How Can Companies Measure the Impact of Their Online Training Platforms?

An online training platform is a web-based software application that provides end-to-end training materials to businesses in a flexible and holistic digital environment.

The best online training platform facilitates the delivery of educational content, including courses, tutorials, and other instructional materials, while enhancing the training experience through various interactive features such as videos, quizzes, and assessments.

An online training platform is more important than ever in today’s fast-paced, ever-evolving corporate environment post-COVID, where the pandemic has forced many companies and educational institutions to resort to remote work and learning practices.

No amount of time, energy, and resources invested in designing and developing the online training course can guarantee its success. Not all online business training programs deliver the desired outcomes, unfortunately.

An effective training evaluation strategy to identify strengths and weaknesses and make necessary improvements ensures that employees actively learn and apply the knowledge and skills required for their roles.

Around 70% of businesses consider online training instrumental to their long-term strategy. Learning and development professionals can uncover gaps in their L&D plan and increase the effectiveness of business training initiatives by leveraging the insights offered by training evaluation. Meanwhile, businesses lose $97 billion to insufficient training.

Most L&D teams today solely conduct training evaluations to tick a box, with disorganized efforts emphasizing tracking course completion, satisfaction ratings, and behavioral change only.

Very few accomplish successful assessments of the training’s outcomes on businesses. Determining if the exercise generates actual benefits and returns in time, productivity, and money terms is paramount, especially when companies commit months and thousands of dollars to elaborate workplace training sessions.

This article shall delve into reliable evaluation metrics businesses can harness to measure the training effectiveness and the impact on the ROI of such training initiatives.

1. Develop A Learning Measurement Strategy

When designing a learning program, it’s essential to have a measurement strategy in place before the program begins.

Begin by defining the specific learning outcomes you want to achieve so you can effectively design training content that aligns with desired goals. These outcomes should be measurable and tied to the proposed overall goals of the organization.

For example, if the goal is to improve revenue, the result might be increased product knowledge among sales staff. Employing quantitative measures that effectuate a significant positive impact on your business by detecting the areas of the training program that are most effective and which are you are lagging.

2. Analyze the Impact of Training on Performance

The ultimate goal of any training program is to improve employee performance. Performance objectives are a potent tool to gauge the effectiveness of your training program.

Compare performance metrics before and after training, conducting a thorough audience analysis assesses performance before instruction to determine their exact knowledge base and level of experience to evaluate performance.

Tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) related to the training topic is crucial. For instance, if the training is on sales, companies can track the sales volume produced by employees before and after the training.

Companies can track pre and post-training customer satisfaction rates if it concerns customer service. By evaluating these KPIs, companies can compute if the program positively impacts employee performance.

Tying your training back to performance expectations helps determine how close you are to achieving your objectives and keeps your audience focused on their performance goals throughout their online training session.

Employing scenario-based exercises wherein workers put their skills to practice and imitate real-world operations and observe the outcome of the scenario.

Conducting interviews or incorporating questionnaires in your post-course evaluation that document employee grievances or supervisor report aid in evaluating the success of your online training and ascertaining whether your targets have been satisfied.

3. Evaluate Employees’ Retention and Skills

Training evaluation extends avenues to assess the efficacy of online training, along with analysis of employees’ knowledge for their benefit by enabling them to realize their shortcomings and fill in knowledge gaps.

For instance, if most employees fail to pass the evaluation at the end of a module, revising it to improvise the content or the delivery mechanism would be the correct thing to do.

The best online learning platform would reinforce training by integrating interactive elements and presenting bite-size chunks of information to supplement and consolidate comprehension of critical concepts.

Quizzes and pre-and-post-training exams offer valuable insights on retention rates and aid in identifying individuals and areas where they may need additional assistance to meet your company standards.

Assessing their skill sets twice, at the training commencement and completion, is a powerful approach to designing the best online training platform.

Comparing the results and assessing post-training job performance goes a long way toward evaluating employee skill sets and determining whether the training has contributed to their performance.

Adopting a personalized, learner-centered strategy ensures that employees demonstrate the impact of positive training through increased productivity, enhanced talent pool, and overall skill development.

4. Maximize the Use of Learning Analytics

The best online learning platform harnesses the built-in metrics in its learning management systems, leveraging the insights to comprehend how employees engage and progress through the online training modules.

Analyzing data on their progress and completion rates facilitates the development of targeted training materials to address knowledge gaps for additional reinforcement. The frequency of logins aids in identifying areas where learners might be disengaged or where your training materials might lack engagement.

Integrated learning analytics provide valuable insights into how to improve your training programs, monitor and evaluate the success of your training and modify it as necessary to support the needs of your learners.

5. Measure Cost-Benefit Ratios

Operating online training platforms can be expensive; companies must determine if the benefits outweigh the costs. Analyzing cost-benefit ratios aids in determining if the performance result accomplished was worth the investment.

Comparing the training expenses to the benefits, such as increased employee performance or retention rates, by analyzing cost-benefit ratios is crucial to ascertain if the training is worthwhile.

6. Monitor Feedback

Reviewing feedback and overseeing areas of improvement where employee performance is lacking and utilizing the insights consequently to take action to revamp the programs and update the relevant operational procedures helps improve the overall effectiveness of the training.

Regularly asking employees for suggestions and tracking the platform’s metrics enables companies to offer highly personalized learning tailored to individual preferences and competency levels while cutting down on training development time and generating savings for the company.

The Bottom Line

Training effectiveness demonstrates the influence of training on a learner’s expertise, skill set, performance, and the company’s return on investment. It is essential to precisely define the training’s aims and objectives to assess whether it contributes to business outcomes and objectives before implementation accurately.

Enhanced productivity, improved skills, higher retention rates, and a consolidated brand image are what you hope to achieve when you arrange training and development for your business.

Are you looking for a way to upskill your employees and stay ahead of the competition? Hurix Digital‘s top-tier online training platform provides cutting-edge technology and knowledgeable instructors to aid in the skill development your team needs to succeed in today’s rapidly evolving business environment.