Vision

With the right help, any company can survive 2020

Jean-Claude Laurent has been the inspirer of Z-A Opleidingsmakelaar for years. With his company he organizes B2B training. His customers know they can count on him, because he always looks for the most appropriate training and trainer.

Since mid-March 2020, everything has changed, also for his company, but he did not throw in the towel.

With a few partners, he studied the current situation in the business world and devised solutions to help companies that are currently experiencing difficulties to emerge from this crisis period.

During a pleasant conversation, he tells us all about it.

According to you, the companies today can be divided into three categories.

Could you elaborate a little bit more on that?

Yes, when I look around me, I see companies that were not affected by the corona crisis. Some even did so well that their business figures skyrocketed.

But this was not the case for everyone.

Some companies remained more or less stable, but are now on their guard. They are paying very close attention to what they are doing and certainly do not intend to incur many costs.

And then you have the companies that are really struggling to keep their heads above water… They will be happy if they can close 2020 with as little loss as possible.

How did you experience this period?

We too came to a sudden standstill with Z-A Opleidingsmakelaar.. So we had to ‘reinvent’ ourselves.

For the first category of companies, we can continue to organize our training – obviously often online. They have a budget and are happy to invest it in their employees.

For the other categories of companies, we realize that training is not a priority right now. Certainly not for the companies for which the crisis is enormously severe.

These companies have no budget to spend on training or even on new recruits. They focus on turnover to keep their heads above water.

What can you do for them?

Companies that are struggling often do not know where their bottlenecks lie. We have developed an analysis tool to locate the company’s ‘entropy’ or inhibitions. When companies know where their bottlenecks lie, only then can they be eliminated.

With Z-A Opleidingsmakelaar, I do not work alone. I can count on a wide range of consultants and coaches, people with a lot of business experience, who advise these companies. They work with the company for a certain period of time and transfer their know-how.

I coordinate everything as a ‘multiple contractor’. You enter into a contract with me (from 3 months onwards) and I provide the right expertise.

For this analysis and guidance, companies can appeal to interesting subventions. We can help with the application of these.

I am convinced that in this way you open the eyes of companies and give them the courage to continue, once they know where they have to make changes.

But what about the companies that seem to be surviving the crisis, but are putting training on hold because they would rather tighten their belts?

From experience, I know that these companies do want to invest in training, but it must not take up too much time, cost too much and it must save the company money in the long run.

We developed shorter training courses for such companies. The company manager does not lose his employee for several days, but only for one day, for example. The trainee has already familiarised himself with the course through an online preliminary course and, after the training, can count on follow-up sessions where he will receive further personal coaching.

This investment does not have to hurt financially. We help the company look for subventions to ‘sponsor’ the training courses. Many company managers often do not know what they can do.

We also help them to identify the inhibiting factors in their management: getting rid of bad attitudes, learning new skills, coaching managers, etc.

To show what a training course should yield, we use the Kirkpatrick/Philips evaluation model. This way, the companies have a good idea in advance of what the new knowledge and the behavioural change can bring about in terms of ROI. After the training, assessment or consulting assignment, we look at whether we have achieved the intended goal.

A clear vision, if you ask me, but how do you pour this into a ’training form’?

We developed a number of new services outside our standard training programmes.

For example, there is the ‘B-Plan‘, where the B stands for boost.

This is where we, with a multi-headed contractor, temporarily give extra competence to the company to put it back on the map.

The ‘Sales and Marketing Assessment and Improvement Plan‘ is a way of training in which companies ask their own customers to participate during the customised training sessions. During role-plays with the customer, the (sales) employees learn new skills. Experience teaches us that customers are very receptive to this.

With the ‘Speed training for managers’ we teach managers a well-defined competence in three hours. This is done through personal coaching and a helpdesk afterwards.

And then we can also take a close look at the current skills and business competences in order to upgrade them to the desired level.

Obviously, we also have to give working from home the attention it deserves. To this end, we have meanwhile developed training courses such as time management for home workers, online meetings, approaching prospects online, etc.

And there are subsidies for all of this?
More than people think.

Most companies are familiar with the KMO-portefeuille, but not the workability cheques, for example. These have even been extended by corona. We work together with a ‘premium hunter’ who selects the appropriate subventions for our clients.

I am sure that with Z-A Opleidingsmakelaar, you can signifie a lot for companies that are having a hard time at the moment.

What should interested parties do?

They can call me at 0478 999 629 or e-mail me at jean-claude.laurent@opleidingsmakelaar.be to arrange an appointment, where I can explain all this in more detail. Without any obligation, of course.