Adding heart to your evaluation

This article discusses the options for training professionals wanting to take a more strategic approach to the evaluation of their activities. It is based on practical experience and an insight into business metrics parachuted into this area from the field of strategic marketing. The author presented the contents of this article at CIPD’s 2003 HRD conference – its intention is to encourage new thinking around this challenging area. The thrust of the argument made is that for a variety of reasons evaluation has been driven by external demands for measurement and focused on efficiency. Business benefits from training essentially depend on effectiveness. Effectiveness requires integrated efforts from T&D and other stakeholders over a sensible time‐line. T&D needs to stop trying to isolate the impact of one element of this integrated mix but report on the whole utilising a combination of measurements and approaches.