Top 8 Training Resources for Small Businesses

You don’t have to feel limited by a modest training budget. Many managers face a similar scenario when searching for effective employee education and development tools.

There are many online and in-person training resources to fuel your ongoing training and professional development plans. We’ve gathered eight of our favorites, and welcome you to bookmark them all as building blocks for your team’s training resource library.

The Training & Development World

This outstanding site warehouses valuable training resources for managers and learners alike. Browse their articles, library, FAQs, printed publications, and training takeaways for a full spectrum of training assistance.

Free Management Library

If you’re new to the principles or methodologies of training and development, this is an excellent – and well-organized – site for managers. It’s also a great quick-reach resource for experienced managers seeking a new training approach or insight into how they can connect with their employees’ learning styles more effectively.

Training Journal

Stay ahead of emerging trends in the world of training by consulting this site’s posts from industry leaders. They cover an impressive range of training-related topics.

Businessballs.com

Funny name. Invaluable library. Many training needs can be addressed within this site’s pages. Explore further, and you’ll find even more great stuff for adding energy and – yes – fun to the training you provide. From icebreaker games to overviews of methodologies, Businessballs has it all.

The Management Center

If you’re looking for feedback tools, this page has you covered. You’ll find templates for performance evaluations and even tips on delivering quality critiques.

Dale Carnegie Training

Dale Carnegie’s online library of free publications is a tremendous resource from one of the most recognized names in the business of business training. Be sure to check out their entire Resources page for insightful material to aid in your own development as a trainer.

edX

Access a multitude of online classes from top universities from a single site. edX constantly adds new courses for virtually every area of study. If it can be learned, you can probably find it here.

KnowledgeWave

We hope you don’t mind a little self-promotion. We’ve helped organizations of every size – and every budget – achieve their software training goals. Our mix of online and in-person training fits any schedule as well. And with affordable monthly pricing, it's easily within reach. 

A few more tips

Outside of those online training resources, you can make the most of what you have readily available. Here are a few additional methods for expanding your training with a limited budget:

• Savvy managers source their top performers to serve as peer-based trainers or internal champions. This is ideal for systems education, skills training, and mentoring new hires.
• Inspire and deepen discussions about certain topics in your training plan by incorporating high-quality presentations, like TED Talks.
• Survey your team for skills and industry knowledge they’d like to learn. Taking it a step further, you could ask them to research a topic to teach one another. Here is a handy guide for setting up a survey in Excel. (By the way, we have a training video on how to do this. Sign up for a free trial to watch it.)
  
• Attend local seminars for insight into trends in your industry. If the cost to send the whole team is too high, elect a member of the team to attend and ask them to report what they learned back to your team.
• If a full-fledged learning management system (LMS) is out of the question, you can still track and organize your training efforts using Excel’s training log. It’s free, and conveniently found in the application’s template library.

A limited budget doesn’t have to limit how effectively you train and develop your employees. The ideas and resources above should give you a wealth of information, tools, and guidance. When combined, you’ll be able to provide quality training your team will appreciate.