The “Course Topics” series from Manage Train Learn and Slide Topics is a collection of over 4000 slides that will help you master a wide range of management and personal development skills. The 202 PowerPoints in this series offer you a complete and in-depth study of each topic. This presentation is on "Evaluating Training".

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Evaluating Training
Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
Evaluating Training
TRAINING SKILLS

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Evaluating Training
Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
The Course Topics series from Manage Train Learn is a large collection of topics that will help you as a learner
to quickly and easily master a range of skills in your everyday working life and life outside work. If you are a
trainer, they are perfect for adding to your classroom courses and online learning plans.
COURSE TOPICS FROM MTL
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Evaluating Training
Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
ARE YOU READY?
OK, LET’S START!

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Evaluating Training
Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
INTRODUCTION
It is often easy to forget that the main purpose of training is
to change behaviour and performance. We tend to judge a
training event on its own merits: did the trainees enjoy the
course; did they mix well as a team; were the exercises
appropriate and fun; did we spend a good time together;
did we get on with the trainer. While these contribute to the
learning process, they are not enough by themselves. They
are the means to an end. And that end needs to be
scrutinised by evaluation.

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
WHEN TRAINING FAILS...
There are many reasons why training doesn't always deliver
its promise. Some may be the fault of the training; some
may not. They include the following reasons:
1. senior management are not sufficiently committed to
the changes which learning brings about
2. the organisation is frightened of what it might unleash
3. more time, practice and opportunity to experiment are
needed
4. there are no incentives to change
5. the material was not right, eg sub-skills being trained
instead of main skills
6. poor delivery of material so that people don't
understand it or remember it
7. training that concentrates on knowledge and attitudes
but doesn't equip people to carry out the skill.

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
THE EVALUATION PHASE
The evaluation phase of training begins shortly before a
course or learning programme ends and continues into the
future. A timescale can be placed on how long it should take
for people to reach understanding and competence, based
on the experience of previous trainees. Not everyone, of
course, learns at the same rate; quick learners are not
necessarily more competent than their slower colleagues.
The Evaluation phase has eight features:
1. assessment by the trainer
2. future pacing to transfer skills back to the workplace
3. action planning by trainees
4. skill development
5. workplace evaluation techniques
6. practice
7. the Happy Sheet
8. reviewing how you did.

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
ASSESSMENT
It is important at the end of a course or training event to
carry out some kind of assessment.
Assessments may be based on people's perceptions or on
measured results.
1. If you want to assess how much someone has learnt,
compare what they know or can do after the event
against what they knew or could do before it
2. If you want to assess what people thought of their
training, ask them their views in a questionnaire
3. If you want to assess the value of your training to the
organisation, use a measured efficiency or effectiveness
ratio, for example:
4. Return on investment = payback/costs x 100%.

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
EVALUATING PERFORMANCE
There are three ways to evaluate a course: by evaluating the
three ingredients of performance, knowledge, skills and
attitudes.
1. to evaluate knowledge, test people. If your course has
been heavily knowledge-oriented, the simplest evaluation is
to run a test at the end such as a multiple-choice test or a
true or false? test. Testing knowledge results in a simple
"know or doesn't know", pass or fail mark.
2. to evaluate skills, observe people. If your course has been
skills-based, it is more difficult to assess people's ability until
they are back in the workplace performing the skill. The
assessment could range from "poor" to "excellent" based on
assessment against standard.
3. to evaluate attitudes, ask people their views. This can
result in a picture of motivation and interest, enthusiasm
and self-esteem.

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
WHAT IS FUTURE PACING?
The transfer of newly-acquired skills to the workplace is
often the most difficult step for trainees to accomplish. For
various reasons, trainees may perform skills well in the
training room but not back at work.
One of the ways to prepare trainees for transferring skills is
Future Pacing. Future pacing means making the link
between skills in the training room and skills in the
workplace. Up to 10% of a training course should consist of
future pacing.
Five techniques of future pacing are:
1. Subconscious links
2. Embedding
3. Success stories
4. Associating and habit
5. Owned action plans.

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
FUTURE PACING
The following techniques of future pacing can be introduced
towards the end of a training programme:
1. Subconscious links. Make a mental link between a skill
and the job, eg "Now that you have learned how to listen
actively, there are opportunities every day to practise.
2. Embedding. Assume one action takes place, while talking
about another, eg "When you are actively listening to the
customer, lean slightly forward."
3. Success stories. Instil the certainty of success, eg "Most
people find themselves doing it automatically within a
week."
4. Associating and habit. "Go into active listening mode
whenever you meet a new customer."
5. Owned action plans. Get trainees to identify how they
will implement the skills.

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
ACTION PLANNING
A valuable exercise in the latter phase of a training
programme is for trainees to identify opportunities when
they might be able to use their new skills back in the job.
These can form part of their Action Plans.
Action planning does a number of things:
1. it forces trainees to make mental transfers of skills from
the training room to the workplace
2. if helps trainees identify situations where they can
practise their new skills
3. it helps trainees come out of training mode and return
to workplace mode.
"To look is one thing; to see what you look at is another; to
understand what you see is a third; to learn from what you
understand is still something else; but to act on what you
learn is all that really matters." (Anon)

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
MANAGEMENT BACKING
No matter how good the skills of the trainer, no matter how
successful the trainee is in the training room, the chances of
using new skills in the workplace are low without
management support.
Studies at the Xerox Corporation show that 87% of any skill
change can be lost within two months of a course without
any active coaching and motivational support from
management.
Some of the ways to gain this support include:
1. encouraging managers to get involved in the actual
training programme, including attending end-of-course
reviews
2. sharing the inputs and discussion forums
3. maintaining ongoing relationships after the course is
over.

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
SKILL DEVELOPMENT
Learning new skills takes time. Even with management
support, a skill learner needs lots of practice, motivation, a
determination to get over obstacles, help with insight, moral
support, and the ability to get past frustration and
impatience. In other words, the skills of learning.
One way we can measure the skill learning process is with
the "conscious-competence staircase":
1. Before training, trainees are blissfully ignorant of their
lack of skills: they are "unconsciously incompetent"
2. As they learn, they become aware of their
incompetence: they become "consciously incompetent"
3. With training, they learn the skills but carry them out
consciously: they are "consciously competent"
4. Only when they can perform the skills without thinking
does the skill become part of them: they have reached
"unconscious competence".

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
MASTERING A SKILL
Learning a skill takes time. It is not a process that can be
hurried or short-circuited. We start by doing things self-
consciously and probably with many mistakes. If we stick in,
we begin to make progress. We begin to learn from our
mistakes, gain insight and finally internalize the skill so that
it becomes a form of personal expression.
"One begins by self-consciously practicing a certain
technique. One proceeds slowly, deliberately, reflectively;
but one keeps on practicing until one is no longer self-
conscious when executing it. After a set of techniques has
been thoroughly internalized, one begins to grasp the
principles behind them. And, finally, when one has
understood, one no longer responds mechanically to a given
situation, but begins to use the art creatively and in a
manner whereby one's individual style and insights can find
expression." (Donald Levine)

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
EVALUATION TECHNIQUES
The ultimate measure of success in training is the extent to
which people's behaviour changes and with it their
performance. In learning organisations, where change is
continuous, it may be difficult to measure one change
before a new one begins. This is why learning and its
evaluation are not just the responsibility of managers and
trainers but also of learners themselves.
There are eight common evaluation techniques:
1. questionnaires to trainees and/or their managers
2. attitude surveys
3. written tests
4. performance tests
5. interviews
6. focus groups
7. observation of critical incidents
8. performance records.

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
MEASURING SKILLS
There are three useful techniques to measure how well
someone has learnt a new skill:
1. Evaluating sub-skills: Rackham and Morgan devised a
simple evaluation sheet for interpersonal skills. This lists
each key skill, eg "proposing ideas" and "building on
ideas" and scores the trainee against each one. Any skill
can be broken down in this way.
2. Critical incident report: a critical incident report
analyses how trainees perform in an important
workplace situation and enables trainers or managers to
compare post-training performance with that of pre-
training.
3. Repertory grid analysis: George Kelly devised the
repertory grid technique to allow trainees to compare
themselves before and after training. The extreme ends
of each skill are listed and trainees or their managers
rate their performance along the scale.

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MTL Course Topics
PRACTICE
Practising a skill is essential in making the learning stick.
When we learn new information, our brains set up new
connections called "dendrites". On the first occasion that a
new piece of information is learnt, the brain releases a fatty
acid called myelin along the connection. Each time the same
connection is made after this, more myelin is released until
the learning branch is thickly coated. With repeated practice
of the learning, the connection becomes easier and easier.
This process is known as "myelination" and is the
physiological basis for the saying that "practice makes
perfect".
"The beginning of a habit is like an invisible thread, but
every time we repeat the act, we strengthen the strand, add
to it another filament, until it becomes a great cable and
binds us irrevocably thought and act." (Orison Swett
Marden)

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
THE HAPPY SHEET
The "happy sheet" is the form usually handed out to
trainees at the end of a course to find out what trainees
thought of the training.
The happy sheet is essentially a customer questionnaire, not
an evaluation of training. It may produce a mixture of
responses, some positive, some negative, some polite and
untruthful, some honest and critical.
Customer questionnaires can give you useful information as
a service provider - it is, after all, free information which you
would have to pay a marketing company dearly for.
They can also be a knock to your self-esteem, when you
discover that your hard work and creativity has met with no
understanding and even less approval. To guard against the
knocks, design a positive and constructive form and use a
personal survival strategy.

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MTL Course Topics
SURVIVAL
Trainers can often be the target of hostile criticism.
This may because they are easy scapegoats for why people
feel they have "failed" as trainees or because the chance is
given to criticise a perceived authority figure or because
trainees need someone on whom to project their anxiety.
Hostile criticism can in time affect trainers' self-esteem, so it
is important that they know how to deal with criticism.
Some survival tips include:
1. getting support from the team
2. separating what you do in training from who you are as
a person
3. maintaining high self-esteem
4. being ready to learn from criticism
5. not judging yourself harshly
6. being brave enough to tell yourself that "criticism is
good because it shows I'm growing".

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
THE PLEXI-GLASS SCREEN
The plexi-glass screen technique is a neuro-linguistic
programming (NLP) technique aimed at reducing trainer
stress arising from criticism.
1. when you are criticised, for example, on an end-of-
course "happy sheet", imagine a see-through plexi-glass
screen between you and your critic
2. now see yourself on the other side of the screen seeing
things from your critic's point of view
3. look at the issues as honestly, openly and
dispassionately as you can. Choose whether you wish to
agree with any of the criticism and how you might
accept it.
4. when you are ready, re-join the old you on the other
side of the plexi-glass screen.
"When you get kicked in the rear, it shows you're out in
front."

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
THAT’S
IT!
WELL DONE!

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
THANK YOU
This has been a Slide Topic from Manage Train Learn