The Best Training Metric

Measuring training is tough but necessary. Which metric, however, is the best one to measure?

Training can often be a tricky thing to measure. Just because it’s difficult, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try. After all, when the people who make budget decisions decide to ask what the value of your training program is, you’ll need a good answer.

With today’s blog, I’m going to try something a little different. I’d like to get your thoughts, dear reader, on the following question. Share your thoughts in the comment section. I’ll come back on Thursday summarizing all the thoughts that are contributed here and add my own thoughts as well.

The question: Which of the following is the BEST metric to measure a training program?

97% of staff have completed the 75-minute mandatory Unconscious Bias training session since its roll-out six weeks ago.
Average participant feedback scores for this training component were 4.8 out of a possible 5.
The eLearning module cost us $18,900 to produce. Employees who completed it have seen re-work errors drop by 24%, saving an average of 2.25 hours of re-work per employee per day. This equates to an average daily boost in productivity of $540, or $2,700 per week.
“This was by far the most interesting and engaging eLearning module I’ve taken in my 10 years of working for this organization!”
Participant post-test scores rose by an average of 17% compared to their pre-test scores.
Following the roll-out of the new customer service training, customer wait times have been reduced by an average of 2 minutes per call.
The Net Promoter Score (NPS) on our 1-day New Employee Orientation program is 54.
Locations that have completed this 2-day training program have realized a 13% increase in revenue compared to those who have not yet completed this training program.
“Thanks for offering this. I’m pretty sure I’ll be better with difficult customers when I head into work tomorrow.”
After 3 months, 78% of learners who responded to the survey said they were still applying the new technique.
88% of participants responded that they are either extremely likely or likely to apply these skills in their work.
After 90 days 62% of managers reported that employees are applying new skills after the training.

Give me some thoughts about which of these is the most powerful metric (and why) in the Comment section, and I’ll compile what’s written and add my own thoughts this Thursday.

Brian Washburn

Brian has over 25 years of experience in Learning & Development including the last 7 as CEO of Endurance Learning.

Brian is always available to chat about learning & development and to talk about whether Endurance Learning can be your training team’s “extra set of hands”.

See author's posts

Articles Similar to The Best Training Metric

5 Training Activities to Engage Your Next Training Group

If you’re on the lookout for some new activities to engage your learners, today’s post offers you a step-by-step downloadable guide to five training activities.

Does training actually change behavior?

Does training actually change behavior? It’s a question we should be able to answer honestly. (And the answer is: No, not 100%… and yes, but seriously, not 100%)

L&D Team Book Club: “Map It” by Cathy Moore

L&D professionals may be responsible for always helping others to learn, but we don’t have tons of time for our own development. Over the past month, my entire team made time to read and discuss Cathy Moore’s “Map It”. These were our takeaways.

Hybrid Learning: When to use it

Recently I had an opportunity to talk with the folks at Mimeo about hybrid learning and when to use it. In today’s post, I share a link to that podcast, which is one in a series of podcasts they did with industry leaders on hybrid learning strategies.

How to create a training plan in under 10 minutes

Using a lesson plan template (which is the most downloaded resource from this blog) can help give you structure. Using Soapbox can save you all sorts of time (and still give your presentation some structure)!