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

Establish targets

Mitigate confounders

Measure pre and post

Analyze results

Visualize trends

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.