Understanding Learning Outcomes: Evaluation Basics for Trainers
Training professionals don’t always see immediate results from their work, but solid evaluation techniques can yield valuable information for you (and your boss) about how well your trainees are learning, whether they’re applying that knowledge in the workplace, and how your training affects the company’s people, products, processes and profits. You don’t need a degree in statistics to evaluate, understand and learn from the outcomes of your training sessions. Designed by evaluation expert Donald Kirkpatrick, the Kirkpatrick Express Evaluation Toolkit gives you the resources you need to start evaluating training outcomes, be able to analyze and communicate your results, and make those results work for you.
Learning Outcomes:
How to evaluate
You’ll start with a comprehensive overview of Kirkpatrick’s four levels of evaluation, the result of years of academic research:
Reaction: How individual trainees react to the learning immediately after completing it. Did they enjoy your training session? Did they find it useful?
Learning: How much did trainees learn? Have they retained the key points addressed in the material?
Behavior: How did your trainees change their behavior to implement what they learned? What challenges did they face? Was what they learned useful to them back in the real world? And finally,
Results: What were the results for your organization? What was the cost-benefit ratio? This level addresses five areas: people, products, processes, profits and overall impact.
All four of the levels are interconnected, and understanding each provides a better picture of the full value of the training.
Analyzing the results
You’ll also gain valuable information on what’s working and what isn’t. The Kirkpatrick Toolkit will help you to pinpoint both strengths and opportunities for improvement in your training sessions, with tips on how to customize and refine your evaluation questions, get the best response and analyze your results.
Communicating the results
The Toolkit will help you to target specific stakeholders in your organization with the information they need to know; from individual participants to their supervisors to your CEO, you’ll learn how to make the case for your department using the right channels and the right messages.
You’ll also find plenty of useful information on overcoming obstacles and excuses, fitting other evaluation tools into the Kirkpatrick framework, and additional resources to help you build your training program and fine-tune your message.
Uses for the Product
Includes fully customizable reports and a professional PowerPoint presentation you can use to communicate the results of your training.
Product Type Toolkit
Time Required Independent study
Author Bios
Donald Kirkpatrick, Ph.D., is Professor Emeritus at the University of Wisconsin and the creator of the “Four Levels” for evaluating training programs. He is the author of numerous books including Evaluating Training Programs: The Four Levels, Transferring Learning to Behavior: Using the Four Levels to Improve Performance, Implementing the Four Levels, and Managing Change Effectively, and has traveled the world as a management training consultant for Fortune 500 companies.
Travis L. Russ, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of Communication in the School of Business Administration at Fordham University. His research explores the intersections between organizational communication, learning, and change. He also offers consulting services to companies and educational organizations on learning evaluation, business communication, organizational change, and diversity.
