As Professor Robert Brinkerhoff rightly noted expecting that training will bring improvements in business indicators, it is like assuming that a perfect wedding ceremony will guarantee a successful marriage. In both cases, one must work hard in order to achieve success. According to this author, only 15% of participants successfully implement what they have learned during a training course. The remaining participants are not able to transfer the knowledge and skills from the training room to their workplace.

One of the solutions to improving the transfer of knowledge and skills from the training room to the workplace is through a change platform – a tool that monitors the effects of training. This process involves the training participants, the coach (this can either be a direct supervisor or an external coach) and the trainer, who conducts the training and monitors the whole process starting with the needs analysis and ending with evaluating the effectiveness of the training.
During the initial stage of the process, key questions need to be answered: What are the business needs? What should the participants do better on the job? Once we have the answers, we then need to formulate precise goals and prepare a set of activities that participants will need to complete after the initial training. The goals and activities are also given to the direct supervisor, in this way the process aims to support the participant’s specific skills over several months. The trainer also keeps track of each participants goals and activities and takes on a supporting role if or when the participants need help. The change platform in many ways resembles other social networking sites, in that it is user-friendly and supports interactions between participants.

What are the results of this type of activities? The results have shown that with the use of a change platform, the post-training return on investment is as high as 80%, as opposed to the previous results via standard training methods where only 15% of participants implemented the learned skills on the job.