3 practical ways to measure if your learning program is successful.

Data and feedback are definitely going to be your go-to way of determining whether your training has had an impact on competency levels. However, it’s not always possible to find an easy-to-use tool to determine whether you have had a return on investment. 

Last month alone, over 600 participants selected one of our Play4Business online courses with close to 100% completion rate! That’s something that we are proud of but it’s not enough. How do we know what the online course made any difference at all? How do we know that the participants are applying their skills in different and improved ways? 

Here are 3 practical suggestions for you: 

• Ask questions that go beyond those relating to whether your team ‘enjoyed’ the course. Training doesn’t have as a primary purpose to create entertainment for your team. It sure doesn’t have to be dry and boring, but if we want to create an impact, we need to ask different questions of your team once they complete the course: 
  • What did you learn that you can immediately apply in your role? Give me an example of this. 
  • What specific skills or behaviors did you gain from the course? How will these assist you in your role? 
  • Explain the key learnings you gained from the program and how these will assist you to improve. 

• If possible, identify any measures that could indicate that the program you implemented had a positive result. Make a real effort to identify these measures and report on them. For example:
  • Did the onboarding program assist with staff retention? 
  • Are there fewer errors made because the system is used more effectively? 
  • Is there any uplift in customer feedback to indicate that the training improved service standards? 
  • Is there a higher level of team engagement because leaders are trained to motivate their team? 

• Don’t always rely on formal questionnaires and reports. Informal research and questioning people can also bring you real insights into how team leaders and members are applying their learning. For example:
  • Send out invitations to speak to people for 5 minutes and ask them for information regarding how they are implementing what they learnt. 
  • If you are back in the office, speak to people over a coffee to illicit details from them about what could be improved in the training to ensure that the skills are relevant and can be immediately used in real working contexts. 

All this data and information gathering forms the basis of your analysis of whether the training met its intended purpose. 

Ask us about how our specially designed learning programs made a real difference to your team’s level of competence! We are a high quality provider at affordable rates. 

Message us on: info@play4business.com.