Case for Your Initiatives

Toolkit: Make a Business

This collection of tools can help earn buy-in for your new initiatives.

Contents» How to Identify the Right

Performance Metrics

» Choosing Presentation Tools

» Risk Response Matrix Template

» Tips for Defending Your Budget

» How to Prepare Your SWOT Matrix

» Influencing Your Audience

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How to Identify the Right Performance MetricsKey performance indicators (KPIs) are quantitative measures to evaluate the effectiveness or efficiency of your short-term plans. The ATD State of the Industry report identifies 13 KPIs you can use to evaluate the efficiency of your training operation.

Use this list to identify the right performance metrics to include in your reporting to prove ROI.

1. Direct expenditure per full-time equivalent employee (FTE)

2. Learning hours used per employee

3. Direct expenditure as a percentage of payroll

4. Direct expenditure as a percentage of revenue

5. Direct expenditure as a percentage of profit

6. Percent of expenditure for tuition reimbursement

7. Percent of expenditure for external services

8. Employees per L&D staff member

9. Learning hours used per L&D staff member

10. Learning hours available per L&D staff member

11. Cost per learning hour used

12. Cost per learning hour available

13. Reuse ratio

Metrics related to business outcomes will require you to think outside the box and talk to your internal clients on how to gauge the effectiveness of a program. Some examples of possible metrics include: • Budget/forecast accuracy (percent variation from budget/forecast)

• Security violations per month

• Documentation errors (in total and per employee)

• Unused capital investment as a percentage of total approved amount

• Hours lost due to equipment downtime

• Number of customer complaints

• Number of nonconformance reports

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Choosing Presentation ToolsThe medium of your presentation needs to reflect the frequency of your executive dashboards, common communication channels your audience used, and the effort you can afford to invest in them.

This chart suggests a few tools and the best ways to use them.

Tool Recommended Use Pros Cons

Business Intelligence Tools Best for large corporations that run

on a huge scale.

Professional look, a number of

options for representation, some

BI tools draw insights from data as

well.

An expensive investment

that requires training to

use effectively.

PowerPoint or Keynote

L&D functions that are just starting

out with executive dashboards.

Easy to use, many templates

available online, can easily adapt to

changing dashboard priorities.

Just a presentation of information to

your audience.

Single Page HTML When dashboards are a crucial

reference point that needs to be

available 24/7.

Information can be real-time, many

templates available online, users can

interact with the data.

Changing templates could be

challenging and requires some

coding skills.

E-Learning Authoring Tools

When you want to try something

new and fresh.

You already have the tools and skills

to use it, can be hosted as a Flash

file or be circulated, can include

interactive elements.

Not a tried-and-tested practice, so

you might have to do a bit of heavy

lifting to figure out the cons for

yourself.

Customized Reports in Your Learning Management System

When you want to keep everything

in a single ecosystem for easy

access.

You already have the infrastructure

to host it, can be linked to course-

specific reports that are already in

the system, LMS vendors can help

with the template design.

There will always be a few

individuals who would hesitate to

open a page and enter credentials to

view the dashboard, and it might not

be the most cost-efficient option.

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Risk Response Matrix TemplateAs talent development professionals, we are being called upon—to a greater and greater degree—to make sure our recommended solutions are in line with the organization’s strategic goals and vision. To do this effectively, one of the things we must consider is where our solutions will get the biggest bang for their buck. Being part of the risk assessment process can shed light on that. The following template is an example of a risk response matrix. The matrix is a tool used in risk assessment to identify the risk and determine its impact, the likelihood of it occurring, the appropriate response, and ownership of the risk.

The matrix also includes a section to identify a contingency plan, if needed. Contingency plans should be in place for any risk that may have a catastrophic impact on the organization. Examples include natural disaster planning, electronic medical record failures, and various other information technology failures.

You may wish to color-code your incidence risk, depending on its likelihood and potential impact:Green: insignificant risk or a low likelihood of it occurring.

Yellow: somewhat greater likelihood of the event occurring and/or greater harm occurring.

Orange: moderate risk or likelihood of event happening.

Red: potential catastrophic event, based on a moderate to significant likelihood of the event happening and possible repercussions.

Risk Impact LikelihoodPreventative Measures

Who Is ResponsibleContingency Plan (If Necessary)

Likelihood5 Almost certain4 Will probably happen3 Moderate risk of it occurring2 Low risk1 Extremely unlikely

Impact5 Catastrophic4 Major3 Moderate2 Low1 Insignificant

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Tips for Defending Your Budget There are two levels of review: financial and management. Here are some recommendations to facilitate the budget approval process.

Know your audience. What are your manager’s expectations for the budget? What about their manager? Ascertain how management likes the information to be presented. Do they want to see the big picture, or will they delve into the details?

Tie your resources to specific programs and initiatives. In this manner, you will be able to specifically defend the budgeted amounts for a particular program and explain how budget cuts will affect the training programs for organizational initiatives.

Don’t sweat the small stuff. Focus on big-ticket items. But be careful! Some line items, such as travel or donations, may not be significant but are highly scrutinized. Know which line items will be subjected to a thorough review regardless of the budgeted amount.

Document, document, document. You will need this information to answer questions during the review process.

Know your numbers. You should be able to discuss your budget without using the phrase “I don’t know” or “I will get back to you.” No one should be able to explain the numbers better than you!

Prepare for the review. Have your finance liaison or a colleague ask you hard questions on your work plan or budgeted figures.

Avoid getting defensive. You have put in a lot of work. Do not get defensive if your manager questions your work plan or your numbers. This type of situation can quickly deteriorate into a nonproductive and stressful discussion. Argue your case with data and facts, not opinions or speculation.

Have a plan B. Be ready to present alternatives if you are asked to reduce your budget by a certain amount. Anticipate what areas or programs could be reduced and be prepared to discuss the organizational implications of these budget cuts.

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How to Prepare Your SWOT Matrix SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. For our purposes, your SWOT matrix will look at factors you will need to address in your next budget cycle.

Use this job aid to guide you in developing your SWOT matrix.

q Limit yourself to one page if possible, but no more than two.

q Use a reasonable size font. Do not cheat by using a very small font size (10 point or below) to cram more information in your document.

q Start by picking the top three items for each internal and external factor.

q Keep paring the list based on importance, until you get to a manageable number that can be summarized in 1-2 pages. A training-related example of a SWOT analysis is provided below.

OPPORTUNITIES THREATS

• Increased use of mobile technologies.

• Investment in training fluctuates with the economy (currently on an upswing).

• Online learning is more cost-effective, flexible, and convenient than live training.

• Mentoring and coaching can complement online or instructor-led training.

• Use of social collaboration tools to promote just-in-time learning.

• Employees and business professionals have limited time available to attend live training seminars.

• Companies are demanding increased leadership skills for exempt employees.

• Aging labor pool, many of whom are not technology-savvy.

• Millennials are more self-directed and can get bored with structured training programs.

• Online training, particularly MOOCs, has a high drop-off rate and requires constant follow-up.

• Limited availability of L&D expertise to produce technical content.

• In-house technical resources with good facilitation skills have limited availability.

STRENGTHS WEAKNESSES

• Business partner relationship with internal customers.

• Proprietary training content in critical business processes.

• Expertise in the design, delivery, and assessment of online programs.

• World-class training facilities.

• Experienced in-house facilitators.

• Access to in-house subject matter experts.

• Active participation in professional associations provides access to latest knowledge and industry trends.

• Training programs are not evaluated based on business outcomes.

• Lack of alignment between training programs and organizational needs.

• New employee orientation program is too long and too boring.

• Lack of availability of in-house technical experts to conduct training programs.

• Lack of resources to coordinate and follow up on training offerings.

• Low ratio of hours used to hours available.

• Lack of agile and user-friendly system to track training hours.

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Influencing Your AudienceEveryone is in the persuasion business—PR professionals, advertisers, lobbyists, pollsters, politicians, consultants, telemarketers—managers are no different. Psychologists have found that the ability to use tactics of social influence, rather than mere charisma, is most effective in altering an audience’s thinking. For influence to occur, the persuader needs to be aware that they’re trying to persuade, and the target needs to make a conscious or unconscious decision to alter their own thinking.

Utilizing credibility, analysis of your audience, a strong opening, and holding your audience’s attention will make your communications more effective. Consider the differences between these two memos:

ORIGINAL MEMO To: Business development team From: Date: Re: Leadership Conference Organizational Breakouts

As you know, an important part of the upcoming leadership conference will be your organizational breakouts. It will be during these breakouts that each team will determine how they can contribute to achieving our business goals for the remainder of 2010. As the leaders, we are looking to you to shape the discussion and guide your teams to solutions. To do so, you need to understand both the business goals as well as what needs to be accomplished during the breakouts. Additionally, financial and business information will be provided to you prior to the meeting for your use during the breakouts. This will give more detailed information on our business goals and challenges and make them more relevant. Listed below are the challenges that need to be addressed in 2017, questions that need to be addressed by your teams, and some information about the structure of the breakouts.

On Monday, August 4, Judy will explain the business’s current situation and present the challenge during her State of the Business address. The organizational breakouts to address this challenge will follow the executive panel on the second day, August 5. Our overarching goal is to improve the rate of revenue acquisition by 10 percent from our current rate through the end of 2017.

Within that framework, we have the following areas of focus: • Rebalance the mix of voice and data by selling more data, not less voice,

to fill the funnel for next year.

• Improve international growth by broadening participation so that all segments can be relied on.

• Focus on acquiring new customers and new services to existing customers, in addition to growing the base.

• Address sales force head count.

The following are some suggestions on ways to structure your breakout sessions. Ask your team the following questions: • What can we do to support the targets?

• What can we stop doing?

• What can we do differently?

• Is what we are doing getting us to where we want to go?

• How can we improve the productivity of our area?

REVISED MEMO To: Business development team From: Date: Re: Info to Help With Leadership Conference Breakouts

Summary Below is information to help you get the most out of your August 5 breakout sessions at the leadership conference. In the breakout sessions, your team will determine how it can help achieve our business goals for the rest of the year. Listed below are tasks that we need to accomplish this year and questions your team needs to discuss. Prior to the session, you will receive additional information about our business goals.

What we need to focus on: Our goal is to increase our rate of revenue acquisition by 10 percent from the current rate through December 31. With that in mind, here is what we need to do: • Sell more data to balance the voice/data mix.

• Improve international growth.

• Acquire new customers, provide new services to existing customers, and increase our base.

• Increase participation of sales representatives.

• Address sales force head count.

• Increase profitability.

During the breakout sessions, ask your team the following questions: • What can we do to support the targets?

• What can we stop doing?

• What can we do differently?

• Is what we are doing getting us to where we want to go?

• How can we improve the productivity of our area?

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VisionCreate a World That Works Better

MissionEmpower Professionals to Develop Talent in the Workplace

For over 75 years, the Association for Talent Development (ATD) is a professional membership organization supporting those who develop the knowledge and skills of employees in organizations around the world. We understand that getting employees up to speed, trained, and ready to tackle today’s increasingly demanding business landscape is no small task—especially when the watchful eye of the CEO is now more than ever focused on talent development, and on how the organization can be more innovative and shift with the changing environment.When the pressure is on, ATD is there for you.