Keywords
Citation
Sayers, P. (1999), "Effective Evaluation of Training and Development in Higher Education", Education + Training, Vol. 41 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/et.1999.00441bad.001
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 1999, MCB UP Limited
Effective Evaluation of Training and Development in Higher Education
Books
Effective Evaluation of Training and Development in Higher Education
Bob ThackwrayKogan Page1997ISBN 7494 2122 3£18.99
Keywords Employee development, Evaluation, Higher education
Bob Thackwray has taken on a difficult subject. As he himself points out, evaluation of training and development is not done effectively in most organizations, and higher- education institutions are no exception. Bob is, though, kind to higher education recognizing that all of the concepts and procedures are there for what is required; the problem is that they are currently used only to validate courses for students and evaluate the effectiveness of undergraduate courses.
On this hopeful note, Bob Thackwray takes the reader through the big picture of evaluation as it is currently used for Investors in People, stopping en route for historical excursions into the way these ideas have evolved over the last half century. He warns against the simplistic use of "happy sheets" and suggests that it is not the training and development department that should be given the responsibility for evaluation. This is something that should be done by all the organization's managers, and needs to be linked to mission, the institution or department's objectives and discussed in other review mechanisms such as appraisal interviews.
There then follows a number of case studies of organizations that have done evaluation effectively, starting with examples from outside the higher-education sector, and finishing with an overview of progress in a number of universities. At this point, perhaps I should declare an interest in that my own institution gets a favourable mention, and I am in the list of contributors to this section.
The first half of the book is full of useful tables, listing processes or definitions that other writers have used on the topic of evaluation. Included is a nice list of myths (including the one that staff developers are responsible for the effectiveness of training and development activities). There are a number of mathematical equations that have been used elsewhere to calculate effectiveness, and comments on how appropriate these might be in a higher-education institution.
The central section of the book is about theories of learning, and how the concepts and frameworks that have been used to evaluate the effectiveness of student learning can also be applied to staff training and development. Another nice touch is where Bob Thackwray follows his own advice and introduces an innovatory approach to presentation in Chapter 11 with a bold shift from lists and tables to bar graphs and pie charts.
If there is a criticism to be levelled at Bob's approach in this book, it is that it is neither wholly a resource book nor an instruction manual. The territory is more than adequately mapped out, the signposts are almost all there, but the route through some of the difficult bits is not explicitly described. It would be easy to miss how, exactly, Bob proposes that the reader use the case studies, for example.
He does point out that an institution has to formulate and agree its own procedures for evaluating training and development. It will not work simply to import a model from elsewhere. Higher-education institutions are also wary about being told what to do. But someone new to staff development or management might have difficulty working out exactly what to do with a lot of the information presented.
Having said that, I would see the ideal readership elsewhere. I would recommend all staff-development departments buy a copy of the book and then give it to read to the relevant dean or pro-vice-chancellor that is, the one responsible for staff development.
Pete SayersStaff Development Adviser, University of Bradford