Workplace Training
Organizational learning, training management and workplace performance
Our Workplace Training portal hosts a wealth of information, advice, tools and resources in all areas of organizational learning and workplace training. Whether you are a training manager, facilitator, trainer, instructional designer or consultant, you will find here leading edge guidance that will help you get the most from your training programs and participants.
Information on best practice models and processes for managing the learning function and for designing and delivering quality training programs in any organization.
Training and Development Today
Organizations and the training function have undergone significant pressures for change in the preceding decade. Financial collapses, technological advancement and increased competition continue to reshape and mould the business landscape. We take a birds-eye view of how business owners, executives, managers and training practitioners are responding to these challenges.
Instructional Systems Design (ISD) – The ADDIE Model
There exists a variety of models and processes for the design and delivery of learning programs. The ADDIE Model is the best known of these. Our simple and clear exposition of the model illustrates its five phases and what we consider to be the important tasks and deliverables for each of the phases. Find out why this model is so powerful and why so many organizations are using it to create and implement their training programs.
Training Best Practice – A Systems Approach
Excellent human resource best practice models have been available for some time. Two prominent examples are the U.S. People Capability Maturity Model and the British Investors in People. As excellent as these models are, they are not specific to training systems. Our training best practice model, however, is specifically designed for training and development practitioners. The Business Performance Training Management Maturity Model™ features an evolutionary approach to achieving best practice and integrates analysis, assessment and reporting.
How Training Works
Many managers think that an entertaining training program is a successful program. This misguided view leads to much waste and frustration as managers discover that nothing much has changed after the training. Getting real benefits from employee training means understanding how successful training really works. We walk you through the necessary steps for getting tangible results from your training programs and provide illustrative case studies.
Managing Training Initiatives as a Project
Designing and delivering training programs is often enmeshed within a wider organizational initiative. The task typically involves multiple stakeholders and interconnections with other systems and processes. It makes sense then to use project management principles and processes to get the best outcome.
Identifying Training Program Stakeholders and Their Interests
Successful training project managers develop relationships with the three key players: the trainer, program participants and their managers. However, success often depends on casting the net wider to catch other key stakeholders that have the resources and influence you need.
Nurturing Training Partnerships
Building mutually beneficial partnerships with your key stakeholders depends on finding a common objective and aligning resources. This Expert View examines the reasons why stakeholders agree or disagree with your program's direction and how you can re-orientate resisting stakeholders.
Nine Tips for Building Stakeholder Relationships
With poor communication practices, stakeholder relationships can quickly go off the rails. Use these nine practical communication techniques to ensure that you keep your key stakeholders aligned with your training program's objectives.
Communicating with Training Program Stakeholders
How you communicate with your stakeholders plays a large hand in their level of support for your program. Are you using communication modes suited to your purpose? Is your meetings practice and presentation style as effective as it could be? Read this Expert View to find out.
Advice on methods and activities used by training experts in analyzing training needs, designing programs and delivering training sessions.
Training Needs Analysis
Creating effective training programs begins with completing a reliable and accurate Training Needs Analysis (TNA). How is a Training Needs Analysis conducted and how should the results be presented? We examine your options and illustrate conducting a needs analysis with three common approaches.
Diagnosing Poor Work Performance
We see many training programs conducted that are a waste of time and resources. The reason is that in these cases training was not the answer to the performance problem identified. There are many causes of poor employee performance. We illustrate what those other causes are and present you with a flow chart that guides you towards an accurate diagnosis.
Creating a Training Program Communication Plan
In this Expert View, we explore why project communications are so important for the success of your training program. Find out what needs to be communicated to which of your stakeholders and the methods available to you. We also share tips on creating a communication plan template.
Constructing an Impact Map for Organizational Behaviors
Some training programs labor under poorly defined objectives and hastily chosen solutions. Involving your key stakeholders in creating an Impact Map engages the people who matter most in the outcomes and helps forge a firm link between your training program and organizational benefits.
Writing Learning Objectives
If you don't know the objectives for your training program, how will you get your training participants to their destination? Many trainers struggle with writing useful learning outcomes for their programs. We present you with a step by step method for clarifying your objectives and putting them in a form that will focus your learners on the end outcomes.
Setting SMART Objectives
Many learning and organizational change programs suffer from poorly articulated goals at the outset. Later down the track, arguments rage as various interests within the organization push their own interpretation. Get off to the best start by helping your stakeholders formulate SMART goals that get everyone on the same page.
Changing Learner Behavior
Ineffective trainers focus their participants exclusively on what they need to know. Knowledge is important only insofar as it underpins the skills they need to apply back on the job. Here are the steps you need to complete to ensure that you make workplace behavior the centerpiece of your training design and delivery.
Performance Objectives in Instructional Design
Trainer-centered objectives focus on what the trainer will teach. Performance-based objectives, on the other hand, center on how the learner should perform following the training. If your training program is to succeed in lifting learners' workplace performance, it makes sense for your instructional design to articulate clearly the standards and conditions of performance on the job.
Harmonizing Learner Engagement and Employee Engagement
What is the relationship between an engaged employee and an engaged learner? This Expert View examines the synergies between the two and how organizations can capitalize on this symbiotic relationship to foster excellence.
Learner Motivation: The Two Types
Do you know how your training program participants are motivated? This Expert View introduces the two basic types of learner motivation and shows how you can use this knowledge to drive better business results.
External Motivation: Three Questions to Ask When Rewarding Learners
For your training program to have impact, program participants need to be motivated to learn and to apply the skills back on the job. How do you motivate employees that are not self-motivated? Here are three critical questions you need to ask and answer if your incentives are to prove successful.
Conducting a Manager-Employee Pre-Course Briefing Meeting
Discussing with each employee before they start a training program why they are attending the course and how they will apply their skills is a smart practice. The pre-training briefing sets the scene for later training transfer to the workplace.
Conducting a Manager-Employee Post-Course Debriefing Meeting
When training course participants return from training, inertia can quickly sink them back to "business as usual". Debriefing the training event with participants spurs them to persevere with applying their skills.
Key lessons on how to get the most impact from your training programs and on measuring the results of your learning initiatives.
Evaluating Training Effectiveness
A training program is of no use if it does not create value for your organization. How do you know when you have created a real impact for your people and your business? We walk you through a simple yet very powerful model for evaluating impact at multiple levels.
Training Transfer Strategies
The best designed training course in the world is useless if participants do not apply the learnings from your program. We share with you some helpful tips on getting your learners to apply their new skills back on the job.
Setting Workplace Targets
Many training programs muddle along with no clear objective. By beginning with the end in mind and setting measurable outcomes tied to organizational results, you can put your program on a firm footing.
Setting Training Targets for Individuals
With organization- or group-wide training programs, it's not too difficult to set goals for the training program. When it comes to setting performance targets for a single employee attending a training program, many managers and trainers don't bother. Here is a step-by-step process for getting more out of sending an individual employee for training.
Hard Measures versus Soft Measures
How do you evaluate the worth of soft skills training programs, such as leadership, team building and communication? The answer is not as difficult as you might think. With the right combination of hard and soft measures, you can produce a useful and credible evaluation report.
Transfer of Training to the Workplace
Getting learners to transfer their learning to their jobs is recognized as the biggest challenge facing program sponsors and training professionals today. A structured approach to the problem of training transfer helps significantly. In addition to introducing our unique PRACTICE Approach™, we share with you our helpful learning transfer checklist.
The Importance of Workplace Environment
We all know that aptitude and attitude varies from employee to employee. What is little recognized is that the employee's workplace environment is an even stronger determinant of their performance. We present the most important of these workplace factors and explain how you can best shape each of these for maximum performance following a training course.
Manager Support Promotes Training Impact
Managers can make or break your training program by the way they discourage or support participants to apply their skills back on the job. Learn how to identify the various types of manager support behaviors and what steps you can take to reinforce the right workplace support for your employees.
Training Expectations: Roles and Performance
Leaving training participants in the dark about changes to their role and performance standards is a recipe for disaster. We show you how to get your training off on the right track by answering some crucial questions about your training program.
Collection of useful training tools, guides and templates plus leading edge articles from a variety of experts.
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Training Management Template Pack
Customizable templates for managing and administering your training function.
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Training Projects Template Pack
Customizable templates for managing your training project in all project phases.
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Training Tracker
Easy to use automated training administration software based on Microsoft Excel.
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Training Evaluation Toolkit
Practical guide for measuring/reporting the effectiveness of workplace training.
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From Training to Enhanced Workplace Performance
Practical guide for improving/measuring the effectiveness of workplace training.
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Writing Learning Outcomes
Practical Guide and Workbook for developing and documenting learning outcomes.
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Training Management Maturity Model
Tool for benchmarking training systems and evaluating training effectiveness.
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Training Management Articles
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Training Practice Articles
