Performance vs Development - Part 1

Salaam and Greetings,

Last week, I had the opportunity to be with a group of HR professionals with experiences ranging from 30 plus years to 5 years. The breadth and depth of the issues raised were exciting to say the least.

One of the things that was discussed were the perennial problem of getting a return on the investment of training. The ROI of Training.

I was trained by the man who basically started this idea of ROI in training some 13-14 years ago. Dr Jack Phillips. I got a lot of it. Was gung-ho about doing it for my organization. Even before the program ends, I already had tons of things I want to measure so that I could justify which program stays, which programs should go.

However, we were warned by Dr Phillips, that, ROI of Training is not for all organizations, and certainly not for all training. He said that:

• To embark on ROI of training, organizations need to have lots of data. And that means, it must be part of the organization’s culture to keep every single datum. Without any of this data, it will be difficult to gauge, whether training has any impact on the organization.
• Not all training gives direct results to the business. (As a learning and development professional, I wish I could claim so). If a company embarks on a complete overhaul on the way they work, the systems, the tools, the processes and procedures, and training was done to ensure all employees understands all these, and if there is a substantial business improvement, who do we give credit? And if it doesn’t work out well, is it training’s fault?
• Some so called training are merely feel good programs. Like going for a motivational talk. Yes, it inspires you for the next few days, or maybe a couple of weeks. You feel you have a new perspective in life and work, productivity goes up, yet, we do know, it is not sustainable. And you can’t keep sending them for motivational talks to get the productivity up. How do we measure ROI?

I have divided training activities into two basic areas, Performance, and Development.

Performance is easier to make the connection with Business results. It can be both quantitative and qualitative. And to make that connection, we ask our training department to go out and do some Training Needs Analysis. Get some data. This could even come from our appraisal forms. Make some analysis. And propose some interventions, training-speak which means training programs.

My experience tells me, and I have done this before, I would prepare a 3-4 pages form, that covers areas like the company’s values and competencies, the departmental functions, and prepare some appropriate statements and/or questions (here I am trying to sound and look smart. I also learned most people look up to you, if you sound intelligent, complicated and complex. If it doesn’t, somehow, they think, you are not smart enough…sigh) and send the forms away. More often, the forms don’t come back. Information is ambiguous and vague, because they don’t check the appropriate boxes, but instead write something on the margins.

After years of more failures than successes, I decided to make it simpler. A lesson I learned years ago in Physics, but forgot. It takes a smart intelligent person to make things simple. Isaac Newton simplified what Copernicus did. That simplicity gave us clarity and depth to laws of motion and gravity. We couldn’t have gone to space if not for Newton’s simple statement of the laws.

Nowadays, my TNA has only one question, but with two parts into it.  I ask line managers, “Looking at your business, what would you like to have more or less?” More, obviously of a good thing, like productivity, output, profits, etc. Less, is of course, the opposite. Less wastage, less time, using less money to produce, less materials, less people etc.

So I learned, making it simple, yet asking specific business needs they need to improve, making the information more reliable and accurate. Line managers are also made to think not in programs, but what business results they want to achieve.

Training professionals be warned, and I have mentioned this in my previous writing, not all interventions are training and learning related.

But, if training is the intervention – and therefore these programs are called Performance based training, then, it is easier to see, whether, the training has help made the business achieve more, or less of their business performance, because you can see the business results.

Next, I will focus more on Development. What is it, and how Development promotes Performance.

Warm Regards,

Noor Iskandar