One FAQ that often begs an answer from the company Learning and Development manager or trainer is: Why is it that the best of training modules sometimes fails to deliver the desired results?
Impactful training
The answer to this may lie in organisation’s inability to recognize the need for designing training programmes for measurable impact. But, it is also an undeniable fact that a programme with no impact makes no sense in continuing with.
Problem of mismatch
A natural corollary to this is – You can obviously ask – why a particular training programme is making no impact on your employees’ job-role performance. Is there any mismatch between the content of training and workers’ caliber? It is very likely, but you can’t always blame your employees either for it. How? Let’s see.
Organizational initiative
A survey on the impact of training on employees’ on-job performance not so long ago showed, if any, a training programme can only address about twenty percent of the causes that hamper employees’ workplace performance. The remaining eighty per cent of the problems can be solved through the organisation’s initiatives in skilling and providing multiple solutions to the workforce as part of its workplace learning culture.
Appropriate measures
The organisation on its part needs to come forward with appropriate wherewithal for ensuring that workplace processes and practices add to the impact of employees’ on-job performance. This can be achieved through solutions that help in setting right goals, correct training standards and provide motivation besides the necessary software and processes to facilitate learning.
Multiple learning exercises
For an impactful training programme, the training programme needs to be designed in such a fashion that it incorporates multiple learning exercises. Experts suggest making use of the Learning Transfer method for enhancing the impact of learning on performance at workplaces. It is considered to be an effective model of measuring both learning and performance outcomes.
Sustained training
A sustained training process is a sine qua non for a visible impact of learning on different job-roles. For, it has been observed that in 80 per cent of the cases one-time learning barely leads to the desired outcomes. In the remaining 20 percent of the cases where the training programme appears to make an impact the performance is enhanced only by fifty per cent despite all out efforts.
Adopting proactive approach
How, then, can one design an effective training programme for measurable impact on organisation’s performance? The first step towards designing a training programme for measurable impact is to adopt a proactive approach with business goals being in focus. This can be followed by auditing of the business. This is essentially to watch out for any loopholes in training programmes and undertake steps to mitigate them.
Tools for designing
· There are tools for designing training modules such as a line-of-sight document also known as impact map.
· It helps make a roadmap for organisation growth and development while measuring workers’ performance metrics.
· Steps needed to reach the growth and development goals and measure workers performance metrics are enlisted for measuring the impact of training.
· Skill gaps are also documented and steps suggested for up-skilling.
New skill training
In the event of unexpected or sudden increase in demands of new services or products, organisations can take recourse to developing or purchasing solutions for new skill learning processes or training programmes for employees to meet the on job workplace requirements.
Scrutinizing poor performance
Analysing the factors responsible for below average or poor on-job showing is another way of measuring the impact of training programmes.
· Is the training design not goal oriented, or has a wrong goal?
· Has there been any problem with the duration of training?
· Has it been designed without adhering to any standard training norms?
· Did the training process make apt and adequate use of IT software or processes?
· Did the training fail to equip learners with necessary skills?
· Making a proper analysis of these questions will help formulate a training programme with measurable impact on workers workplace performances.
Conclusion
Finally, training is all about keeping pace with change. In a fast evolving work environment where processes and methods are undergoing constant upgrading, learning is also a way of measuring how adept the workforce is in absorbing and implementing the best practices. Effective designing of training programmes ensures skilling is always impactful so organisations are never left behind in the race.