Do you have all 7 steps in your performance measurement strategy?

In the last few years, L&D has grown into a more influential role in organizations. According to the 2022 Workplace Learning Report, three-quarters of L&D leaders agreed that L&D has become a more strategic function and has helped organizations rebuild or adapt to change. Strikingly, the number of L&D leaders that agreed that L&D has a seat at the executive table more than doubled between 2020 and 2022.

As organizations realize the value that L&D offers in retaining and developing their best employees, there's been a greater emphasis on demonstrating the business impact of L&D initiatives. Measuring performance change also helps L&D teams refine their training programs and strategies.

When you ask about learning evaluation, any learning professional worth their salt will recite Kirkpatrick evaluation levels back to you. True to the axiom, "All models are wrong, but some are useful," the Kirkpatrick model is imperfect. The evaluation levels are not equally weighted in importance, and often evaluation efforts stall beyond levels 1 and 2, which are the easiest to measure and implement. Test scores improved 30%—hurrah! But did on-the-job behavior change in a meaningful way? And what impact did the training initiative have on the business?

Let's look at seven steps for developing a performance measurement strategy that shows an impact on metrics that matter to the business.

Justify the value

JUSTIFY the value of performance measurement by defining the purpose of data collection. How will the data be used? To demonstrate the value of L&D to the organization? To iterate on the learning experience? To improve training efficiencies? To identify other interventions? By defining your purpose, you can identify what questions to ask and which data to collect.

Identify KPIs

IDENTIFY key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure. Start with the goals of the project. What business results or performance behaviors is the intervention targeting? What data indicated that a training intervention was needed?

Common KPIs across a business might include:

• Financial metrics: revenue growth, profit margin, cash flow

• Sales metrics: revenue, deals closed, client acquisition rate, pipeline velocity

• Marketing metrics: leads, customer lifetime value, customer acquisition cost, website traffic

• Customer metrics: customer satisfaction (CSAT), net promoter score, (NPS), customer retention, average response time

Establish targets

ESTABLISH targets for each KPI. Use business forecasts or historical or industry benchmarks to establish target ranges for each metric so stakeholders agree on the definition of what success looks like at the start of the project.

Mitigate confounders

MITIGATE confounding variables that might impact your KPIs. Question your stakeholders and monitor other events, like a new product launch or seasonal variation in sales, that could impact these metrics.

Measure pre and post

MEASURE the pre and post values of KPIs. Establish a baseline before the intervention to compare to the end results. Plan to measure outcomes after sufficient time has elapsed for meaningful change to have occurred, usually around 3 to 6 months after the training intervention.

Analyze results

ANALYZE the results by comparing the results to your targets and looking for trends. Dig deeper into the data by looking for correlations between workers who engaged deeply with the learning experience, their performance outcomes, and impacts on business metrics. For instance: Did employees or divisions that spent more time in the LMS produce better outcomes?

Visualize trends

VISUALIZE, track, and communicate your data via a dashboard, reports, or KPI scorecard. Highlight the most compelling data and tell a story to stakeholders about how the training intervention impacted the business.

BONUS: Did you identify an element of your intervention that was unsuccessful, but it's not clear why? Return to your learners and gather qualitative feedback via surveys, interviews, or focus groups to understand the issue better. Anecdotal stories from learners—of both successes and failures—are powerful tools in communicating your results and influencing stakeholders.