Transcript Needs Assessment - Training and Development

Needs Assessment
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Figuring out what is really needed
Not always an easy task
Needs lots of input
Takes a lot of work
“Do it now or do lots more later”
First step in HRD process
The HRD Process: A DImE
Comparing the HRD Process
Model to the PDM Model
HRD Process Model
• Assess
• Design
• Implement
• Evaluate
PDM
• Analyze need
• Design training
• Develop
• Produce pilot
• Evaluate pilot
• Deliver training
• Improve
What is a “Need?”
• A discrepancy between expectations and
performance
• Not only “performance” needs involved
Various Types of Needs
• Performance
• Diagnostic
– Factors that can prevent problems from occurring
• Analytic
– Identify new or better ways to do things
• Compliance
– Mandated by law or regulation
Traps in Needs Assessment
• Focusing only on individual performance
deficiencies
– Doesn’t fix group of systemic problems
• Starting with a “Training Needs Assessment”
– If you know training is needed, why waste
everyone’s time?
Traps in Needs Assessment
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• Using Questionnaires
– Hard to control input, often high developmental
costs, hard to write properly
• Using soft data (opinions) only
– Need performance and consequence data
• Using hard data only
– Easily measured data is provided, but critical, hardto-measure data is missing
Levels of Assessment
• Organization
– Where is training needed and under what
conditions?
• Task
– What must be done to perform the job effectively?
• Person
– Who should be trained and how?
Strategic/Organizational
Analysis
• A broad, “systems” view is needed
• Need to identify:
– Organizational goals
– Organizational resources
– Organizational climate
– Environmental constraints
Why Strategic Assessment is
Needed
• Ties HRD programs to corporate or
organizational goals
• Strengthens the link between profit and HRD
actions
• Strengthens corporate support for HRD
• Makes HRD more of a revenue generator
– Not a profit waster
Sources of Strategic
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Mission statement
HRM inventory
Skills inventory
Quality of Working Life indicators
Efficiency indexes
System changes
Exit interviews
Task Analysis
• The collection of data about a specific job or
group of jobs
• What employee needs to know to perform a job
or jobs
How to Collect Information
For a Task Analysis
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Job descriptions
Task analysis
Performance standards
Perform job
Observe job
Ask questions
Analysis of problems
A Sample Task Analysis
Process
• Develop job description
• Identify job tasks
– What should be done
– What is actually done
• Describe KSAOs needed
• Identify potential training areas
• Prioritize potential training areas
Task Analysis for HRD Position
Job title: HRD Professional
Specific duty: Task Analysis
Tasks
Knowledge and Skills Required
1. List tasks
Subtasks
1. Observe behavior
List four characteristics of behavior
Classify behavior
2. Select verb
Knowledge of action verbs
Grammatical skills
3. Record behavior
State so understood by others
Record neatly
2. List subtasks
1. Observe behavior
List all remaining acts
Classify behavior
2. Select verb
State correctly
Grammatical skills
3. List knowledge
3. Record behavior
Neat and understood by others
1. State what must be known
Classify all information
2. Determine complexity of skill
Determine if a skill represents a series of acts that
must be learned in a sequence
SOURCE: From G. E. Mills, R. W. Pace, & B. D. Peterson (1988). Analysis in human resource training and organizational development (p. 57). Reading,
MA: Addison-Wesley. Reprinted by permission.
Person Analysis
• Determines training needs for specific
individuals
• Based on many sources of data
• Summary Analysis
– Determine overall success of the individual
• Diagnostic Analysis
– Discover reasons for performance
Performance Appraisal
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Relied on heavily in person analysis
Hard to do
Vital to company and individual
Should be VERY confidential
Based too often on personal opinion
The Employee Appraisal
Process
Performance Appraisal
Process
• Determine basis for appraisal
– Job description, MBO objectives, job standards, etc.
• Conduct the appraisal
• Determine discrepancies between the standard
and performance
• Identify source(s) of discrepancies
• Select ways to resolve discrepancies
Prioritizing HRD Needs
• There are never enough resources available
• Must prioritize efforts
• Need full organizational involvement in this
process
• Involve an HRD Advisory Committee.
Warning!!
• HRD cannot become a slow-acting
bureaucracy!!
• HRD must respond to corporate needs
• HRD should be focused on “performance
improvement,” and not just “training”