A client from a multinational organization recently asked for my advice on how to tackle the problems they had encountered in their training programs within the company. The company sees hundreds of incoming and existing leaders go through their leadership programs at any given time. Instead of creating the desired outcomes, however, the programs were found to be ineffective in building the desired leadership skills. It also became increasingly unfeasible and very cost-intensive to have extraordinary large numbers of people participate in these leadership training programs.

The problems were not exclusive to their in-class training but extended to their e-learning measures as well. The issues were also not exclusive to a type of leader. Both junior and senior managers did not benefit as much as anticipated. For the company and its management, this meant unnecessary expenses, lost revenue and time, lower participant satisfaction, and an underutilization of talent and resources.

Underperforming training areas

Two of the most affected areas were training programs on effective communication and employee recognition. Both of these leadership skills are interpersonal competencies in their very nature. It is thus little surprising that neither in-class nor e-learning training courses yielded the desired effects. In-class training consists of listening, group exercises, and certainly – a very aspect of training – exchanges between participants. However, they can only go so far in strengthening interpersonal skills, particularly if the cohort is not only five, ten, or fifteen, but hundreds of managers that undergo these training programs in, due to the sheer mass of participants, in a short time frame.

In a similar vein, e-learning, a training method comprising extensive on-screen time in front of a computer, in solitude, understandably falls short of impacting a leader's interpersonal abilities, particularly leadership competencies such as effective communication and the identification of employee contributions. Even more so, as any real change happens slowly and needs to be repeated multiple times before it becomes an integral part of one's mindset and behavioral toolbox. The neuropsychological impact of e-learning is in fact very limited with regard to leadership skills.

It is thus important to create training programs that fit the purpose and can effect changes on an individual level, even when it is hundreds of leaders and employees going through leadership development courses.

The hesitant participant

Besides the limited impact and lack of feasibility, it may also be participants themselves that undermine any potential for learning new skills or improving existing ones.  Another client was faced with such a conundrum.  
A lack of readiness to partake in training programs and to accept new techniques may hinder the effectiveness of training measures. Reasons may be manifold. For instance, participants would rather spend time on the shop floor, with clients, selling, or simply be back in the office and work on their tasks will see little interest in spending their valuable time in training sessions. Managers and leaders who have been practicing their skills for years may also feel inclined to reject ideas that challenge their belief systems. Indeed, their hesitance might produce lower productivity and efficiency. Contrary to the goal of the training program, forced learning tends to lead to a drop in motivation and performance among participants. Trust in HR and upper management may also be undermined for participants feel that their individual needs are neither acknowledged nor addressed.

These unwelcome issues were endured by our client before turning to us for support. Their participants saw little value in the offered training. They felt it added little value to their experience and began to question the seriousness and motivation of the human resource department and their superiors with regard to truly developing the human capital.

The consequence of the training programs was little change and development, great resistance and growing satisfaction with and trust in management and HR, and significant losses in terms of time and financial resources.

Given the high expectations and costs of training programs, a subpar return on investment is unacceptable and calls for measures and solutions.

1: How to best manage a large training cohort and reap the greatest benefits?

Companies of all sizes may experience the need and demand to train a large number of employees in a short-time frame. Whether it is due to a large intake of new leaders, a change in strategy, or the realization that new stimuli will help drive the business. Frequently it is the employees who demand more training opportunities – offering personal and professional development have indeed become the new pinnacle of good human resource management. This is particularly true for the ever so important human capital asset, the Millennial generation – the biggest percentage of today's workforce.

But how do you cope when hundreds of employees are to be trained? At which point does a particular training approach become unfeasible and how do you retain the value for employees even as the group to be trained increases in size?

Undoubtedly there is a threshold as to how many people can participate in a respective training session and for the return on investment to produce any significant yield. In order to determine what size is appropriate for a specific training program, well thought out metrics that are consistently measured are key for any human resource department. Metrics are pivotal not only to determine the right size for a specific training method but also to track its performance across time, participants and cohorts, and be able to adapt when needed.

Only with predetermined and elaborate metrics is it possible to evaluate the feasibility of a training method for large groups. The derived data allows to determine the effectiveness, the required length of the training program and its pace, and importantly the size threshold indicating when cohorts become to large for a particular training program.

2: How can we minimize the potentially negative effects of imposed training programs?

Training programs are time and money intensive human resource initiatives that can go two ways. Ideally their impact on the individual, team, organization, motivation, performance, customer satisfaction, product quality, leadership, sales – the list goes on – are clearly visible and lasting. The other end of the spectrum sees training initiatives that not only fail to deliver the anticipated outcome but yield negative effects. Training initiatives, when perceived as ineffective, may leave a sour note with participants and damage the relationships with and trust in management and increase employee resistance to future human resource initiatives.

A client came to us with this exact issue. Their participants left dissatisfied and with an unhealthy distrust of management. They questioned whether their departmental heads and human resources even understood their training needs. Rather than a significant uptick in performance and an improvement of the participants' sills, motivation frequently deteriorated post training. Hundreds of thousands were lost in training expenses alone, not counting the lost revenue, reduced motivation and trust in the company and its management – only to name a few.

The solution was as simple as the issue. It was about understanding what employees really needed and wanted. An appropriate initiative is evidence that management and human resources sincerely cares and understands its employees.

It is generally more difficult to create enthusiasm among unwilling participants, those who have training imposed on them. Even those willing and eager to develop their skills set will only commit and engage in a training and improve their skills when the training is tailored to their needs. This is key: understanding employees' and leader's needs and goals. Only if employees have a stake in training programs, their full potential – both employee and training – will materialize.

3: How can we determine what training programs are appropriate for what cohort and their effectiveness?

How do we determine whether training programs are effective and appropriate. It brings us back to our first point. It is all about the right metrics, an understanding of what the company, its employees, its leaders, and the market needs. Little value is added if a company hears of blockchain technology and decides to train its staff in this cutting-edge technology. Yet, we frequently read about companies wanting to adopt blockchain technologies for even the most basic tasks that could easily be achieved with existing tools.

Merely following a hype creates little value, neither for the employee nor the company and its productivity and profits. Training people in new technologies may be a wonderful idea on paper, yet, what is the reasoning behind such an initiative?

It is crucial to understand the needs of the organization, the needs and interest of employees and whether they are indeed willing to learn a new skill. It may be for a lack of realization that employees do not realize the significance and the opportunities of a training program. In this case, it is for management to clearly communicate the benefits for the employees – after all, it is their time and energy they invest in broadening their skill sets.

Knowing the needs of the business and its employees enables HR to only run training initiatives that are indeed required for the business and that employees regard as worthwhile engaging in. While the earlier is essential for businesses to flourish, the latter is often perceived as more challenging. It is thus crucial for human resource departments to identify the needs of both the organization and its employees and the status quo before identifying the appropriate key performance indicators and measuring them consistently. This requires an oversight and the relevant data and the expertise to turn training data into usable information. Too often are training programs measured with little long-term impact for a lack of failing to translating the derived information into impactful initiatives.

In order to determine whether a training initiative is appropriate and effective, data analytics should be the driving force behind any employee development program and before spending precious resources.

4: Is there an ideal cohort size, a maximum or even a minimum, for training programs to be effective?

Occasionally companies attempt to run training sessions with cohorts that are larger than ideal. This may be due to time constraints or in order to reduce the financial impact. The effectiveness of training cohorts that are too large, however, will not justify any of the compromises regarding expenses or time. Contrary, the costs may outweigh any savings if opting for the wrong group size. Learning effects may be negligible, satisfaction and subsequent performance may deteriorate, and training programs may turn into lost opportunities.

Groups that are too large in size will fail to integrate all participants, make interpersonal exchanges difficult or impossible, alienate certain individuals, and fail to achieve any significant learning and developmental effect.  
Picture a leadership in-class training with twenty or more people: The likelihood of everyone getting to speak, being fully engaged, and being able to polish their leadership skills becomes increasingly unlikely the larger the group. For those who are introverts, a group that is too big may feel overly threatening to get involved in discussions or exercises. The same applies to many team building exercises. The more people are involved in these exercises, the less the impact on the individual and the team as a whole. It is too easy to “hide” and feel disengaged due to the large group size. An expensive team-building events consequentially becomes a mere day out of the office potentially doing more harm than good.

Any training and developmental initiative needs to ensure that the size of the cohort allows for each and everyone to be fully engaged.

Similarly, training with too few members may yield little return for the employee, the leader, and the company. Imagine a training on better team leadership skills with only two or three participants:  important exchanges allowing for new, though-provoking views, would be limited, opportunities to engage, role play scenarios, and get multifaceted feedback far and between.

A larger group size with diverse members from across the company will yield the highest return on investment and create the strongest impact on participants.

In a similar vein, external training courses have to be grounds for growth. External training courses can only produce the desired outcomes if leaders from different backgrounds, different companies and industries have the opportunity to exchange their experiences and feed off each other.

Yet, if the focus is not on learning new leadership skills but reinforcing and polishing existing ones, smaller groups are more desirable. Just as in sports, to improve a football player's dribbling skills, a player will work with the coach in one-on-one sessions . Any minor shortfalls can be identified and addressed before practicing the refined skills with a other players. Attempting to refine the dribbling skill in a cohort of thirty people is not only ineffective, it does not allow for zooming in on individual characteristics, weaknesses, strengths, and potentials.

5: Is there one best training method – Multi-channel training programs?

There are always training methods that are best suited for a specific purpose, a particular group of participants, a certain phase in an employee's development and career, and the desired outcome.

There is no one-size fits all approach to effective training. The differences can be individual, industry, department, or time specific. It depends on what we seek from training employees and leaders. The best training method is the one that is best suited for whatever specific objective the individual, the team, the organization, management and human resources have. For that reason it is best to combine training methods and use multi-channel training approaches.

Multi-channel training approaches cover a multitude of criteria. Ranging from theoretical knowledge to hands-on experience, virtual reality to self-reflection sessions, coaching and group exercises, app-based learning and gamification, multi-channel training approaches tend to be the most effective. Yet, just as for other training programs, it is crucial that they are well elaborated, address needs and shortcomings, and are consistently measured and adapted through the utilization of data analytics. It is for that reason that one of the most successful and profitable luxury car firms employs multi-channel training approaches. Not only has their multifaceted approach led to impressive revenues and profits over the years, but the company enjoys an equally high level of employee commitment, whilst employee turnover has remained very low for a good number of years.