Given the relative informality of selection criteria used to predict success on the job, it is perhaps no surprise that many small businesses rely on training programs to help prepare their staff for the demands of the job or that it takes a long period of time before employees are fully prepared for the job. In terms of training, 61.6% of the employers sampled suggest that the most common method of training their most skilled employee is to have someone in the firm work with the new employee and another 13.5% report allowing employees to learn through actually performing the job (on-the-job performance). An additional 11.3% of the sample utilizes outside vendors for training their most skilled workers