Measuring the ROI on Training

Measuring the ROI on Training

Measuring training's impact comes down to asking the right questions to find the data that can be linked to changed behavior, Richard J. Wagner and Robert J. Weigand argue in their new book, Measuring Results of MBTI Type Training, ROI in Action. Wagner, a former corporate trainer who is currently professor of management at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, and Weigand, the director of management training and development at St. Luke's Hospital and Health Network in Bethlehem, Pa., use the implementation of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality assessment tool to illustrate how training's ROI can be measured.

Most organizations and companies only are measuring the effectiveness of training at the most superficial levels, such as simply asking students to rate how happy they were with the program, or how much information they will take back to the office, Weigand says. Just how much of the training ends up making a difference in employees' work isn't usually looked into because it is thought of as impossible, or too difficult to measure.

To make determining training's ROI easier, the authors try to show trainers how the worth of training programs can be measured using the easy-to-attain data that's right in front of them. Weigand says he and Wagner only applied their methodology to the MBTI, but that it can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of any training program. "We believe if you ask the right questions, and go to the right data sources in the organization, if the data is there, you can find the data out and link it to changed behaviors," Weigand says.

For example, Weigand says the head of biomedical engineering at St. Luke's was able to successfully pitch a change of work schedule to subordinates, thanks to the understanding of their personalities that he gained through use of the Myers-Briggs tool, which assesses personality type, or how different types of people prefer to approach life. The department head had a goal of reducing overtime expenses in his department. He realized that tinkering with his employees' work schedules could significantly impact costs for the better, but he worried that workers, used to their old routine, would react unfavorably to the changes.

He was able to get his approximately 20 workers to agree to the shift in schedules at least partly because he knew how to sell the idea to each of them. While one worker may be driven to make decisions based mostly on hard facts, such as the amount of money that will be saved after making the change, another worker, based on his personality type, will likely need to be convinced by non-monetary, non-bottom-line factors, such as the maintenance of comfort to his lifestyle. As a result of getting employees to go along with the change in routine, he saved his department between $81,000 and $100,000 in reduction of overtime pay this year, Weigand says