I have a thing about the lack of evaluation and assessment (E&A) of workplace training & learning, my problem I know. So while I am getting over that, lets be more positive and look at a few great ways to make your training & learning programmes stick.
Needless to say, there are many benefits of E&A, it will help employees & everyone else in your business to begin to see why training takes place, be more involved with the learning plans & objectives and best of all save training your budget. Notwithstanding the great return on investment. Learning engages people and as a result will more than likely improve their productivity and performance at work.
So here we go a few quick and easy steps to get measuring training at work.
- Proper training needs & skills gap analysis. If there is no needs or skills gap analysis, there is no understanding who needs training or development. A discussion with all the stakeholders involved and a plan to help the individuals development, what the return on investment looks like and to make targeted decisions for the best way forward. Staff team training needs should be reviewed as part of the performance and development review process via the one-to-one meetings and annual appraisal.
- Measure learning before pre & post training. Assessment of what learner knew about the topic before and after the training is a great place to start. Beware that the results can be inflated by 6 times if not careful. Happy sheets after training are also very limited due to various reason. Some may be the warm glow of a nice lunch! So factor in effective measures of training transfer and ultimately the proposed return on investment.
- Transferring Training & learning to work. In order to ensure your training has been effective, you need to do more than evaluate and assess. We need to take post-training time to help trainees transfer their new skills and knowledge to the workplace and to make these behavioural changes stick. You may need to help employees overcome certain obstacles to applying training to the job. Perhaps coaching & mentoring will help make the transfer of training knowledge stick. Certainly line managers taking an active interest on how the training is being applied to the workplace.
- Putting It All Together. Investing in people is a very wise decision for every organisation. Training makes better employees & people, better people make better companies. Try to keep in mind training is much more than a one off event. As methods and technologies need to keep changing with the way the organisation works. Companies that stay competitive invest in their employees by turning them into lifelong learners, whilst being engaged and the most valuable resource you have in your business.
This is a whistle stop tour of just a few effective methods of evaluating your training and assessing the people being trained. Indeed the importance of training employees both new and experienced cannot be overemphasised. Manager and supervisor training and development is equally important as orienting new employees in order to promote workplace safety, productivity, and satisfaction. So lastly here are a few more points to bear in mind to help your organisation make training the centre of your operations for staff and ultimately a more profitable future for your business.
- Make training & coaching a top priority at all levels of the organisation.
- Develop a training/coaching programs that meets needs and is customised to your company and its employees.
- Choose the correct training models for your training needs.
- Evaluate training at every level.
- Assist trainees as they transfer learned skills and behaviour into their work.
Needless to say this is just the tip of the iceberg for measuring your training & workplace development. Drop me a line to find out how we can help your business put the processes in place to relate learning outcomes to efficient business results.
