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Diagnosing Skill Gaps: Identifying Training Needs
Principles of Management · Chapter 13: Human Resource ManagementSection 13.4 · lesson 86 of 11714 min · free with a free account
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In this lesson
Diagnose before you prescribe.
- Conduct a needs assessment at organizational, task, and person levels
- Distinguish a skill gap from a system or motivation problem
- Explain why training is so often over-prescribed
- Write a learning objective from an identified gap
Transcript
Everything said in the video, section by section (1,875 words). Read along, or search it.
Human Resource Management
Diagnosing Skill Gaps: Identifying Training Needs
When performance falls short, the reflex in most organizations is to schedule training. Quite often, that's money spent on the wrong fix. This section is about diagnosing before you prescribe. We'll run a training needs assessment at three levels: the organization, the task, and the person. We'll look at the data sources for person analysis, and the bias each one carries. Then comes the central question. Is this a can-not-do problem, a will-not-do problem, or a system problem? We'll see why training gets over-prescribed anyway, and how to rank the needs that are real. We'll write learning objectives that can actually be verified. And we'll follow a warehouse manager whose training request turned out to have a very different cause.
Needs Assessment
3 Levels, Each With a Cost If Skipped
A training needs assessment works at three levels. Each one contributes something the others can't, and skipping any of them has a specific cost. Organizational analysis asks whether the organization's strategy and capability requirements actually call for this training. It also asks whether the organization will support applying what's learned, once the course is over. That connects directly to strategic planning, in Subchapter fourteen point one. Skip it, and you get training for a capability nobody needs. Or learning that has nowhere to land. Task analysis asks what the job itself actually requires. It draws on the job analysis from Subchapter thirteen point two, not on the job description alone. Why not the description? Because it can drift out of date, while the real work keeps changing underneath it. Skip task analysis, and the training is built around an inaccurate, or outdated, picture of the role. Person analysis asks who actually has the gap, and how large it is. Skip it, and training goes to people who didn't need it. Meanwhile, the people who did are left unaddressed.
Figure 13.4.1
A Funnel From Organization to Person
Figure thirteen point four point one shows these three levels as a funnel. At the top, organizational analysis asks whether the organization will support new learning. Its data comes from strategy documents, and leadership priorities. In the middle, task analysis asks what the job actually requires. Its source is the job analysis, not the job description alone. At the bottom, person analysis asks who has the gap, and how large it is. It draws on performance data, assessment, and self-report. The funnel narrows for a reason. Each level asks a more specific question than the one above it. And here's the key point. A genuine training need has to clear all three levels. No single level, on its own, is enough to justify it.
Person Analysis
4 Data Sources, 4 Characteristic Biases
Person analysis draws on several data sources, and each has a characteristic bias. Performance data is objective. But it may reflect factors beyond the individual's control. Competency assessment is structured. It can, however, be time-consuming to administer well. Self-assessment is efficient to gather. But it's only as good as a person's perception of her own gaps. Manager judgment is informed by context. Its weakness is the attribution error, covered fully in Subchapter ten point seven. Here's how that error works. When a manager asks why an employee's performance falls short, she tends to over-attribute it to the person. She blames the person's own characteristics, and under-weights the surrounding situation. That bias matters a great deal for the question we turn to next. A manager primed to blame the person is primed to prescribe training for the person.
The Diagnostic Question
Can-Not-Do, Will-Not-Do, or System?
One question prevents most wasted training spend. It connects back to the performance equation from Subchapter eleven point one. Is this a can-not-do problem, a will-not-do problem, or a system problem? A can-not-do problem is a genuine skill gap. The person lacks the knowledge or capability the task requires. The test: could she perform the task correctly under close observation, with every incentive to succeed? A will-not-do problem is a motivation problem. She has the capability, but isn't applying it. The test: has she ever demonstrated the capability successfully before? A genuine skill gap wouldn't allow that. A system problem is an obstacle in the environment itself. A process, resource, or structural barrier she can't overcome. The test: would a clearly capable, clearly motivated person still fail, under identical conditions? Now the blunt observation. Training gets prescribed for all three, and it only addresses the first. Training a will-not-do problem doesn't touch motivation. She already has the skill to act on. Training a system problem does nothing to remove the obstacle in her way. Either way, real resources go to a fix that was never going to reach the actual cause.
Table 13.4.1
6 Performance Problems, Classified
Table thirteen point four point one applies the diagnostic to six problems. First, a new employee can't complete a task correctly, even with close guidance. There's no prior successful demonstration, even under favorable conditions. That's a skill gap, so targeted training fits. Second, an experienced employee stops performing a task she's done well for years. Her clear record of correct performance rules out a skill gap. It's motivation, so investigate the cause rather than retrain. Third, a whole team's output drops after a new software system arrives, with no training. That's a system problem, because the obstacle applies regardless of individual skill or effort. Notice the fix in this instance. The gap is in how the tool was introduced, so proper training on it is exactly right. Fourth, a capable employee's reports are always late, because another department's approvals are slow. A capable, motivated person would hit the same delay. So fix the bottleneck, not the employee. Fifth, a strong performer starts making errors after her workload doubles, with no added support. Again, a system problem. Address staffing or workload, rather than retraining a skill she's already shown. Sixth, a new hire keeps applying a company policy incorrectly, despite good effort. She's had no prior exposure to the correct application. That's a skill gap, so targeted policy training, with practice and feedback.
Over-Prescription
Why Training Is Reached For Anyway
If training only fixes skill gaps, why is it reached for so consistently? There are four reasons. First, it's visible. Commissioning a training program is a concrete action a manager can point to. Second, it's fundable. Many organizations have a training budget earmarked for exactly this kind of spending. That makes it an easy category to draw against. Third, it locates the problem in the individual. The alternative is a system the manager herself might be responsible for maintaining. That's far less comfortable. Fourth, it lets a manager act without changing anything she controls. Redesigning a process is hard. So is a motivational conversation, which can be personally uncomfortable. Training the employee is, in a real sense, the path of least resistance. Notice that none of these four reasons says anything about whether the training will work.
Finding and Ranking Needs
Data Sources and Priorities
Several data sources feed a needs assessment. Performance data flags where output falls short of standard. Error and incident data flags where mistakes cluster. Customer feedback flags gaps that are visible from outside the organization. Turnover and exit information can reveal capability gaps that drove people to leave. That links to Subchapter thirteen point one. New system or regulatory requirements create needs that didn't exist before a specific change. And then there's manager request, a manager simply asking for training. Treat it with genuine skepticism. It's the source most vulnerable to the over-prescription pattern. A request isn't evidence until it's been tested against the can-not-do, will-not-do, system diagnostic. Once genuine needs are identified, they're prioritized along three dimensions. Risk weighs how severe the consequence is, if the gap is left alone. Strategic weight weighs how directly the gap connects to what the organization is trying to accomplish. And number affected weighs how many people share the gap. A broad need usually justifies a different response than an individual one.
Learning Objectives
Behavior, Condition, Standard
Once a real skill gap is confirmed, the next step is a learning objective. A learning objective specifies three elements. The behavior is what the person should be able to do, and it has to be observable. The condition is the situation in which she'll perform it. The standard defines what successful performance looks like. A vague objective fails to pin down one or more of these, clearly enough to verify. That's the real test. Could someone watch the person, and say yes, she met it? Understand, know, and be better at are not behaviors anyone can observe. Draft, identify, create, and deliver are.
Illustration
4 Vague Objectives, Rewritten
Here are four vague objectives, each rewritten with a behavior, a condition, and a standard. Understand customer service becomes something concrete. Given a written customer complaint, draft a response that addresses the specific issue. It must follow the company's tone guidelines, and be done within fifteen minutes. Know the safety procedures becomes a scenario test. When presented with a described workplace hazard scenario, correctly identify and state the required control measure, without reference materials. Be better at using the new system becomes a timed task. Using the new scheduling system, create and confirm a correctly formatted appointment, within two minutes, with no errors. And improve communication skills becomes this. Given a routine project update, deliver a two-minute verbal summary covering status, risk, and next steps, without notes. In each rewrite, the condition sets the scene, the verb is observable, and the standard is checkable.
Before Commissioning
Mandatory Training and the Assessment Document
Mandatory training is a genuinely different design problem. It's required for compliance, not chosen to close an identified performance gap. Compliance training is designed to demonstrate that required information was delivered. Its success is measured by completion, and documentation. Training meant to change practice is designed around behavior change. Its success is measured by whether the targeted behavior actually changes. Confusing the two produces a predictable failure, in either direction. Compliance training is assumed to have changed behavior, simply because it was completed. Or practice-focused training is treated as adequate once a completion certificate exists. Either way, the behavior it was meant to change was never verified. Finally, the assessment document. Before any program is commissioned, it should contain four things. The gap, identified at all three levels. And the evidence that it's a skill gap, not motivation or a system problem. The learning objectives the training is meant to achieve. And its priority, relative to other needs competing for the same limited training resources.
Case Vignette
Renzo Requests Training and Finds a Process Cause Instead
Here's a composite case, constructed for instruction. Renzo is a warehouse operations manager. Shipping errors had risen noticeably on his order-processing team. He requested customer service training, assuming his team needed a refresher on verifying an order before it shipped. Before commissioning it, an HR partner asked him to run the diagnostic question. Had the team ever performed the verification step correctly before? Renzo confirmed they had, reliably, for years before the recent rise in errors. So this was not a can-not-do problem. Digging further, the timing lined up closely with a recent software update. The update had quietly changed how the verification screen displayed order details. A key field was now much easier to overlook. The team hadn't lost the skill, or the motivation. A system had changed underneath them, and nobody adjusted for it. Training them on a procedure they already knew would have addressed nothing. Renzo's request fit the pattern exactly. Visible, fundable, and comfortably located in the team, not the system. Next, Subchapter thirteen point five turns to development methods, and how a genuinely diagnosed skill gap actually gets closed.
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