Tracking Employee Training: Why and How Should You Track Employee Training Progress?

Many companies spend tons of money on training their staff. The main objective being the staff developing or improving the skills that they need to get by on their job. When one invests in their staff’s career development, the least they expect is to see some results. But if one hasn’t established ways to keep track of training, how can they get updated with their staff’s progress level? 

While you might have thought about everything concerning the training—from the kind of training the employees are going to receive to how much that training it’s going to impact their job performance, you might have neglected the part where you keep track of their training progress. Before we go deeper into this topic, let’s see first why you should track employee training progress. 

Why Track Employee Training Progress?

We get it, you’re here because you want to find ways through which you can track employee training. Before we give you all the nitty-gritty details, we will be focusing on the “whys” you would want to do this, to begin with. More or less, 40% of employees leave their jobs within their first year because they didn’t receive adequate training. 

Enhancing employee engagement

A company’s main goal is to hire staff that will be with them for a long time. The average employee tenure is considered to be eight years. The yearly voluntary turnover rate is 19%, whereas the annual involuntary turnover is 8%. With those statistics being presented, companies don’t want to be spending their resources on temporary employees. On the other hand, they want to do what it takes to keep them there for as long as possible. Here, employee training can help with their engagement and, in turn, with employee retention. 

Signaling opportunities for improvement

Sometimes, launching a course can feel like this is it, you did it, this course can be used to train employees for years on end. Still, this is where many have it wrong. When you track employee training, you’ll see that you can find hundreds of opportunities to improve the current course. 

The staff’s engagement with the material and the data exploited with tracking it can help you more in this direction. 

Keeping the company compliant

Every company needs to abide by the sector and industry standards and regulations. One of the regulations happens to be employee training. Companies and organizations keep up with their compliance measures by keeping a record of the pieces of training that they offer and the employees who receive the said training.  

Capturing important statistics and metrics

Among many other benefits that a company can get by keeping track of its employees’ training is the opportunity to get tons of information from the analyzed metrics. The data extracted can help with picking up patterns that can enhance future courses and employee training performance. Among the information you can get your hands on are:

• Total hours of training
• Average scores
• Participant engagement
• Training efficacy
• Return on investment (ROI) 

Metrics You Should Use to Track Employee Training Progress

Surely, tracking employee training is important. We already tackled this topic. But do companies really know which metrics they should be focusing on analyzing? In case they don’t, we put together five of these metrics. Let’s have a good look at them. 

The time staff spends on training

Setting up an employee training course can give you an educated guess of how much time it should take for a staff member to work their way up to finishing the course. While that estimated time isn’t set in stone, the time staff spends should revolve around it. It’s common knowledge that not everybody studies at the same speed rate. With that being said, the time staff spends in the training may vary from person to person. However, if you notice significant differences and inconsistencies in the time it takes to go through the course, there might be an issue for you to take care of. It shouldn’t take too long, but also it shouldn’t be completed in one sitting. 

If they complete the course in a very short period, the chances are that they’re not giving the attention they should and aren’t retaining much of the information. Even worse, they could be skipping the entire content and go straight to the assessment part. Whereas, if it takes too long for them to finish, you should consider that the content is too difficult to interact with, and they couldn’t finish because of its complexity. 

The time staff engages with training

There is a difference between the time staff spend in the training their time engaging with it. Someone could just open the course on their device and then get to something else. While this could show that they spend hours in the course (when they actually didn’t). However, when you analyze the time they engaged with the training you’ll get the answer to the question ‘how long does it take to finish the training course.’

The time spent on each module

Looking up the time spent on every single module is equally important as looking at the time the course takes to be completed from the beginning to the end. No two modules are the same, some have to be easier to work on, and some will be more complicated. With that in mind, one can expect the staff to complete a particular module faster but then spend more time at the other. Check for these indicators so that you can get to fixing them as soon as possible. 

Drop-outs

One other metric you should be focusing on is the drop-out rate. You want to know why exactly the drop-out is happening. Also, you would want to have more details at which part of the course exactly are the staff dropping out. If you happen to find courses or modules that have quite a high drop-off rate, you could get to review them and the possible issues that they might have.  

Pass/fail rate

This particular metric refers mostly to quizzes and tests that are done at the end of each module. Successful completion of a module means that the participants managed to learn and retain all the information provided in the coursework and managed to pass the quiz at the end of every module. 

However, this metric can be a little tricky. If all the participants pass it on the first attempt, it could mean that they’re all well-prepared for the quiz, or it could also indicate that the test was too easy for them. Contrarily, if most of the participants fail the test, that could mean something is wrong with the materials provided there, and you’ll need to give your attention. 

3 Ways You Can Track Employee Training Progress

We already discussed the reasons behind tracking employee training. Now, let’s focus on the ‘hows’ you can actually get to tracking these pieces of employee training. With that out of the way, here is our shortlist of the ways you can keep track of every e-training you deliver. 

Excel and Google Spreadsheets

Not every company can afford to create a learning portal from scratch, as it can be quite costly. To create such a learning platform, a certain budget would need to be allocated, or companies would have to wait for the next financial year to get that budget. However, the training could not wait for that long. The sooner you deliver training to your employees, the better it will be. So what can one do? 

There is always another, cheaper option for companies to choose from. What other things could this option be other than Microsoft Excel or Google Spreadsheets? Chances are, you already have them downloaded to your device. Each of them has its advantages. 

In these spreadsheets, you can keep track of the training by creating a training log, a list of the training courses that are going to be delivered, and a list of the participants. 

Training Management System (TMS)

A Training Management System (TMS) is a type of software for managing training processes for those kinds of trainings that an instructor leads. Enterprises mostly use this software. It targets organizational activities which happen long before the classes even take place. 

Through a TMS, one can track managing session plans, budgeting, booking management, logistics and resource management, and business intelligence reports. 

Learning Management System (LMS) 

A Learning Management System (LMS) is a digital platform used for learning and teaching. In this kind of platform, you can upload learning materials, manage the content you upload there, and assign it to participants. Besides this, LMSs collect different kinds of statistics relating to the training process and create the necessary reports for you. An LMS such as KIWI can be one of the easiest and most appropriate solutions to monitor training processes. 

Training is an important factor in engaging and retaining employees. However, one has to make sure that employees make the most out of these training sessions. The best way for the employer to make sure that their staff is engaging with the training is by tracking their progression. Naturally, there are good reasons why one should do it and how. Make sure you use those tips too.