The Police College will officially roll out the newly-developed Training Management System (TMS) in January next year, following successful trial runs in Western District, Hong Kong Island Region and Crime Wing.

The TMS has been developed in-house by the Police College to:

* streamline the administrative, application and nomination procedures for the training courses organised by the Training Authorities in the Force or by the Civil Service Training Development Institute;

* promote self-directed learning among Force members;

* facilitate re-imbursement of course fees or examination fees, and

* provide a centralised database of training courses and officers' training records.

In preparation for implementing TMS Force-wide, the Police College converted the training records of all Force members from PICS to TMS in June last year. In the following month, the college tried out TMS in Western District. After this trial run, a number of enhancements were made to the system.

In May this year, TMS was further tried out in Hong Kong Island Region and Crime Wing, and the feedback from user Formations has been favourable.

Superintendent Chan Wan-lung from the Police College's Police Operational Learning Division is the System Controller of TMS, who is responsible for drawing up policies and procedures for system usage, security control and data maintenance, and oversees the TMS Team to be set up upon implementation of TMS.

SP Chan said that the launching in January next year would form the phase I development of TMS, and phase II would start a few months later when TMS would be extended to cover the courses organised by the Weapon Training Division and applications for re-imbursement of course or examination fees.

The main features of TMS are as follows:

Web-based System

Unlike the majority of the present Force major computer systems, TMS is web-based and individual officers will possess a personal email account. All TMS correspondence will be personalised and will interact directly with individual officers. Through POINT from Home, officers can also make use of home computers to gain access to TMS.

Automation of Training Management

The present different levels of General Registries (GRs) with a great volume of paper circulation will be wholly replaced by the automation of TMS. The paperless mechanism drastically decreases the great amount of paperwork and almost 90 per cent of the present application procedures will be processed within the system. Filing of training records is also automatic and individual officers and their senior officers are also able to view or retrieve training history from the system.

Manpower Management

All training authorities of TMS will generate enrolment or nomination procedures at least eight weeks before commencement of a training course. Two weeks prior to the course, all successful applicants or candidates and their GRs will receive confirmation messages. Individual officers' and their supervisors' training diaries will be automatically updated. GR or administrative staff is given a Super User account to view these training arrangements, which in turn facilitates the deployment of duties. Supervising officers, by making use of TMS, can manage the training activities of their subordinates and allow more training opportunities to polish up their troops.

Encouraging Self-directed Learning

Almost 90 per cent of Force training activities is going to route through TMS to qualified or eligible individuals who meet the selection criteria. Individual officers will base on their own training needs, job requirements and personal considerations, such as timing, areas of interest and training background, etc., to enrol in the courses. An adult learner will gain the most from training activities, which are self-directed as he or she will attend with self-motivation and learning objective.

Training Need Analysis

There are almost 35,000 Force members, including Regular, Auxiliary and Civilian, using TMS to enrol in training activities. Officers should not be discouraged by their failure to apply courses. Each of their failed attempts will be picked up by TMS, which will become a vital part of Training Need Analysis. It is obvious that Training Authorities will base on this Training Need Analysis to organise training programmes with appropriate frequency to address the training needs of Force members.

Comprehensive Database

TMS automates the collection, collation, analysis and dissemination of all training data. Apart from submission of training statistics to the Central Government, it also provides Force management an analysis of training related surveys which will assist in formulating future human resource development issues.

E-User Guides and FAQs are now available at the TMS Portal for users' easy reference. A TMS hotline, 2860-3891, and a TMS Helpdesk, tms-helpdesk@police.gov.hk, have been set up to answer queries of TMS-related matters.

SP Chan Wan-lung is the System Controller of TMS