I'd like tips on how to measure the effectiveness of my training team. We have % delivery targets, and expectations for pre and post course contact. I want to change these. Currently we have is nothing to relate back to the business what value has been added by the training team other than volume of training.
So info on what measures can be set, as well as how to measure them, will be more than welcome.
Amanda Hepworth (Training manager - Halifax plc)
3 Responses
To measure the change you must measure the past
Having worked for several large corps on training programs it is deemed easy(!) to measure training effectiveness. However you must start with a known base of performance for the trainees and then observe/measure changes in performance after the training.
It is easier to see if Customer Service staff are performing better. Do they spend less time on the phone for each client (ie: they are more effective), or do they deal with more clients, and if they are being measured by the client has their satfisfaction rating improved.
For sales and marketing training, a bit trickier. You can measure that a sales person earns more commission, but what you would need to evaluate this against is the cost of sale. I have seen many places where sales person does ever bigger deals, but the cost of the sale for each one keeps going up as a greater proportion, so in fact they are having a negative impact on margin, while having a positive effect on revenue.
To measure their effectiveness you need some tools which are placed by HR to measure the company not just your trainers.
One way maybe to do some post evaluation (say 4 months later) on the trainees as they will have had time to assess whether they were able to effectivley use what they did on the training sessions.
So you can measure how effective the trainees felt the trainer was, you need good HR systems to actually measure what effect your team had on the business.
Although I am an independent sales and pre-sales development consultant, I do not have the tools to be able to help, but one place to start looking to get some measurements going would be PwC, and a tool they are positioning called SABA. There are most likely others out their, and SABA have other partners so you may choose outside of PwC.
Good luck
Measurement of Trainer Delivery
Hi Amanda
I am currently working on putting together a proforma of competency indicators for my team, to assess their delivery effectiveness.
This will be linked to the NVQ level 3 standards and to our internal performance management system. Ultimately being used to assess delivery standards across the site, including Work Place Trainers.
I was interested in Pete’s comments, as we tend to measure trainee effectiveness (back in the workplace) and attribute this back to the development event material, as opposed to the Trainer.
I would be happy to discuss what I am working on and any ideas that you may have.
Tony Bulmer
Training Manager
Legal & General (Cardiff)
Maximising your ROI in training
Went on a one day seminar by Paul Kearns earlier this year covering this subject. Had some useful models for measuring training against business objectives. There is a book (Maximising Your ROI in training) covering the material and is available through Pearson Education.