21 Frontline Employee Training and Skills Statistics

Skills development and frontline employee training are increasingly viewed by deskless employees as an important indicator of how invested companies are in developing the individual talent of employees.

In fact, one in three employees view frontline employee training, learning systems and development opportunities as one of the top three factors that motivates them to stay with their current employer.

Below we look at 21 important statistics that re-inforce the importance of frontline employee training and skills development, as an important component of employee engagement.

  1. Employee retention: companies with strong learning cultures increase their employee retention rates by 30% to 50%.
  2. Lack of workplace training: companies that want to standout in this aspect of employee engagement simply need to take note of the fact that 59% of companies offer no specific workplace training to their employees.
  3. Budgetary constraints: as much as 39% companies report that inadequate training and skills development opportunities are the result of budget cuts.
  4. Self-paced: as many as 58% of employees prefer to learn or train at their own speed.
  5. E-learning: when training material is made available on a digital employee engagement platform, for example, companies experience a 75% increase in terms of employees accessing the material.
  6. Untapped potential: 74% of employees think they have more to offer their employer and this can be unlocked with more training.
  7. Personalisation: as much as 75% of skills and training professionals believe delivering personalised employee training and learning is the biggest future challenge.
  8. Personal contribution: as many as 72% of employees have considered contributing to the cost of their own skills training, underscoring how much these opportunities are valued.
  9. Improved performance: companies that offer training see employee productivity increase by 17%, and the busines sis 21% more profitable.
  10. Employee satisfaction: workers are eager to learn and grow, and 70% of them would quit their current position to work for an organisation that places a high priority on employee development.
  11. High costs: the cost to replace a trained employee can exceed 200% of their annual salary.
  12. Career advancement: employees who feel they are progressing in their careers as a result of training and skills development are 19% more likely to stay with their company.
  13. Formal structures: only 50% of companies have formal training and skills development programmes in place, which extend beyond statutory training requirements for employees.
  14. On the job: 68% of workers want to be trained at work (preferably whilst conducting their daily work routine).
  15. Leadership: estimates suggest that 58% of supervisors who lead one or more workers have received no formal leadership training.
  16. Role-specific training: 34% of employees feel that the specific training they receive helps them better fulfil their roles.
  17. Proactive training: in some industries skills requirements for certain jobs have changed by as much as 25% in the past decade, necessitating ongoing training to remain competitive.
  18. Artificial intelligence: it is predicted that between 2024 and 2031, the incorporation of artificial intelligence into digital corporate training and development platforms will grow at 7% annually.
  19. Learning hours: the amount of time spent by employees in training and skills development activities at companies focused on employee development has grown by 110% over the past decade.
  20. Stagnation: despite the importance of skills development only 39% of employees acknowledge learning something new in the past 30 days.
  21. Insufficient investment: Only 5% of business executives strongly agree that their company is investing enough in helping people gain new skills to keep up with the rapidly changing nature of work.

The numbers don’t lie! These statistics clearly demonstrate the value of investing in employee development. For companies who want to attract the best talent and remain at the competitive edge of their industry, skills development and frontline employee training must form part of their employee offering.

Let’s connect to upskill and improve your frontline workforce today.