| Author: | Fok, On-yi Veronica |
| Title: | Training in SMEs : the case of Hong Kong |
| Degree: | M.Sc. |
| Year: | 2000 |
| Subject: | Small business -- China -- Hong Kong -- Personnel management Employees -- Training of -- China -- Hong Kong Hong Kong Polytechnic University -- Dissertations |
| Department: | Multi-disciplinary Studies Department of Management |
| Pages: | ix, 93 leaves : ill. ; 30 cm |
| Language: | English |
| Abstract: | The small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are the largest sector of employers in Hong Kong. Though battered by financial turmoil swept through Asia in 1998, SMEs remain the most influential part of the territory's economy. They associate with a large number of people, which own skills and knowledge that contribute to the competitive advantage of the enterprises and the society as well. Recent years, the business community is facing a range of critical challenges continuously due to heightened internal or external competition and technological advancements causing our chronic labour shortages worsen. In this view, it comes to the time that training of workforce - an investment in human capital - should be given renewed importance to ensure the supply of home-gown high quality people needed for continuous economic growth. Training has much to offer to individuals, organizations and the society who wish to enhance productivity and competitiveness. The level of skills and knowledge acquisition that in turns affects the productivity depends on investment in training. Driven by the perceived need to boost the investment in training in order to create sufficient highly skilled workforce upon whom SMEs can draw to improve their competitiveness, the author of this study considered valuable to explore SMEs' actual provision of training made in monetary terms since we rarely have the information in the current literature. Similarly, it was necessary to understand the training practices in this sector. The more we know about their training behavior, the better the policy makers and educators can formulate future training strategies. The research here is to report the results from a study of the training efforts made at the SMEs in Hong Kong. It was found that the investment in training was more widespread among surveyed SMEs than previously thought. The training that took up in SMEs are most often relied on external sources and tended to be ad hoc, rarely having a conscious strategy in skills enhancement in the business plan. The follow-up interviews further revealed that the training practices were informal and unsophisticated compared with the Western standard. The biggest barrier to take up more training was the lack of time rather than cost constraints. At the macro level, we need a consistent and coherent training policy and long-term planning in human resource. It is necessary to encourage more investment in training as well as to diversify the training activities. Training would be of paramount importance to the overall efficiency and profitability of SMEs. |
| Rights: | All rights reserved |
| Access: | restricted access |
Files in This Item:
| File | Description | Size | Format | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| b15057562.pdf | For All Users (off-campus access for PolyU Staff & Students only) | 3.27 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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