【正文】 must keep abreast of changing Federal and State regulations and legislation that may affect employee benefits. Working with employee assistance plan managers or worklife coordinators, many benefits managers work to integrate the growing number of programs that deal with mental and physical health, such as employee assistance, obesity, and smoking cessation, into their health benefits programs. Employee assistance plan managers, also called employee welfare managers or worklife managers, are responsible for a wide array of programs to enhance employee safety and wellness and improve worklife balance. These may include occupational safety and health standards and practices, health promotion and physical fitness, medical examinations and minor health treatment, such as first aid, flexible work schedules, food service and recreation activities, carpooling and transportation programs such as transit subsidies, employee suggestion systems, child care and elder care, and counseling services. Child care and elder care are increasingly significant because of growth in the number of dualine households and the older population. Counseling may help employees deal with emotional disorders, alcoholism, or marital, family, consumer, legal, and financial problems. Some employers offer career counseling and outplacement services. In some panies, certain programs, such as those dealing with physical security or information technology, may be coordinated in separate departments by other managers. (See administrative services managers elsewhere in the Handbook.) Training and development. Training and development managers and specialists create, procure, and conduct training and development programs for employees. Managers typically supervise specialists and make budgetimpacting decisions in exchange for a reduced training portfolio. Increasingly, executives recognize that training offers a way of developing skills, enhancing productivity and quality of work, and building worker loyalty. Enhancing employee skills can increase individual and anizational performance and help to achieve business results. Increasingly, executives realize that developing the skills and knowledge of its workforce is a business imperative that can give them a petitive edge in recruiting and retaining high quality employees and can lead to business growth. Other factors involved in determining whether training is needed include the plexity of the work environment, the rapid pace of anizational and technological change, and the growing number of jobs in fields that constantly generate new knowledge and, thus, require new skills. In addition, advances in learning theory have provided insights into how people learn and how training can be anized most effectively. Training managers oversee development of training programs, contracts, and budgets. They may perform needs assessments of the types of training needed, determine the best means of delivering training, and create the content. They may provide employee training in a classroom, puter laboratory, or onsite production facility, or through a training film, Web videoondemand, or selfpaced or selfguided instructional guides. For live or inperson training, training managers ensure that teaching materials are prepared and the space appropriately set, training and instruction stimulate the class, and pletion certificates are issued at the end of training. For puterassisted or recorded training, trainers ensure that cameras, microphones, and other necessary technology platforms are functioning properly and that individual puters or other learning devices are configured for training purposes. They also have the responsibility for the entire learning process, and its environment, to ensure that the course meets its objectives and is measured and evaluated to understand how learning impacts performance. Training specialists plan, anize, and direct a wide range of training acti