The Business Case for Learning Measurement
January 2011
A Leaning Management System
(LMS) worthy of your time (and money!) must provide an infrastructure that
allows you to plan, deliver and manage E-Learning programs in your existing and
future formats.
When it
comes to your E-Learning initiatives, it’s all about business results. Training
success hinges on the ability to link your learning programs to job impact,
especially in today’s uncertain budget and economic climate.
The case
for assessment and measurement crosses industry boundaries and touches learners
in all capacities, including employees, customers and students. Your training
team can launch front-end training programs that include sales, technology, competency
and overall performance improvement training, and then quantify the resulting benefits,
such as enhanced sales, productivity increases, error reduction and total
progress and advancements.
Current Training Trends
Learning
measurement is a cornerstone in an organization’s successful training platform and
should include data collection, storage, processing and reporting. With the
automatic collection of information and the analytical power of your LMS, you can
turn raw data into actionable business intelligence to: 1) Improve learning
programs, 2) Demonstrate value to stakeholders, and 3) Optimize learning
investments.
Making Data Work For
You
When the course
completion and testing data is collected, the administrator can activate the
reporting function and quantify the results of the training program. Individual
learner training results can be forwarded automatically to the student’s
manager or other designated management staff. Additionally, the LMS can generate
a post-event “survey,” which can aid the administrator with relevant learner feedback
for future implementation.
Your LMS
should include a robust reporting process for learning measurement. With the
relevant and necessary input, including courses, student demographics, roles,
organizations, business units, test scores, and surveys, you’ll have the output
you need, such as performance, comparisons and trends.
In the
final analysis, the training team can use metrics for performance management.
Critical areas of measurement that will benefit you are: 1) Benchmarks -
internal or external, 2) Goals – actual to goal, 3) Trends - time-based
analysis, and 4) Dashboards - concise data.
Choosing an