How to measure your ROI on training investment
What springs to mind when you think about training? Workshops and away days? Conferences and seminars? They are important to any learning programme but are only part of a bigger picture. There are many ways that people can learn and they don’t all involve sitting in a classroom. So to get a true measurement of your return on training spend, you need to look at everything your organisation does that could come under the training umbrella.
Purists call it “blended learning” which means learning via lots of different routes. For instance a line manager could recommend particular books or industry publications, such as Construction News, to employees as part of their development. Even watching TV programmes like The Apprentice and Working Lunch, can be useful and should be considered as well.
There’s so much useful material online too, like webinars, podcasts, blogs, white papers and much more. This type of learning is particularly engaging for younger employees who are used to getting information this way.
First steps for successful training programmes
To make sure any training is successful and effective you need to identify individuals who need development. If properly managed, appraisals will tell you a number of things such as where there are skill gaps in your organisation. Once you’ve found the trends you’ll be better placed to plug the gaps. If you find trends emerging in training needs, a cost effective way to address it is by running a session workshop in-house.
However, success really depends on employee buy-in at the outset of any type of training. Try to involve people at the design stage so they feel engaged. Encourage them to suggest areas in which they are interested or want to improve. People will get more involved in activities they’ve helped to develop. That means they’re more likely to retain and implement what they have learned.
Following up
After any conference, away day, seminar or workshop, line managers should book a quick meeting to ask delegates what they got out of the training.
Give the trainee a 10 minute slot at the next team meeting to talk about the training and to share what they‘ve learned. In my experience as a trainer, if a delegate knows they have to do this, they always listen more attentively and tend to make more notes. Hopefully it also means they are more likely to implement what they have learnt.
Ultimately, we invest in training for one reason; to improve business performance. So how do you check if your training programme has been effective? Here are the top five measures of success:
- Staff retention.
- Absenteeism rates
- Success for internal job applicants
- Feedback from employee surveys.
- Feedback via the appraisal process
So if we take health and safety training as an example, if it’s been effective, you should see fewer accidents. Fewer accidents result in improved productivity, and hopefully, fewer insurance claims.
Breaking it down to the basics, fewer insurance claims equal more profitability. And what more could you ask for from your training investment?
Alyson Pellowe is founder and managing director of People Vision Ltd, a leading provider of cross-industry human resources management and development expertise.
