Deming once said – “It’s not enough to do your best; you must know what to do and then do your best.”
Imagine if you had the greatest processes and procedures in the world, however none of your employees were adequately trained on those procedures.
What do you think the result would be? You guessed it – failure.
Without the proper training, your world class systems can be made irrelevant.
This is why from a Cost of Quality perspective, Training is considered a preventative action – because it is meant to ensure product is built right the first time!
In addition to preventing issues – training can also be utilized as a continuous improvement tool to improve performance.
This includes introducing new concepts, tools & techniques that are meant to take your business to the next level.
This is why ISO has specific requirements for employee training – because it is the linchpin between your process & your people.
Below is the Learning Objective for The Quality Training portion of the ASQ CQE Body of Knowledge:
- Identify and define key elements of a training program, including conducting a needs analysis, developing curricula and materials, and determining the program’s effectiveness. (Apply)
The training model presented here is called the ADDIE Model. It is not unique to Quality and can be applied to any other topic or situation.
The ADDIE Model provides a framework & structure for the entire training process from Start to Finish. This model and its application to Quality topics is the bulk of the discussion below.
Before we jump into the ADDIE model though, I wanted to “Start with the End in Mind” (Stephen Covey) and quickly reviewing the final step in the process, which is the Effectiveness Check of your Training Program.
It will be important to keep this information in mind as your moving through the training process – especially the design & development phase.
What does Effective Training Look Like – A Quick Preview
Before we jump into the training process, I want to make sure we’re all aligned with the goals & objectives of quality training. This is best understood by quickly reviewing how you will determine the effectiveness of your training.
Below is the Kirkpatrick Model for Training Evaluation, as developed by Don Kirkpatrick.
Mr. Kirkpatrick was a professor at the University of Wisconsin & a past president of the American Society for Training & Development (ASTD), and he published level’s 1 – 4 in 1959.
This model has been modified a bit to add the 5th level of evaluation, ROI, which considers if the business results obtained were worth the effort. This addition is attributed to Dr. Jack Philips.
Overall the model has 5 different levels of training evaluation – where the top 2 are Results (usually business results) and ROI.
This indicates that the most effective training always results in an incremental increase in business results as a direct result of the training program.
Keep this in mind as you move through the training process – training is meant to deliver business results!
I’ve dedicated an entire section below to these different levels and how to measure each of them successfully. Much more to come on this topic below.
Analysis of Training Needs
Your Training Needs Analysis (TNA) is the 1st step in the Quality Training Process.
In this Needs Analysis your primary goal is to determine if a training need exists, and if so, what training is required to fill those gaps.
Sources & Methods for Capturing Training Needs
Training Needs can come from multiple sources which include:
- Business Strategy & Organizational Changes – The TNA should include a comparison of the organizations vision, goals, objectives & strategy against its current capabilities to determine what additional skills or knowledge are needed to implement the vision.
- Task Requirement Analysis – The TNA should include a review of all major job activities to determine if any new or different skills & techniques are needed to accomplish those tasks more effectively or efficiently.
- Employee Capability Assessment – The TNA can also include an assessment of the capabilities of your organizations employees. This might capture both their current technical skills and their soft skills like learning agility.
Capturing the actual training needs should include:
- A review of the current organizational strategy and interview with upper management
- A survey or interview of the managers, supervisors or Human Resources of the area under assessment
- A survey or interview of the trainees themselves
- Direct observation of skills, focus groups & work sample reviews
Purpose of the Training Needs Analysis
I know we’ve ready covered this, but I want to reiterate it again – It’s important to remember that training just for the sake of training is irrelevant. Your training must be aligned with the organizational goals & objectives & directly linked to a business NEED.
Aligning your Training Needs with the Goals, Objectives & strategy of the alignment basically drives support from management. This will ensure Management support & greatly impact your overall effectiveness.
Output of the Training Needs Analysis
At the end of your training needs analysis, you should have identified:
- WHO needs training
- WHAT concepts, tasks, activities or topics need training
- WHY the training is important (aligned with business results)
Design & Development of Training Course
Now that you’ve determined there is a need for training – it’s time to design your training course (the when, where & how) & develop your training content (the what) to bridge the knowledge gap you’ve identified; the output of this phase are:
- Outline of the Course
- Detailed Course Objectives
- Learning Objectives for each Topic
- The Training Delivery Method
- The Training Material
- A Course Evaluation Strategy.
The collection of these outputs would be called your Training Plan. This plan should close the training gap you identified in your Training Needs Analysis.
To help you design the most effective training plan possible, it’s important to understand some of the science behind training and the different strategies that impact learning and long term memory formation.
The first strategy I want to discuss is one that will assist you in overcoming a trainers biggest problem – forgetting.
The Forgetting Curve & How to Combat It
Forgetting is an unfortunate part of the human brain.
However there is some interesting research that has been conducted in this area and there are some proven techniques that we can implement to reduce forgetting – this should ultimately improve the effectiveness of your training plan!
This research starts with the Ebbinghaus Forgetting Curve.
In 1885, Hermann Ebbinghaus a German psychologist, performed a series of tests on himself over various time periods. He then analyzed all his recorded data to find the exact rate at which we humans forget.
With this data Ebbinghaus was able to confirm that there was a time-based relationship between learning & forgetting – and that this relationship is exponential. Devastating, I know
From this curve, we can see that humans generally forget nearly 50% of what we learn within only 20 minutes and ~75% of what we learn in 1 week. You can see why forgetting can have such a big impact on the effectiveness of your training.
How can you combat forgetting? Ebbinghaus gives us the answer.
Using Spaced Repetition to Boost Long Term Memory
Following his breakthrough analysis, Ebbinghaus continued his research by studying the effect of what has since become known as Spaced Repetition.
What Ebbinghaus found was that he could dramatically improve his memory retention by strategically spacing out multiple review sessions of the material over time.
Check out this graph carefully (follow the dark pink line)!
What Ebbinghaus found was that if he reviewed the material at predetermined intervals the rate at which he forgot the material lessened.
Then eventually after enough repetitions, the rate of forgetting becomes almost flat – this is know as long term memory! This is what we as trainers want.
Strategically Implementing Spaced Repetition
OK – so we know we can enhance the long term memory retention of our trainees by using spaced repetition of the training material. What does that look like in practice.
Let’s say you’re planning a training class for a new topic within your organization where you’ve prepared a PowerPoint slide deck that covers the material.
You can leverage the spaced repetition strategy by creating pre-course study material and distributing that to the trainees 24 – 48 hours in advance of the training.
This study material will act as the 1st learning session and will allow you to use your classroom lecture as a review period.
At the conclusion of the lecture, you can also provide follow up study materials on that same topic; this might include webinars, podcasts, or YouTube videos to act as a follow up review session for your trainees.
Got it? Alright. So the next training strategy we need to discuss is one called Active Learning.
Effectivity of different Training Methods – Active Learning
The next most important topic that you’ll need to tackle when designing a training program is your training delivery method. This is the HOW of your training plan.
There are many ways to deliver training. You can simply buy someone a book and ask them to read it. You can give a lecture. You can host a discussion. You can walk teams through live examples. etc.
What you have to remember up front is that the delivery method you pick has a huge impact on the memory retention of your trainees.
There are generally two types of learning that needs to be discussed – Passive Learning & Active Learning.
Passive Learning includes things like reading, listening, watching, etc. These are activities where you passively sit there and take in information.
Active Learning takes the learning process to the next level. Active Learning is doing, writing, discussing, etc. In Active Learning, the Trainee is not only taking in new information (passive learning), they are actively applying what they’re learning.
This has been proven to increase memory retention and increase the likelihood that the training will be effective.
Active Learning Examples
The following activities are all considered active learning opportunities:
- worked examples
- group discussions
- practice exercises
- live demonstrations with trainees
- performance checks (quizzes)
These are all opportunities to the trainee to take what they’ve learned and use it 1st hand.
The bottom line here is that when you’re designing your training program – you should attempt to make it as interactive & engaging as possible by giving the trainee the opportunity to apply what they’ve learned as quickly as possible!
Confucius once said – “Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.” This is the essence of Passive versus Active Learning.
It’s also important to note that you don’t have to limit yourself to one method of training – in the example above about spaced repetition we took a blended approach to learning by utilizing different media (videos, podcasts, pre-reading, PowerPoint presentation, etc) which covered both active and passive learning.
Implementation of Training
It’s finally here – training day! Implementation of Training is all about communicating information in a clear, concise and engaging way.
Engagement is a requirement for learning. Once your learners are engaged, they’re ready to learn. S
o your first goal during the implementation phase is to engage the trainees.
But Learning is not enough – remember we’re trying to drive business results.
So you not only have to train your trainees on the new concept, skill or technique, but you almost must sell them on why using this new technique, skill or concept will benefit them personally.
Along with communication skills, you’ll also need some effective facilitation skills to lead open discussions, field questions & deal with any conflict that may arise during training.
You’ll also want to work with Upper Management during this implementation phase to ensure that you’ve got their full & public support. This will encourage participation and engagement.
Effectiveness of Training & Continuous Improvement
At the end of the Implementation phase, or at spaced intervals during the training, you’ll want to collect feedback from the trainees to assist you in determining the effectiveness of the training.
As we saw above, the effectiveness of your training moves through a 5 level process known as the Kirkpatrick Model of Training Evaluation.
As you’ll learn, these effectiveness levels build on each other and represent a more objective measure of effectiveness of your training.
You must confirm each one before moving on to the next as they will allow you to better analyze the strengths & weaknesses of your overall training program. If your training does end up ineffective, you’ll be better able to determine the root cause if you confirmed each of these level individually.
It’s important to note here that this stage in the training process is very important as it demonstrates the value of the training and provides credibility to your training program / curriculum.
Level 1 – Reaction
This initial evaluation level is all about the reaction of the trainees to the program.
This level is very basic and is simply meant to determine what the trainees thought and felt about the training.
This Level has recently been expanded to also capture elements of trainee engagement.
If you’re your trainees are not engaged in the learning process then it is highly likely that learning did not take place.
Questions you can ask for Level 1 Evaluation:
- Did they enjoy the training & believe it was successful?
- What were the biggest strengths & weaknesses of the training?
- Did trainees feel that the training was worth their time?
- Did they like the venue & training method (style)?
This information can normally be collected in a post-training survey.
You can also attempt to assess this during the training by watching the body language of the trainees to assess their overall engagement.
Level 2 – Learning
Ok so you’ve got engaged employees.
Now it’s time to determine if they’ve actually learned something!
This is a reflection of the training plan (material, method, etc).
Was it sufficient to transfer that knowledge to the trainee?
You can use a pre & post test to determine what skills, knowledge or attitudes changed as a result of the training, and by how much did they change.
This is key because your trainees cannot change their behavior after the training if they didn’t actually learn anything.
Remember back to the forgetting curve.
It is likely that you’re trainees will be able to recall all or most of the information associated with the training at end of the training.
Therefore, if you want to assess the long term memory of the trainee, you can schedule an additional post-training test for 30 days after the training to measure memory retention.
Level 3 – Behavior / Training Transfer
Alright – So you had engaged trainees and you confirmed that they learned a new skill or concept, excellent!
Now – did they actually change their behavior or apply what they learned to their day job as a result of the training? This can be difficult to effectively measure or assess.
Similar to the 30 day post-training test, you can conduct a survey of the trainees at an appropriate time interval (30 days) after the training to get their feedback.
You can also survey the trainees supervisors & managers to assess how much change has taken place.
Below is a list of question from BizLibrary on Employee Training & Development that can assist you in surveying your trainees on the results associated with the training.
Which Statement below best describes your experience since participating in the XYZ Training:
- I learned something new, I have used it, and it has led to some very worthwhile results
- I learned and tried some new things but can’t point to any very worthwhile results yet
- While I may have learned something new, I have not been able to use it yet
- I already knew about and was doing the thing this training taught
- I don’t think I can really use what I learned in training
If behavior hasn’t change, it doesn’t imply that learning didn’t take place. In fact you may have confirmed that learning and long term memory retention did take place.
If you get positive results from level 1 (Reaction) & level 2 (learning) but not level 3 – try to uncover the other factors, conditions or obstacles that might be preventing the application of knowledge – these might include a lack of support & recognition from management, etc.
Level 4 – Results
Ok so you’ve got engaged employees who’ve learned a new skill and they were able to implement that new skill on the job, epic!
Now it’s time to determine what additional business results were achieved due to that training, and are these business results directly tied to an organizational goal or objective.
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This level is typically the most difficult to measure because of how difficult it can be to confirm a causal link between the training and the result.
Put differently – it can be difficult to isolate the training program as the only contributing factor to the business results.
Level 5 – Return on Investment
OK – so you’ve got engaged employees, who’ve learned a new skill and they were able to implement that new skill and it resulted in additional business results – were those results worth the cost of the training?
This requires the ability to quantify the cost of both the training itself, and the additional benefits of the training.
5 Reasons for Ineffective Training
Alright, so we’ve moved through the training process and we find out at the end of the day that our training program was ineffective. What do we do?
We start analyzing the root cause of the failure, which can occur at any point in the training process.
What I’ve done below is gone through the 5 step training model (ADDIE – Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement & Evaluate), and listed out a few failure points to assist you with this process.
If may also be very beneficial to review this list prior to beginning the training process to familiarize yourself with these failure points and address them up front as a form of Prevention.
Failures during the Needs Analysis Process
- The business needs were not fully considered when assessing the training needs
- The assessment overestimated the current knowledge of the trainees leading to an unidentified gap
- The needs assessment was biased towards the Assessors (trainers) strengths or industry fads that were miss-aligned with organizational objectives
- The Needs Analysis was to narrowly focused on specific techniques and did not include any learning of broader skills and topics to provide context
Failures during the Course Design & Development
- The training curriculum was not aligned with the training needs or knowledge gaps identified
- The Delivery Method selected did not match the training topic and was not conducive to a transfer of knowledge
- The Training Material that was developed was miss-aligned with the training needs – leading to an insufficient transfer of knowledge
- The Training Plan lacked the appropriate usage of examples, exercises & demonstrations to adequately transfer knowledge
- The Training Plan lacked the appropriate strategic review points (performance checks) & quizzes to ensure that information is being learned & retained
- The Training Plan lacked the appropriate usage of spaced repetition to ensure that long term memory retention occurred
Failures during the Course Implementation (Actual Training)
- Poor attendance or engagement due to a lack of management or organizational support
- The delivery style of the trainer was miss-matched with the audience, topic or culture
- The classroom was not conducive to learning (distractions, lack of technology, poor ergonomics, etc)
The reasons for ineffective training are all process related – if you fail to follow the training process outlined here, you’ll negatively impact the effectiveness of your training.
Continuous Improvement
Like every other activity within the Quality world – Continuous Improvement is necessary for success. No matter how effective your training was (or wasn’t) you can always improve it!
Your Effectiveness Review should, through root cause analysis, attempt to determine the reasons for ineffective training. You can then take corrective action to address those issues and improve your training.
You can also utilize your CAPA system to address any deficiencies in your training plan.
Final Thoughts
Zig Ziglar has a quote that say “Motivation is like showering; it’s something you should do everyday”, I think this same quote is true for training – we should be continuously training and developing our employees.
Continuous Training should treated like a strategic business priority and should be a big component of your overall Quality Plan.
I’m a firm believer that the biggest asset that an organization has is its employees – and a business is only as good as the collective knowledge & understanding of your workforce – which is why training is so important!
As a Quality Engineer, you’ll will likely be involved in the Training process at some point in your career – whether it’s creating a new training program for a new process, or simply delivering training to new-hires, etc.
You must understand not only the value of training, but the process required to effectively train people.
Training Videos
Conclusion
One of my favorite all time quote is this – “creativity is the power you get when you learn something new” – this speaks volumes to the benefit of training.
Learning something new empowers your trainees to be more creative and innovative in how they approach their work, which is why training is one of the most underrated activities that a Quality Engineer can engage in.
When training is effective, it can be the difference between success and failure as a business.
Training is the linchpin between your people and your procedures – it assures that your product (or service) is built right the first time. It is a prevention activity. Training is a continuous improvement tool to improve performance and it’s an ISO requirement.
Within this chapter we discussed the key elements of a training program by following the ADDIE training model which includes:
- Analyze your organizations business strategy & organizational capabilities to determine if training is needed.
- Design the training plan including your training method, performance objectives & evaluation strategy.
- Develop the training material, lesson plans & performance checks.
- Implement the training plan that you’ve develop & transfer knowledge to your trainees.
- Evaluation the effectiveness of your training plan & take corrective action as needed.
Within these sections we also discussed the important of the Forgetting Curve, Spaced Repetition and Active Learning; and their impact on the retention of a new concept into long term memory.
This chapters is the last of the Quality System – if you’re ready to keep studying, check out the next section: Product & Process Design.
Other Articles on Quality Training
- Wikipedia (The ADDIE Training Model, Training Needs Analysis, Spaced Repetition, Forgetting Curve, Spacing Effect, Active Learning)