Cal Wick
Founder and Chairman
Fort Hill Company

In this issue of Learning Alert we highlight the crucial role that a learner's manager plays in reinforcing - or undermining - learning transfer.

Our research on the Six Disciplines that increase the effectiveness of training and development underscored the importance of involving the manager in the learning and development process.

Companies that are using our Follow-Through Tools™ to engage participants' managers enjoy a greater level of post-course effort, progress and improvement.

Our experience has convinced us that doing a better job of engaging managers is one of the most effective things that learning organizations can do to improve the impact of their programs.

We welcome your comments, experiences and questions regarding the role of the manager for inclusion in future issues of Learning Alert.

Cal Wick

Cal Wick is the Founder and Chairman of Fort Hill Company.

Cal is a nationally-recognized consultant, educator and researcher on improving the performance of managers and organizations.

Cal's research led to the concept of Follow-Through Management® and the development of web-based Follow-Through Tools® that improve results by increasing follow-through and learning transfer.

Cal graduated as a Rockefeller Fellow from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut and continued his studies as an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow at MIT's Sloan School of Management.

He can be reached at: wick@forthillcompany.com

The purpose of the Learning Alert is to share best practices that help learners follow-through and improve their personal and business results.

Please feel free to forward this issue to your colleagues.
Email to a colleague.

If you are not already receiving Learning Alert and would like to subscribe, send your name, title and company to: subscribe@LearningAlert.com

If you no longer wish to receive Learning Alert, please send your email address to: unsubscribe@LearningAlert.com and we will remove you from the recipient list.

To send feedback on this issue or questions for future Learning Alerts, please email us at: ideas@LearningAlert.com.

Recent Learning Alerts

Managers Matter!
(in maximizing Learning Transfer)

In the most recent Learning Alert, Marshall Goldsmith explained why "leaders who don't follow-up don't improve." An important - and often overlooked - factor in whether someone follows through on training and development is his or her manager.

Corporate training and development programs can significantly improve personal performance and business results provided the new skills and knowledge are transferred and applied on the job.

Whether transfer and application occurs depends to a significant extent on the participant's manager. It does not matter how carefully the program was designed, how superbly presented, how enthusiastically evaluated - if the participants' managers are not actively supportive, then the desired results will not be achieved.

Broad and Newstrom surveyed trainers regarding the role / time factors that had the greatest impact on learning transfer. Trainers rated the manager's role before and after the program as more important than themselves! (Transfer of Training, 1992, p. 54).

Brinkerhoff and Montesino (1995) found that participants who had discussions with their managers before and after training reported higher levels of skill application and felt more accountable for applying new learning. Four of the eight factors that Feldstein and Boothman (1997) found characterized high performance learners were related to the influence of the manager.

Yet most program designs focus on the learner, and do not adequately address the criticality of the manager in success or failure of training and development. Our research on the Six Disciplines that Turn Learning into Business Results indicates that one of the fastest ways to increase program effectiveness is to increase manager involvement.

A simple but effective method for increasing manager involvement is to send them a copy of their direct report's goals. In most programs, participants write goals for continued development and learning transfer. They are encouraged to share these goals with their managers, but this is usually left to individual initiative.

When we polled managers in a control group study, we discovered that in the press of ongoing business, the recommended sharing often did not occur. Indeed, 60% of managers admitted that they were unaware of their direct report's program-related objectives. As a result, they were unable to provide relevant support or direction.

We recommend that training departments forward a copy of participants' goals to their managers. When this was done, both the managers and the participants reported:

• greater post-course effort to follow-through and transfer learning
• a greater number of discussions between managers and reports regarding the program and development
• greater progress and improvement

We have designed our Follow-Through Tools® (Friday5s® and DevelopmentEngine®) to automate this process, but it could also be done manually by making copies of the participants' objectives and mailing them to their managers.

However it is accomplished, the key issue is that participants' managers must be informed and involved to maximize the ROI of learning. Training and Development professionals will realize a greater return on their efforts by devoting a portion of their time and effort to increasing manager support.

Ideas for Action

1. Make sure managers know about the program - the business rationale, the expected outcomes, the topics covered, and the measures of success. Send them a short (1 page) synopsis with links to a website of additional information.
2. Ensure that managers understand their role in supporting learning transfer and generating a return on investment and that the importance of doing so is reinforced by their managers.
3. Make sure that managers know what their direct reports' goals are by sending them a copy; do not leave this to chance or individual initiative.

Learning Alert is sponsored by:

Copyright 2005, Fort Hill Company, all rights reserved