At Disney, you would be SHOCKED by how little training actually happens. Your local business probably does more mentoring, in reality, and so can't even comprehend how little they do. Videos in a room at DU, doesn't cut it. My Dad has problems 90% of the time when he buys something with an employee discount. Many can't even recognize the maingate, and so don't even know where to begin. The only place it regularly does not happen is the shop in Japan. He's been told he doesn't get a discount, told he doesn't get one on that particular item, told that if they go get their manager they will get in trouble, and every other excuse under the sun. To use an employee discount. Where in the real world do you have trouble with one of those? So how well, do you think they know the other tasks of their job?
In my Mom's last job she had to pass a special class. You would think that would equal training. No, it was a class for how one of the computer software packages worked. And that didn't tell her a darn thing about everything that needed to get done. Her first day in new job, was a Sunday when there was no one else of her type available to even ask questions of. She wasn't even told where the office was to report to, just Epcot-France. She needed a radio, no one ever asked if she had one, or if she knew how to use it. Also, when you are new they move you around as "temps." So one week you're in Epcot, the next week All Star Sports, the next week Liberty Square, where each of them operate under a different set of procedures, and if you aren't in a park, you are on your own, no one to ask. Everyone said my Mom was a great employee, and that's why she was recommended to do that job, but she spent the first couple months in tears because she didn't want to do a bad job and there were no resources available to help her. She'd call others of her type and a lot of them admitted they didn't know either. Eventually, she got a more permanent (lasted months instead of a week), temporary spot, and the front line CMs she interacted with were fabulous, so she was able to really learn so when she got her permanent post she knew what to do. But when she got there, she found that nothing except the most base level of tasks had been performed in over a year. When my Mom passed away, a couple of her co-workers were so shook up because they knew that without my Mom, things were going to go back to the way things were before she came...chaos.
When Disney altered their training, they did it at a time where there were a lot more full-time, career employees who were able to provide adequate on-location training. Those days are long gone, and in a world where CPs and IPs turn over 6 months, a year, there are few that are truly capable of providing it. There is little "institutional knowledge" remaining.
