How to Measure Training Effectiveness (3rd ed.)

Michael Middleton (Queensland University of Technology)

Asian Libraries

ISSN: 1017-6748

Article publication date: 1 October 1998

Issue publication date: 1 October 1998

654

Keywords

Citation

Middleton, M. (1998), "How to Measure Training Effectiveness (3rd ed.)", Asian Libraries, Vol. 7 No. 10, pp. 307-308. https://doi.org/10.1108/al.1998.7.10.307.9

Publisher

:

Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 1998, MCB UP Limited


Rae is a management and training consultant, and his concern in this book is to present practical approaches to determining the effectiveness and value of training. He does this in a step‐wise manner that commences with training needs analysis, progresses through evaluation approaches to training itself, and follows with post‐training analysis. The context is British, and Rae draws attention to the national standards for training and development within the National Vocational Qualifications framework. These consist of five areas, one of which relates to continuous improvement of training and development, including key roles on evaluation of training effectiveness. In one sense the book may be regarded as a manual for implementation of these key roles.

There are three chapters that deal specifically with obtaining the details for a job specification. The first of these gives an overview of a number of methods such as critical incident technique, Delphi technique and questionnaires that are outlined in briefer form that would usually be found in a research methods text. The second chapter exemplifies in detail the participant interview technique known as repertory grid analysis. The third concentrates on observational methods which are categorised as process or behavioural, with emphasis given to the latter. The sections concerned with the training process itself are divided into tests for knowledge and skills that are conducted prior to, during and after training events. Methodologies explained include questionnaire structuring by semantic differential, Likert, Thurlstone and ranking scales. Internal validation based on a training group’s own impressions, and external validation based upon outcomes are also discussed.

The preceding material was included in earlier editions of the work. In this new edition it is supplemented by additional chapters that focus on customisation, including one that is linked directly to competence standards for an evaluation approach. The book concludes with a brief section on analysis of evaluation data that includes some examples of representation of the data. An effective index helps to associate the different contexts in which the same analytical techniques are used.

There are no examples specific to the library and information environment, but the generic nature of the book means that it provides a useful, structured approach with lots of options for those managers wishing to apply it to a training process in any environment.

Related articles