Development and Training of Operational Staff in the Retail Segment in the Czech Republic

This study introduces these issues: the quality of corporate training of operational staff and their education system, efforts and tries to reconcile the needs of operational staff, the confrontation with the declared educational policy, or with the lack of corporate culture and the knowledge management. Indeed, these are objectives for the so called knowledge based economy, and transformations toward a (self-) learning organization. As the methodology for research part in our study a hypothetical knowledge base, which in terms of the adult education and personnel management can be considered as fundamental and should be possessed by the managing employee, so the corporate education could exist in some form, was assumed. The hypothesis of this certain mindset playing role in managing knowledge was verified in practice through a research in concrete commercial companies. The aim of this study is to consider a broader view onto education of operational staff, as also managers of corporate training make their decisions in a broader context (of corporate policy or their individual knowledge base). Research has shown that the hypothesis of a certain mindset was right, as well as the hypothesis, that training of operational workers is underestimated. Other theses were also proven: e.g. employee motivation or obstacles in education. The conclusion of this paper brings not only a summary of knowledge-managing theories and their comparison, but also a confrontation of employment policy with the real state documented through research. Especially the system approach to corporate training is emphasized, as there is assumed, that the operational staff is a system unit of the employee system and may not be omitted.