Q: "What if I train my people and they leave?"
A: "What if you don't train them and they stay?"

It's a common lament among all small businesses. But the bigger question is, can you afford NOT to train your staff? Staff that feel valued are likely to be more loyal and productive than those who feel the relationship is merely transactional and therefore simply show up to receive a pay check at the end of the week.

There are dozens of ways to engender staff loyalty, like offering incentives or implementing reward and recognition programs. Training is also a legitimate loyalty garnering activity that has instant benefits for both you and your staff. Most surveys of employees conducted by corporations and recruitment agencies indicate overwhelmingly that money alone is not the greatest incentive to stay with a company.

The opportunity to learn and thereby contribute to the business fares much higher on the list. Of course, training people can lead to increases in pay commensurate with the newly acquired skills, and the Awards system that covers hospitality and cellar doors demonstrates this quite clearly.

And as far as running the risk of losing your trained staff to other establishments, consider the bigger picture: the more well trained staff working in your region, the better the overall standard and the better the results for all.

Value of Training
Successful wine tourism enterprises understand the value of educated staff and conduct regular in-house training programs, often supplemented by external programs, to ensure skills are up to speed. This learning culture is fostered at every level so that continual learning becomes embedded in the job. For small wineries in particular, the ability of staff to sell is absolutely essential.

There is a range of training options available to cellar doors - from tailored workshops and programs to nationally accredited certificate courses run through TAFE colleges, Universities and Registered Training Organisations.

Training Basics
A set of Standard Operating Procedures is an ideal training reference, and if you plan to become quality certified, or even enter business awards programs, they will be essential. Simply put, Standard Operating Procedures cover every aspect of the business and provide a detailed set of instructions for doing virtually everything. In the case of handling hazardous materials, Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) will also be included. (See Business Planning Section for more information on compiling Standard Operating Procedures).

The modern cellar door facility will need staff with a range of skills. These include:

• Responsible service of alcohol
• Sensory evaluation of wine
• Product knowledge (wine, history, company culture)
• Local tourism knowledge
• General knowledge (regional and Australian)
• Retail selling skills
• Advanced customer service skills
• Presentation skills
• Understanding visitor motivations
• Supervisory and management skills
• Literacy and numeracy skills
• Computer knowledge.

Learning by "osmosis" is a common way to passively teach people what you do. That's great if you have the luxury of time and a very skilled operator from whom to learn. However, many of the skills required to deliver exceptional cellar door experiences will need to be outsourced.

First Step
The first step is simply to identify the kinds of skills you need your staff to have and conduct a skills audit. Find out who can do what and identify the gaps. Then look within your business to see where you have people with the appropriate knowledge to impart. This will form part of your Training Plan.

For example, Responsible Service of Alcohol certificates can only be obtained by attending courses approved or conducted by Liquor Licensing, whereas the winemaker could provide product knowledge on your wine range. The staff member can only acquire some things over time themselves, like general knowledge, which is something you can screen for on recruitment. For the other skill sets, professional private and public trainers can provide hands-on, practical training courses and workshops.

The decision to utilise accredited training versus non-accredited and in-house training is a matter of choice, depending on the needs of your business and individual employees. In larger companies, a structured training program that leads to improved employment opportunities within the company and perhaps forms part of an enterprise agreement will be most relevant. In small wineries, management must evaluate whether there is sufficient expertise in-house to provide relevant training in the first place.

Cross Training or Multi-skilling
As cellar doors increasingly take on additional facilities such as food outlets, function facilities, accommodation and guided tours, there is a greater demand for staff to have a range of skills that are not just wine related. In fact, multi-skilling your staff can increase loyalty and create the opportunity of packaging a job that offers greater hours, flexibility and interest than would be the case in having a number of casuals working only in their respective areas of expertise.

There are significant advantages in this approach: staff can cover each other on leave absences and breaks; staff are more motivated; a career path is possible; increased loyalty due to greater job satisfaction; better understanding between staff; costs can be amortised over several areas of the business; and there is opportunity to create permanent part time and full time positions.