HR and training professionals are warming to the idea of freeing-up their time and resources by using external providers to undertake training administration tasks, according to a new survey.

KnowledgePool asked 95 HR directors, departmental heads and training managers of UK organisations about this issue.

In a previous survey, undertaken in 2002 by IT Skills Research*, only 17% of practitioners were considering or using such services.

However in the Knowledgepool survey, 38% of HR practitioners said they were in favour of contracting out time-consuming training tasks which have traditionally been performed in-house. This included administrative tasks such as booking training events, inviting delegates, managing cancellations, gathering feedback and generating reports - as well as third party supplier procurement and management.

Rod Edwards, Chief Executive of KnowledgePool, said: "The concept of using external providers for training administration tasks is gaining ground in the UK because HR practitioners would rather spend their time and resources on pressing HR concerns, such as setting the learning strategy and managing the broader human resources activities. There’s also a growing recognition that external providers can offer economies of scale."

The survey warned that there is a potential conflict of interest in contracting out training administration to an external provider that runs its own training courses - 60% of respondents said that these tasks should only be undertaken by independent, ‘vendor neutral’ service providers.

The survey also shows that HR practitioners in the private sector appear to be slightly more inclined to contract out training administration tasks than their counterparts in the public sector.