Succesful Training Needs Analysis

Every project begins or should begin the same way: with a client need followed by a needs analysis. After many projects, I have developed my preferred needs analysis process, and in this post I will share some best practices.

The discovery phase always begins with a kickoff meeting where the learning team embarks on the exploration of the task at hand. This is where subject matter experts and learning strategists meet to hash out learning objectives, competency levels, and possible delivery methods. The training needs analysis should take you through a series of steps regardless of the project. However, based on the specific project, you can choose to employ all or some of the following types of analysis. Remember, to be successful here you should never skip this step, and you should keep it as flexible as possible.

1. Organizational Analysis. If your project deals with a complete overhaul of a training program, the development of a new program that impacts the entire organization and various types of audiences, then you may need an organizational analysis. This is an analysis of the business needs or other reasons the training is desired. Of course, you can start with this regardless of the type of project and speed through it if you are dealing with many known items.

The type of questions you should answer here are:

• What is the business problem the organization is trying to solve?

• What are the organization’s specific goals for this program?

• Why do we believe a training program is needed for this business problem?

• What is the pertinent history of the organization with regard to employee training and other programs?

2. Audience/People Analysis. This is where you analyze your audience or the multiple audiences and figure out all the specific needs each audience has. This step is also where you start posing the question of potential instructors or subject matter experts who may be involved in the process. The questions being answered by this analysis are:

• Who is the target audience(s) for this program?

• What is the audience(s)’ existing knowledge level on the subject at hand?

• What is the audience(s)’ learning styles?

• What has been the experience with these audiences embracing these types of programs?

• Who can we identify as champions for each audience?

• What are the goals for each audience?

3. Work analysis / Task Analysis. This is an analysis of the job and the requirements for performing the work. This analysis goes into the details of main duties and skill levels required for this program. Relevancy is significant to the success of any training program, so this step helps ensure that the training will be relevant links to each audience’s job. Here you should interview subject matter experts and champion (high performing) employees. You should also interview the supervisors and managers in charge to get their perspective on what’s important to them. You have to be clear of what employees need to know in order to perform their jobs.

Some of the questions to ask here are:

• What job is this content targeting?

• What tasks are performed?

• How frequently are they performed?

• What knowledge is needed to perform the task?

• What training is already available?

• Does the job description match the task analysis?

• Did the task analysis miss parts of the job description?

• Are there differences between expert employees and novice employees on specific work tasks?

• Can the process of the identified tasks can be trained?

• Are there changes to policies, procedures, software, or equipment that require or necessitate training?

Once you have these answers, organize the identified tasks, develop a sequence of tasks, and go observe the employees performing these tasks. Update the sequence if needed and document the affected documents, processes, etc.

4. Performance Analysis. This analysis is important to establish the expectations and the metrics to be used to assess the success of the program. The questions to ask here are:

• How does this program improve performance?

• What specific improvement are you looking for in each audience?

• Is training alone enough to achieve the performance expectations?

• How will we measure the performance change?

• What types of assessments are needed for this performance change?

• Is there a performance gap?

5. Content Analysis. This is the nitty gritty of the analysis. At this point you will have to gather and review any existing content like documents, laws, procedures used on the job. You should perform this analysis together with the subject matter experts and ensure that the content of the training does not conflict with any aspect of the job requirements. Make sure you ask:

• What specific knowledge or information is used on this job/task?

• Where does the information come from? Manuals? Documents? Regulations?

• What are the specific learning objectives for this training? At this point you can start your design document. A key component of this analysis is determining the competency level that will be expected of participants as a result of the training. The three levels of competency are:

  • Awareness — Your audience just needs to be made aware of something (e.g., there is a new benefit available to them starting on the 1st of the next month).

  • Application — Your learners need to be able to do something in a different way after taking the course (e.g., they need to know how to select and enroll in the new benefit before the 1st of the next month).

  • Mastery — Your learning needs to be sufficiently skilled at something such that they can guide someone else in performing the task (e.g., your learners are in the HR team, and they will be supporting employees throughout the benefit-selection process before the 1st of the next month). Deciding what level of mastery is required can shape your course objectives.

• Is training the suitable solution for meeting each objective? If not, why not and what is the most suitable approach?

• Does all content exist to meet each learning objective? If not, how will we gather it?

• Who will the main subject matter expert be?

• Who will be the main reviewer?

• Who will be the main approver?

6. Cost-Benefit Analysis. Ultimately, developing and delivering training costs money, and businesses like to make money. It is your responsibility to be prepared to demonstrate the return on investment (ROI) of training. This is the place where you should determine all the metrics and key performance indicator needed to determine the ROI. The cost of the training should not include only the development and delivery, but the assessment, metric reporting, and potential refresher. Effective training results in a return of value to the organization that is greater than the initial investment to produce or administer the training.