7 Responses

1. Evaluation
   Hi Barbara

   I run one on complete evaluation. concentrating on defining critical success factors and later measuring it against this. Don’t know if thats the sort of thing your looking for. You can find details on the toolkit version at http://www.supremacytraining.com. If you’d like to talk more, contact me at Rich.Lucas@blueyonder.co.uk

   All the best

   Rich

2. A couple of options…
   Hi Barbara

   I may be able to help – draft of course info at http://www.5boxes.com/mc

   Also check out Robert Brinkerhoff’s Success Case Method – book at amazon – http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/1576751856

   Info on my approach published last year on trainingzone.co.uk at

   Part 1 – https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=135396
   Part 2 – https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=135728
   Part 3 – https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=136034
   Part 4 – https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=136342

   You can also take a look at what Fenman have – http://www.fenman.co.uk

   Finally, I have a pile of stuff that may help you decide on specific needs (either met by me or others) at http://www.5boxes.com/resources

   Good Luck!!

3. Recomendation
   I recommend that you check the courses offered by Langevin http://www.langevin.com.
   I also strongly recommend that you read the book (Training Ain’t Performance) Published by ASTD.
   Good Luck

4. Useful reading
   Hi Barbara,

   It might be useful for you to check out books written by Jack Phillips. He’s done a lot of work on ROI & more specifically how to measure the impact of softer skills development (the following link takes you to a selection on Amazon – http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index=books-uk&field-author=Phillips%2C%20Jack%20J./203-7844325-7008713).

   There is a course run by Franklin Covey, which helps put it all into practice.
   Go to their website – http://www.franklincoveyeurope.com.

   My simplest approach is to get the business to define what they want to be different as a result of the development work & therefore how they will measure it’s success. They always have some targets that they want to achieve (though it takes a while to educate that thinking) & it helps better define the development work to be done.

   Hope this helps,

   Esther

5. A short course does exist
   Barbara, first there is a great book by Paul Kearns – “Measuring Your ROI in Training”. Second, if you go to the Fenman website (.co.uk I think)you will find that they run workshops a couple of times a year and Paul Kearns covers this specific subject. I also recommend having a look at how your business (or client) measures its performance (the numbers). The approach I would take would be to take a baseline measure on some of the key indices that business leaders believe the training intervention is supposed to impact on and get a responses as to “by how much”. Translate this into the key performances, skills, knowledge etc that will impact on this business performance and then develop the training to target those specific areas. At an agreed interval after the training remeasure the business performance and the improvement (assuming there is some). Additionally, if you can get into a conversation about the perceived ‘value’ of the increased performance you can try to calculate an ROI cost benefit analysis which is very valuable when you are negotiating the budget for the training intervention. One final thought. This of course is all based on the presumption that it is a performance issue that ‘training’ can fix. If its down to something else the intervention is NOT a training one, or at least not one targeted at the original target population, but perhaps higher up the organisation(?).

   Hope this helps. Good luck.

6. Training course on evaluation and assessment
   My colleague attended the CIPD course – Training Evaluation and Assessment and the feedback was very good. The course is listed on their website – http://www.cipd.co.uk/CMSTraining/coure_review

7. Bespoke Evaluation…Evaluate what you need to
   Adding to the book list first…’Evaluating Training’ by Peter Bramley or ‘Training Needs Analysis and Evaluation’ by Francis & Roland Bee are both useful texts.

   The National School of Government run a good evaluation course, it is part of their CIPD Certificate in Training Practice programme.

   The drawback with many such courses however is that they cover the ‘key theory’ and ‘general practice’, leaving you to formulate your own evaluation strategy and determine how you will approach the thorny issue of calculating ROI. My advice would be to look for a course that offers a practical workshop element, preferably one that has been designed specifically to meet YOUR needs (after all, why would you want a general course that doesn’t fully meet you needs?).

   The other alternative would be to employ a consultant/coach who would help you understand how to evaluate your training and coach you through setting up an effective strategy/system.

   I know of one or two companies that offer specific bespoke evaluation courses, if you would like details please contact me.

   Good luck!

   Paul Hollands
   FITOL

   p.s. Q. How will you evaluate the effectiveness of your evaluation training?