Organizational, job and personal predictors of employees' participation in training and development

Predictors of participation in training and development were examined. A sample of 2452 female and 2832 male fulltime Australian employees responded to a mail-out questionnaire and a year later 1592 women and 1852 men responded to a repeated data collection. Contemporaneous and longitudinal analyses showed that participation in training and development was predicted more by employee personal level factors of masculinity and use of career strategies and job level factors of managerial level and occupational level, than by perceived organizational level factors of training policies and promotion ladders. However, career encouragement was an important organizational level predictor, whereas personal factors of human capital had little effect and family factors were unimportant. The explanation of men's and women's training and development was similar, although job level factors indirectly disadvantaged women's participation in training and development compared to men's. The impact of processes by which employees come to participate in training and development was discussed, including skill requirements of jobs, instrumental behaviors of employees, and career cultures of organizations.