Training Evaluations: New Techniques and Strategies - Research Proposal Example

Training Evaluations: New Techniques & Strategies Introduction Every individual company does conduct a lot of training and development programs for its employees to make sure that they can improve the performance of the employees and also increased their knowledge levels. The various raining and development programs are basically done focusing on certain points that are to be improved in the individual. The training and the development programs do help in increasing the skills of the employees by building on certain factors. This does help in increasing the efficiency and productivity of the company by a good amount. Though this training and development programs that are been conducted by the company at various points must undergo through a rigorous evaluation step to see how much the programs has been affective. The training and development of the program does provide a good platform for the company to improve the efficiency of the employees and also for increasing the productivity of the company. These programs are been conducted to remove a certain problem and for improving the performance of the company. This research report is done based on the secondary data gathered from various scholarly sources where many scholars have already done research over the new strategies that are been implemented to evaluate the effectiveness of the training and development programme that is been conducted. Based on this research the importance of good training and development programs and also the importance of having a good evaluation process for the training and development program being implemented can be understood. It also helps to know what all steps are to be implemented to make sure that the process is good productive process. Review of Literature In 1994, Lewis and Thornhill defined the evaluation of training as the process of assessing the total value that is been achieved from the training that is been provided. It is related to the general outcomes and the cost benefit that the company gets and also the amount of improvement in the performance level of the employees who have undertaken the training program. This helps to know the amount of impact that the particular training and development program has in the overall business operation. As per Kirkpatrick in 1996 the evaluation is generally the determination of the training programme that is been conducted. It is related to gathering the information based on the effects that the particular training programme has caused and also to assess the value that the particular training programme has created for the organization. In 1997, Van Dyk said that the evaluation process for training and development programme is been done mainly based on three purposes which are to increase the skills of the employees, for improving the course of work and to analyze how effective the business system is. According to Kitpatrick in 1996, it is very difficult to evaluate and analyze the impact of the training and development programme in terms of the result that is been obtained, so as per him the training and development programme must be evaluated based on the learning, behavior and reaction of the employees first and then the results that are obtained must be analyzed (Phillips, 2012). According to Molenda in 1996, the design that is made for the instructions that are to be followed does move forward in a smooth and orderly systematic manner only when all the process are been carried out in a logical and smooth way and output from each step becomes the input for the nest step and the process remains a continuous one. This statement was been supported by Erasmus in 2000 as he also said that the training and development process should be done in a systematic manner and in a proper order and only then the training and development programme becomes a successful one. Erasmus did also say in 2000 that the first phase is to determine the exact problem and the cause for which the training and development programme is to be conducted and once the exact cause is been determined than the process for going about with the training and development programme is to be planned in a proper way and then it should be implemented. According to him the training and development programme that are been planned should be made based on the objectives that are been set. In 1999 Horwitz stated that the process for measuring and evaluating the effectiveness of the training and development programs have increased a lot and it is very important too. As per him the first step for evaluation is done by gathering information in informal manner from the members who have gone through the training and development program while the second level is more systematic and the effectiveness is been analyzed very strictly by seeing the impact that the training program has created on the job and the way it has helped to improve the efficiency of the employees. This second level of evaluation is very important as even in 1997 Patrick said that many of the training and development programs are good enough in the classrooms but once they come on the actual job location it fails. Thus the transfer of the training from the classroom to the job field becomes a big failure and also becomes a huge loss for the company (Wilson, 2005). In 1984, Bramley and Newby did find five main purposes for evaluations which are the feedback related to the informal information gathered from the members, control which is related to have a good control over the overall process and the program that is been implemented for enhancing the skills of the employees, research which is related to the amount of training skills that are been transferred from the classrooms to the job field, the intervention in which the results are been evaluated in context of occurrence and power games to see the manipulation that is been done to maintain the organizational politics and get the result in the benefit of the team conducting the program. The concept of having a proper and systematic process for the evaluation is been explained by McClelland in 1994 and is been supported by many others like Van Dyk in 1997. According to it the company needs to have a good strategy to make sure that the training and development program is been evaluated in a proper way and the exact results are been obtained which is been interpreted in the right way. As per Sims in 1993, the companies do implement latest strategies to evaluate the training and development programs but they do fail as there are many barriers in the evaluation of the training program that has been conducted. Thus many companies do fail ion the evaluation process and thus are not able to get the correct performance results of the programme and the effectiveness of the programme is not known correctly. In 1996, Mann explained the reasons because of which the training and development programs do fail which are related to the inadequate planning, evaluation errors, inadequate understanding of the cause of the training program, improper interpretation of the result, lack of budget and also right objective for proceeding with the training programme. According to Sackett and Mullen in 1993, the emphasis that is put on the designing and measuring aspect of the training program is very less (Barrow, 2003). In 1993, Goldstein said that formative evaluations is done to find whether the particular programme is been operating in an originally planned way, whether the improvements are been made and the programme is been determined to see the exact effectiveness of the training programme that is been conducted and implemented in the business process from time to time. Cascio in 1991, said that a pre-test and posttest model has to be implemented to understand the exact gap that is there between the situation before the training and development program and after the training and development program is been implemented thus the organization will be able to understand the exact situation and the impact of the training program on the business process. Many organizations do fail in analyzing the gap and thus are not able to understand the exact impact that is been created over the company. Implications of Literature Looking at the scholarly sources based on which the literature review is been done many implications related to the evaluation of training and development program and the new strategies that are implemented by the companies can be seen. Based on the way evaluation is been defined by Lewis and Thornhill it can be understood that it is a systematic approach to perform an analysis for the performance and the amount of impact that the particular training and development programme that is been implemented creates over the organizations overall operations. As said by Van Dyk, it is understood that every training and development programme is been made and conducted based on the requirement for brining the improvement in the business operation and also for making the process more efficient by increasing the productivity of the organization (Russell and Russell, 2005). The training and development programme must be planned in a proper way based on the actual requirement of the cause for which the organization wants to bring the improvement in the business process as explained by Molenda and Erasmus. The new strategy that is been brought in by the company to analyze the training and development programme in the second step should focus on seeing the factor that the amount of training and development programme creating impact on the real job field and the amount of skills that get transferred from the classrooms to the job field. The right interpretation of the results will help the company to improve its business process by a huge amount. A good control measure should be there so that the training and the development program is in line with the business process and the business activity is benefited from it so that the amount of cost is kept under control and the process is been executed in a systematic manner. The gap should be analyzed in a proper way so that the company can have a good analysis of the situation and also understand the exact improvement that the company has achieved by implementing the training and development program. Companies do fail in evaluating the training and development programme in a proper way and the newly implemented strategies do fail because of many reasons such as the right cause for the training and development programme is not been understood properly, the planning process for going about the training programme is not been set in a proper way, Members not been able to grasp the new training skills properly, the training program being not in line with the business process or the organization culture and many others. Companies building new strategies for evaluating the training and development programs need to have a good and systematic process for proceeding with the overall process and for making sure that the process is been effectively implemented and thus helps the company in improving its business operations and also in increasing the efficiency by a good amount (Blanchard, 2012). More amount of emphasis has to be put towards designing and planning the entire training program in a good systematic manner so that the company can eradicate the problems that might be arising from time to time and it can bring in the improvements in the operations. Thus the company can have a good strategic process to go along with the training and development process and also a good evaluation strategy to get the better results for improvement of the company’s business process. Conclusion This research does give a clear indication over how a company needs to conduct the evaluation process for evaluating the impact of the training and development programme that is been implemented by the company for bringing the improvement. Many factors are to be kept on mind by the management of the company so as to get the right impact from the training and the development programme. The proper evaluation process needs a lot of properly designed procedure based on which the process for evaluation has to be done and only then the right result can be obtained on a constant basis. The management must make sure that the right cause for the particular training and development programme is been determined so that they can implement the programme in a successful manner and also the strategies that are made to evaluate the process should be in line with the process so that they can evaluate the impact of the program in a good and efficient way. Good evaluation process does help in building a good control process over the entire training and development program in a way that they can have a good and effective training and development process which will help the company in increasing its efficiency. For example, In Apple Inc. the evaluation process is been conducted based on different levels of management. There are basically five models been used in the company for evaluation process which are been listed below. Reaction of the participant to the training program, Find changes in employee knowledge, skills or abilities, Evaluate the changes in on-the-job behaviors of the employees The changes in organizational culture with the impact of the training The return on investment of the training program. This helps the company Apple Inc. to have a good evaluation process for the training program that is been provided. Thus the company needs to have a good and efficient evaluation strategy and also training and development program where both should be in line with the business operation as then only the business process will be benefited from the particular training program rather than incurring a loss because of failure in implementation of the training program and also the evaluation technique. References Barrow, C. (2003). E-Training and Development: Training and Development 11.3. London: John Wiley & Sons.  Blanchard, P. (2012). Effective Training, Systems, Strategies, and Practices, 4/e. New Delhi: Pearson Education India. Cooke, N and Teichmann, J. (2012). Instructional Strategies and Techniques for Information Professionals. London: Elsevier Phillips, J. (2012). Handbook of Training Evaluation and Measurement Methods. London: Routledge. Russell, J and Russell, L. (2005). Strategic Planning Training. America: American Society for Training and Development. Wilson, J. 2005. Human Resource Development: Learning & Training for Individuals & Organizations. London: Kogan Page Publishers Read More