August 11, 2003

Employee ’In-House’ Training Program Named ‘Best Practice’

BOISE, ID – The Department of Administration’s ‘In-House’ Training Program where employees share their expertise to train peers in classes on computer applications, project and time management, photography, and business writing has been recognized nationally.

The National Association of State Chief Administrators (NASCA) selected the Idaho agency’s program as a “Best Practice” for other state governments to emulate across the country.

Each year, as part of NASCA’s Outstanding Awards Program, states are invited to submit nominations that provide creative solutions to assure continuance of needed services and help leverage limited resources and taxpayer dollars. Major consideration is given to those programs that are readily adaptable to other states. NASCA will recognize the programs at its annual meeting the end of August. According to Pam Ahrens, Department Director, the state’s current budget crisis all but eliminated employee training dollars, but thanks to the creativity and dedication of Department of Administration employees, important skills courses continued to be provided. “This was such a success that our Human Resources office will be working with our employees to develop a fall/winter offering – repeating some of the highly requested classes as well as offering new ones.”

The department’s program was developed at no cost through the efforts of its Human Resources Manager, Rebecca Fry, who worked closely with employee volunteers who served as ‘professors’. “The success of this program is directly attributable to their involvement,” Fry said. “They developed the full course, the handouts and guides, and created a relaxed learning environment. They were incredible, and deserve a big ‘thank you’ for their time, effort, and talents,” she added. The department’s network employees helped by rounding up older, available PC’s to set up a no-frills, “Learning Lab” in the basement of the State Employee Capitol Garage.

Program summaries of the “Best Practice’ states along with the two NASCA Outstanding Program Award winners, are on the NASCA website at: http://www.nasca.org/awards/awards.cfm.