.

Bloomington, IL: IUniverse.

Jonassen, D., Tessmer, M., & Hannum, W. (2009). Task Analysis Methods for Instructional

Design.

Mahwah, NJ. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Smothers, J., Doleh, R., Celuch, K., Peluchette, J., & Valadares, K. (2016). Talk Nerdy to me:

The role of intellectual stimulation in the supervisor-employee relationship. Journal Of

Health And Human Services Administration, 38(4), 478-508.

Unknown. (n.d). Operating Activities. Investopedia. Retrieved from

http://www.investopedia.com/terms/o/operating-activities.asp.