Corporations in Hong Kong have increased budgets in employee training this year to the highest level in five years.

According to the 2008 Training and Development Needs Survey conducted by the Hong Kong Institute of Human Resource Management (HKIHRM), corporations in Hong Kong have increased on average their training budgets to a record five-year high of 3% of annual base salaries.

Among the 92 companies surveyed, 85% indicate that they have a formal training budget for 2008 and that the average ratio of this budget to total annual base salaries is 3%. This figure is 0.2 percentage points higher than last year and is also the highest since 2004. Sectors allocating a higher budget include construction / property development / real estate (4.7%), wholesale, import/export, trading (4.2%), and financial services / banking / insurance (3.6%).

The survey finds that among the 81 companies that provided data on the average number of training hours provide to employees, the number per employee per annum was 24.1 hours, while some 37% of respondents indicate that their employees received on average more than 20 training hours per annum. Sectors that tend to provide more employee training hours include business services / professional services (38.1 hours) and transport / services allied to transport (storage) (30 hours).

It is reported that at all levels, ethics / business conduct is a highly related topic in employee training conducive to organizational and business success. For management-level employees, organization culture/value/mindset is an important training topic, whereas customer service and product/ service knowledge are considered crucial training topics for staff at non-managerial level.

According to the survey findings, 75% of the respondents provide employee-development programmes to employees. The most common programmes are development of high-potential leaders / managers and development of high-potential staff.

HKIHRM comments that providing staff training helps companies secure their competitive edge by building a more competent workforce to support the sustainable development of the business. On the other hand, employees are encouraged to continue their life-long learning in order to equip themselves with skills and professional knowledge to secure their employability.