Abstract:

In today’s highly competitive global marketplace, workplace training and continuous learning of employees in the relevant areas became essential for organizations. There is a continuous need to ensure effective workplace training to match up with such market requirements, most importantly for the necessary survival. Workplace training is an important means of improving employees’ skills throughout their careers and fostering organizational development. Nevertheless, it is one of the most important challenges faced by organizations in the Middle East region.

Across the Middle East region nowadays, there is a substantial investment in education and significant improvement in access to education at all levels, in terms of enrollment rates and literacy rates. However, employers often identify lack of the right skills as a barrier to employability and business growth. Furthermore, employers’ level of concern about employees’ skills does not show to be matched by similar level of commitment to provide on-the-job learning opportunities for employees. It seems that organizations in the Arab region are less likely than organizations in other regions to provide training in terms of quality and frequency.

This paper explores the challenges and opportunities of workplace training in some countries in the Middle East. The paper also highlights the importance of exerting efforts to expand workplace training opportunities and to make them more relevant to employers’ needs, as well as for employability and career advancement. Recommendations are proposed for organizations in the Middle East to help addressing the workplace training challenges and building a culture of continuous learning.

Keywords:

Continuous learning, training and development, Arab Middle East, workplace training, on-the-job learning.