Professional training

On the matter of professional development, I share with Paul the same view that focusing on job-related training can benefit employees more, because I am convinced that today's job market cherishes specialty more than versatility. As technology advances and the division of labor increases, companies, especially those in high-tech industries, are hiring more and more people specializing in their respective fields, such as programming, engineering and medicine. In this case, job-related training offers people the opportunity to improve their expertise, and thus their competitiveness on the job market. Indeed, just as Paul points out, training programs not directly job-related may help employees secure promotions or land on better jobs; however, if they are not excellent at what they do, managerial or interpersonal skills won’t save their skins when a massive layoff hits their companies. Therefore, I highly recommend that employees should put more effort on improvement of their own specialties rather than on becoming “omnipotent” laborers.