Problem:
Measuring the impact of training on workplace performance and its contribution to organizational results is a matter of great concern for management in all types of organizations. As a result of growing economic pressures, business leaders are becoming more cost conscious and they are more sensitive about the return on training investment. In the current economic downturn, such pressures have further increased. Human resource managers and training professionals have to justify training expenses by providing some evidence about the positive impact of training dollars upon business results. Consequently, the issue of measuring training effectiveness has gained lot of importance over the last few years.
During the past four decades workplace learning & development professionals have done lot of work in the area of evaluating training effectiveness. Dr. Donald Kirkpatrick did some pioneering work in this field and introduced the well known four level evaluation model, which is still widely used in training industry. Later, some other experts also made contribution in this direction and made modification in the existing models.
The document provides a literature review on this subject and highlights the research work done in this field. Students of human resource management and training and development will find this material very useful as a reference for their academic assignments.