Exam 1

Question 1

Training

Answer 1

Facilitates learning job-related competencies, knowledge, skills, or behavior

Question 2

Development

Answer 2

Future focused, include education, job experiences, relationships and assessments

Question 3

Learning needs to demonstrate:

Answer 3

How it contributes to the company’s competitive advantage through

• improving employee performance
• supporting the business strategy
• contributing positively to business outcomes such as quality, productivity, development of new products, retaining key employees

Question 4

Human capital and why is it valuable compared to financial capital

Answer 4

Knowledge, advanced skills, system understanding and creativity, and motivation to deliver high-quality products and services
Valuable since it is difficult to imitate or purchase and is unique to the company

Question 5

Formal training and development

Answer 5

Training and development programs, courses, and events that are developed and organized by the company

• Employees attend these programs such as face-to-face or online training
• Companies invest billions into formal training

Question 6

Informal learning

Answer 6

Learning that is learner initiated and involves action and doing

• Motivated by an intent to develop
• Occurs without a trainer
• Occurs on a as-needed basis
• Ex: social networking, interactions with peers, emails

Question 7

Knowledge management and its primary focus?

Answer 7

Consist of the tools, processes, systems, structures, and cultures to improve the creation sharing, and use of knowledge
-Contributes to informal learning

Question 8

Explicit knowledge

Answer 8

Knowledge that is well documented, easily articulated, and easily transferred from person to person
Ex: flowcharts, formulas
Primary focus of formal training and employee development

Question 9

Tacit knowledge

Answer 9

Personal knowledge based on individual experiences

-Facilitated by Informal learning

Question 10

How is tacit knowledge applied to informal learning?

Answer 10

Informal learning is central to the development of tacit knowledge since it involves employee interactions in personal relationships with peers, colleagues, and experts through which it is shared

Question 11

How is knowledge management applied to informal learning?

Answer 11

Ex: G4S developing an Internet and social networking system which provides company material, announcements, manuals, tools and can be accessed from anywhere across the office.

Question 12

Advantages of a centralized training function

Answer 12

• Drives strong alignment with business strategy
• Set of metrics or scorecards to measure and report rates of quality
• Helps streamline processes
• Gives company cost advantage in purchasing training from vendors
• Helps companies better integrate programs

Question 13

What is a balanced scorecard? What are its four perspectives? What are examples of metrics?

Answer 13

A balanced scorecard is a performance measurement that allows managers to look at the overall company performance or from performance of departments or functions from the perspective of internal and external customers, employees, and shareholders
Four perspectives and examples of metrics used are:
CT-Customers (time)
I-PICS-Internal (process that influences customer satisfaction)
ILES-Innovation and learning (employee satisfaction)
FG-Financial (growth)

Question 14

What is the ADDIE model

Answer 14

Analysis: 5 W’s “Who needs to learn this, what needs to be learned”…
Design: Best way to deliver this info?
Development: What tools do I have?
Implementation: How can I efficiently get this to the learners?
Evaluation: What went well?

Most closely associated with formal training and development

Question 15

Outsourcing

Answer 15

Use of an outside company (external services firm) that takes complete, overall, or most of responsibility and control of some training and development activities

Question 16

Why should companies outsource training?

Answer 16

Cost savings, time savings that allow a company to focus on its business strategy
Improvements in compliance and accuracy in training mandated to comply with regulations
Company lacking capability to meet learning demands
Desire to access all training practices

Question 17

Three levels of needs assessment

Answer 17

Organizational, person, and task analysis

Question 18

Organizational analysis

Answer 18

Involves identifying whether training supports the company’s strategic direction, whether managers, peers, and employees support training activity

Question 19

Person analysis

Answer 19

Helps identify employees who need training, perhaps due to lack of training or poor previous

Question 20

Task analysis

Answer 20

Results in a description of work activities, including tasks performed by the employee and the knowledge, skills, and abilities required to complete the task

Question 21

McDonalds Case Description

Answer 21

McDonalds conducted a need’s assessment to examine its learning perspective to achieve strategic goals. Chief learning officer and her team examined employee’s backgrounds (gender, age, generation), and gathered data on how frequent the employees used online training content. They also examined the responsibilities, task, and leadership skills for each job. The needs assessment showed that although more trainees were more millennials and Gen Z, the training method delivered did not meet their needs. Thus they created shorted training curriculum that was accessible through smart phones, computers, and tablets

Question 22

Crowdsourcing

Answer 22

Refers to asking stakeholders to provide information for needs assessment. Involves a larger number of employees involved

Question 23

Focus group

Answer 23

Type of SME interview that involves face-to-face meeting with groups of stakeholders where they ask questions relating to specific training needs

Question 24

Historical data

Answer 24

Involves collecting performance data from electronic or paper records. It provides info regarding current performance levels

Question 25

Benchmarking

Answer 25

Using information about other companies’ training practices to determine the appropriate type, level, and frequency of training

Question 26

Goal setting theory

Answer 26

Assumes that behavior results from a person’s conscious goals and intentions

• Goals influence a person’s behavior by directing energy and attention, sustaining effort over time, and motivating the person to develop
• Used in training program design

Question 27

Reinforcement theory

Answer 27

Emphasizes that people are motivated to perform or avoid certain behaviors because of past outcomes that have resulted from those behaviors
-Behavior modification

Question 28

Expectancy theory and it’s three factors

Answer 28

Suggest that a person’s behavior is based on three factors: expectancy, instrumentality, valence
Expectancy: the link between trying to perform a behavior and actually performing well
Instrumentality: belief that performing a given behavior is associated with a particular outcome
Valence: the value that a person places on an outcome

Question 29

Information processing theory

Answer 29

Gives more emphasis to the internal process that occurs when training content is learned and retained
-Undergoes several brain transformations

Question 30

What does learning transfer mean?

Answer 30

The act of applying knowledge and skills learned in one situation to a new situation or context
Transfer depends on a trainee’s ability to retrieve learned capabilities
-Employees need to know the objective
-Need meaningful training content and opportunities to practice
-Commit training content to memory
-Feedback
-Observation, experience, and interaction

Question 31

Adult learning theory: andragogy

Answer 31

Adults:

• Has the need to know why they are learning
• Self-directed
• Brings more work-related experiences into the learning situation
• Enter a learning experience with a problem-centered approach to learning
• Motivated to learn by both extrinsic and intrinsic motivators

Question 32

What creates a healthy learning experience for trainees?

Answer 32

Employees need to know the objectives
Employees need meaningful content
Employees need opportunities to practice
Employees need a number of pre-practice conditions
Employees need practice involving experience

Question 33

What is learning? What are the key components to learning?

Answer 33

The process of acquiring knowledge, skills, competencies, attitude, or behaviors
Three components: Knowledge management, formal training and development, informal learning

Question 34

What is a learning organization

Answer 34

A company with the capacity to learn, adapt, and change. A place where employees seek, share, and apply new knowledge, and where training is part of a large system to enhance human capital.
Learning has to help employee performance and business success and companies need to support informal learning since tacit knowledge is difficult to acquire in formal training.
Learning must also be supported with physical resources and psychologically.