Five years on from its launch, the annual ‘Measuring the Business Impact of Learning Report’ from LEO Learning and Watershed is now live. Reflecting on five years of industry research and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, this report delivers insights from some of the industry’s top experts.
LEO Learning, a market leader in global learning strategy, content, and technology, alongside Watershed, industry leader in learning measurement and data analysis, have come together for their fifth annual ‘Measuring the Business Impact of Learning’ report.
Since launching five years ago, the survey has reached over 1,700 global L&D leaders to assess a range of topics surrounding learning measurement including:
- Executive pressure to measure the business impact of learning
- Budgets, tools, and capabilities
- Barriers to effective learning measurement
- How L&D departments are evaluated
- The impact of big data
Additionally, in this year’s survey, participants were asked to share the main impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on their departments, targets, and priorities.
As well as a breakdown of the survey results, this report includes insights from industry experts Piers Lea (Chief Strategy Officer at LEO and Watershed’s parent company, Learning Technologies Group plc) and David Ells (Managing Director of Watershed).
These insights cover topics such as the importance of maintaining measurement, the impact of disruptive global events, and the key differences between Return on Investment (ROI) and Return on Expectation (ROE)—and why organizations should focus on the latter.
Piers Lea, Chief Strategy Officer at LTG said: “What the results clearly show us is the pervasive importance of measuring the business impact of learning. Even with the challenges and pressures of the global pandemic, those with measurement strategies in place have thrived and many of those without still consider it a top priority. We’re excited to have reached the five-year milestone of this report and have the opportunity to reflect on what has changed, and what hasn’t, since we first launched.”
David Ells, Managing Director at Watershed said: “In addition to the continued importance of having a measurement strategy in place, one interesting deviation from previous years is that ‘learner satisfaction’ has a much higher emphasis in measuring success.
“We’ve previously characterized learner satisfaction as a basic measurement, but it takes on new importance this year in light of a bigger potential trend—that many roles have shifted to be location-independent, giving employees more career choices and causing employers to differentiate more in terms of a people-first approach.”
