Executives’ beliefs about training: their moderating effect on the relation between work requirements and training expenditures in Quebec SMEs
This research aims to shed light on the effect of two factors on the SME’s level of investment in competency development : does the level of investment mirror work requirements and to what extent do management’s beliefs regarding the organizational benefits of development moderate the effect of work requirements, whether the organizations are legally obligated to invest or not. The factors considered for this research, which are based on the systemic approach, are the organization (link between work requirements and learning needs), the executive (its beliefs) and the environment (legal requirement). Data was collected by questionnaire among 287 Quebec SME executives. The results of the ordinal logistic regression are that: perceived work requirements influence the level of investment in competency development; the executives’ beliefs regarding the usefulness of competency development positively reinforce the effect of work requirements on the level of investment in training, whether or not organizations have a legal obligation to allocate a portion of their payroll to it; the relation between work requirements and level of investment in training persist notwithstanding fear of negative impacts from competency development.