Every organization aims to plan, design, create and implement training programs that can help elevate the branding and positioning of the organization in the market. Not just this, it also strives to improve the skills and knowledge of employees or learners to get improved retention and engagement rates.

After delivering the eLearning courses to learners, you as an organization must try to evaluate yourself. This evaluation can be done by collecting and analyzing data to get a deeper understanding of the effectiveness of your training programs. Hence, collecting data is a must for training needs assessments.

Why collect data for training needs assessments?

By collecting data for training needs assessment, you’ll be able to-

  • Identify trends or patterns concerning learning
  • Understand engagement levels of learners
  • Check the completion rates of learners
  • Understand the loopholes and voids in the eLearning courses
  • Understand the vulnerability of learners
  • See the learning outcomes

By collecting data, you can generate reviews, recommendations, and reports to address the shortcomings of your online training programs. 

Remember, the collection of data shouldn’t be just limited to learners. Rather, data collection should also focus on online instructors, eLearning project managers, L&D team, etc., i.e. to see how well they are performing their roles and responsibilities. There are many software solutions to aid your organization’s training and learner data collection, for example Learn LMS. 

How to collect data for training needs assessment?

Here are 3 ways to collect data for training needs assessment-

Surveys

The easiest way to collect data for training needs assessment is to conduct surveys. Surveys can help you to identify performance deficiencies in specific areas. To conduct a survey, you can prepare a questionnaire and circulate it among learners via email. 

The questions in the survey should focus on understanding how far the employees have been able to improve their skills and what extra they need to be provided to achieve your organizational goals.

Surveys are the best way to collect data, especially when you have a huge workforce. They are inexpensive and easy to analyze.

Observations

You should try to observe the learning progress and path of the learners, your employees. Using a learning management system, you can track and monitor the steps of learners across the eLearning platform. 

Continuous observations can help you track how far the learner has progressed, whether they are attending online classes or not. You can also track how many training assessments and assignments have they completed and what kind of eLearning material they are accessing from the online digital library. 

Observation generates valuable data like employee perception, priorities, and performance.

One on one interaction

You can also have one-on-one interactions with the employees to collect data for a training needs assessment. For instance, you can directly ask them about their experience and feedback from the day they started their online training. Such interactions can be formal or informal, depending on how you want to proceed.

What to look for when collecting data for training needs assessment?

After understanding why and how you should collect data for training needs and assessments, we will now explore what exactly you should look for while collecting such data.

Track learner progress

You can track the learner’s progress in the following ways-

  • Track the number of eLearning courses completed and pending.
  • Track the eLearning assessments attempted and the ones remaining.
  • Take immediate action on poor engagement levels of learners and generate statistics on a particular department, region, or job role.

Track results

The training results of individual learners give a clear picture of how well or bad they are performing. Therefore, you must try to identify the best-performing employees or those lagging and who need more help. You can track the results by knowing the eLearning course status. For instance, the number of eLearning courses accessed and the time spent on each course. 

Also, by analyzing the results, you can give a new life to the eLearning courses by making required modifications so that learners can learn and enjoy them at the same time.

Track specific eLearning course details

You can track specific eLearning course details in the following ways: 

Measure the efficiency of a course-

Tracking individual eLearning course details can help you to measure the efficiency of a course, especially for advanced courses.

Know how the learner is getting along-

The eLearning course completion status, scores, and time spent on each module for a specific course provide a wealth of information regarding individual learner growth and development throughout the eLearning journey.

Figure out the shortcomings in the eLearning content-

You must try to figure out the inadequacies or intricacies of the eLearning content if any. If you find any shortcomings then try to rebuild or restructure your eLearning content.

Track the response breakdown for tests

Sometimes, you might have observed that learners are unable to move past a set of questions. In this case, you should try to find out why learners get stuck. 

Also, make sure that the objective of the question is unambiguous and that the answer to the question has been covered in the eLearning course. This helps learners revisit topics any number of times they want. You can also add some extra information in the form of videos or images, which is easy to understand and absorb. 

Track the best performers

The employees’ performance is critical to the overall growth and success of the company. Track and pick up the best-performing employees and assign them important tasks and responsibilities.

Track time log

By tracking the time logs, you can get to know how long it takes for learners to complete an online training course, assignment or assessment. Tracking such details can help you decipher the difficult sections of the eLearning course and content.

Conclusion

Collecting data for training needs assessment is a must no matter if your organization is big or small. Such data is precious and can help you spot problems and find solutions instantly.