The Quasi-Experiment Design for Organizational Evaluation - Essay Example

Evaluation Design al Affiliation: Evaluation Design Introduction A design is plan for conducting a research or an evaluation. The randomized experiment, relatively known as the experimental design refers to a design where the subjects for evaluation groups are selected randomly and assigned to groups, in this case, one that receives training intervention and a comparison group called the control group, which does not receive any form of intervention. The data from all the groups is collected before and after the intervention and when the evaluation process ends it is analyzed to determine the effect of the training. The difference between the groups that received training and those that did not receive intervention is stipulated, thus elaborating the benefit of training to the organization. On the other hand, the quasi- experiment is similar structurally to the randomized experiment design only that it does not select the subjects of the groups on a random basis. Thus, it makes the outcomes of the particular design be more feasible and practical in real life situations as opposed to the former (Phillips, 2010). How You Would Decide Which Design To Use for an Evaluation Evaluation is a very crucial exercise for any business organization since it enables it to analyze and determine the benefits that result from training in the sense that, the company can trace the effect of training on employees’ performance and thus determine the cost-benefit of such an activity. Relatively, choosing the right design for evaluating the training activities of a firm is equally important as different evaluation models give varied outcomes depending on the situations in the particular organization. Thus, in order to choose an ideal evaluation design an organization needs to consider a number of factors that will help it in make an informed decision on the evaluation design to use in its operations. To begin with, those involved in the exercise of choosing the design should establish what is going to be assessed and thus select a compatible or rather a design that accommodates the provisions of the subject under evaluation (Kirkpatrick and Kirkpatrick, 2012). The purpose for the assessment process should also be taken into consideration before settling on the ideal design for a particular assessment. In this sense, the stakeholders that require the report should be identified to determine the importance of the exercise. If information of the evaluation is needed by key stakeholders of the organization, then a rigorous evaluation design should be implemented to provide a precise report that would be depended upon during decision-making. However, if the report is for use by lesser stakeholders, a quicker design can be implemented to enhance the pace of the process (Phillips, 2010). The availability of relevant resources is the other factor that should be considered in determining the design to be implemented for an evaluation process. Some designs are time-consuming, and incorporate a large number of participants, thus demanding a huge budget for implementation. Hence, constraints of time, people and money should be considered before choosing the ideal model for evaluation since those elements should match the available resources for the entire process to be successful (Morgan, & Duncan, 2008). Identify Potential Weakness of the Designs Randomized Experiment Design The randomized trial designs are not feasible in the real-world situations because the randomization of the subjects renders the design non-practical; thus, the results obtained cannot be relied on. The issues with the feasibility of the design arise when subjects are randomly assigned to comparison and intervention groups. It is unethical to offer intervention to some groups excluding others by implementing a random selection that does not utilize any substantial criteria to choose, which groups should be intervened and which ones should not be subjected to randomization. Therefore, the randomized experiment design can make comparison groups to be influenced by spillover effects that arise from the intervention; hence, affecting the overall outcomes of the design, which ultimately create a false impression of the reality. Relatively, the high rate of participants dropping out of the intervention and comparison groups can jeopardize the final results of the design due to bias arising from the irregular participation of the subjects. Moreover, the randomized studies are often very expensive to implement, thus limit the feasibility of the design to be utilized in an organizational setup (Nickols, 2012). The randomized experimental design has a number of bottlenecks due to its nature of randomly selecting subjects, a factor that eventually affects the outcomes of the evaluation. Thus, the model is not appropriate for organizational evaluation since the results generated may not reflect the actual situation in real life (Morgan, & Duncan, 2008). How You Would Compensate For the Weakness of Randomized Experiment Design The shortcomings associated with the randomized experiment design result from the random nature in which subjects are selected. Thus, to overcome this element a design that does not implement randomization should be deployed to dispense with the effects of randomization. Hence, it is prudent if the quasi-experiment design is utilized in place of the randomized design since it does not employ randomization in the selection of the subjects in its evaluation. Discussion on How to Educate Client about These Different Models If the Customer Intend to Use One Particular Design is Not Useful or Appropriate To begin with, before a client can embark on choosing the ideal model for carrying out an evaluation in his/her organization, there are a number of factors that have to be considered to ensure the evaluation design selected fits the needs and goals of the particular firm. The client should first spend some time to analyze all the available models to ensure that the one chosen is reliable in the training evaluation process of that organization to provide valid, authentic and dependable results that can be used for decision making. Ideally, the design selected should be able to pinpoint the key areas that the organization ought to work on as well as those that it has been successful to enable it to trace performance from its training activities to enhance its efficiency in the future operations (Morgan, & Duncan, 2008). However, to ensure there is credibility of the outcomes of the evaluation process, the quasi-experiment design should be considered in preference to the randomized experiment since it has no element of randomization in selecting subjects, an issue that jeopardizes the credibility of the results. That notwithstanding, in order to identify external factors that are not related to the training process of the organization but which have an effect on the company’s operations; the open experiment design can be ideal as it tends to explore a broad range of factors; hence, giving a better insight and reliable results (Phillips, 2010). Similarly, to ensure that the client has a coherent plan and structure for carrying out the evaluation, the design chosen should be able to accommodate all the provisions of the entire assessment process to ensure the client leverages from the exercise and the design adds value to the training process to benefit the company. In such a case, the quasi-experiment design can be the appropriate design since it involves a two-tier process that explores all the deliverables in the evaluation process, thus giving an informed outcome that is reliable and ideal for decision-making process. Conversely, the client should be able to understand the circumstances under which he/she should choose a design for the evaluation process. Some instances do not require evaluation models since the deliverables are insignificant and thus implementing a plan will be a waste of resources since the outcomes are negligible to warrant deployment of a design such as the randomized design, which requires a great deal of time and resources. In this case, the randomized experiment design that the client opts to implement the evaluation is rigorous in the manner in which it is implemented such as it is time consuming and require more resources in terms of participants, time and money to ensure the entire process is achieved. However, even with better and successful implementation, the desired outcomes cannot be reached since the results from the design are often infeasible when applied in a real life settings due to the randomization nature of the design (Nickols, 2012). Implications for the Organization Based On the Client Decision Ideally, implementing the randomized experimental design can be a costly undertaking to the organization since you will have to deploy significant resources to undertake the evaluation process successfully. Relatively, it will not be economical since the design that the client chose for his organization cannot deliver the required outcomes as some issues of credibility, and the practicability of the outcomes are subjective and problematic. To solve that problem it is prudent if the quasi- experiment or the open research design is implemented instead of the randomized trial as they require lesser resources to implement, in addition to, the results of the process being more credible and feasible in a real life situation. Conclusion In a nutshell, the quasi-experiment design is ideal for organizational evaluation since it does not require a considerable amount of resources as well as time. The outcomes of the assessment plan are also practical in real life application compared to the randomized design, which is costly to implement, and its outcomes are infeasible in practical application. Thus, organizations will leverage more benefits from the quasi- experiment design as compared the randomized experiment design. References Kirkpatrick, J. D., & Kirkpatrick, W. K. (2012). The feds lead the way in making training evaluations more effective. Morgan, K. M., & Duncan, J. R. (2008). The ROI fieldbook: Strategies for implementing ROI in HR and training by Patti Pulliam Phillips, CPT, Jack J. Phillips, Ron Drew Stone, and Holly Burkett, CPT. Nickols, F. (2012). Evaluating Training: There is no" cookbook" approach. Distance Consulting LLC. Phillips, P. P. (Ed.). (2010). ASTD Handbook for Measuring and Evaluating Training. American Society for Training and Development. Phillips, P., Phillips, J. J., Stone, R., Burkett, H., Morgan, K. M., & Duncan, J. R. (2008). The ROI field book: Strategies for implementing ROI in HR and training by Patti Pulliam Phillips, CPT, Jack J. Phillips, Ron Drew Stone, and Holly Burkett, CPT. Performance Improvement, 47(1), 45-47. Read More