Learn the Secret Formula for Measuring Learning ROI

McDonald’s French fries. The recipe for Coca-Cola. The 11 herbs and spices in KFC. Some companies guard their secret formulas like gold. Measuring your learning ROI should not be one of them. 

Even though C-suites demand to know the return on investment of every aspect of their organization, knowing how to measure the ROI of learning programs has been a mystery for many organizations—until now.

L&D teams can no longer skirt around the issue. In 2017, LinkedIn’s first annual Workplace Learning Report found that Chief Learning Officers (CLOs) were facing increasing pressure to deliver learning programs that both engage employees and positively impact their organization’s bottom line. Businesses expect proof that the investment in learning is paying off both in increased workforce performance and financial payback.

According to a report from EY on the ever-growing importance of L&D for the future of work, “data can be a game changer within the functioning of corporate L&D and help the function earn their spot as a strategic partner.” 

Furthermore, in a research paper on adaptive learning by industry analyst Josh Bersin, he states “the depth and ability to continually assess, learn, and act changes the game for how learning departments will operate and make investment decisions. It allows the organization to make faster, better, and more effective decisions.”

Proving the value of employee learning and development investments is often the sticking point, but it doesn’t have to be. With the right tools, L&D teams can easily track learning analytics and measure outcomes. Yet many learning management systems (LMSs) only collect a limited amount of learning data and come up short on business impact insights. 

Companies have traditionally measured the effectiveness of L&D programs through course completion, class attendance, pre- and post-surveys or assessments, engagement surveys, and direct feedback, but none of those ways speak to a business ROI. As a result, none of those methods answer the essential question your C-suite is asking: How is our learning program improving our bottom line? 

Unlock the Secret to Measuring Your Learning ROI 

L&D teams need proof that their learning programs are achieving not just their learning goals, but also the organization’s financial goals. The problem is that measuring the ROI of employee learning is not always a slam dunk, because most LMSs are missing the required functionality.

What L&D teams need to be able to measure their learning ROI is a “secret sauce” created by Schoox data experts. To measure their ROI within the Schoox LMS, all companies have to do is correlate their preferred KPIs against any online training variables they want to measure. This allows the extraction of any relationship that exists between the datasets. 

Schoox empowers learning teams to get creative with how they can look at the training data and performance from different angles—while discovering exactly what impact training has on the business’s bottom line. 

Schoox in Action—Celebrity Cruises Measures a Single “Port of Call”

A perfect real-world example of the power of Schoox learning ROI formula is Celebrity Cruises. The travel company’s learning program has two components: training internal customer services staff members and ensuring external travel advisors are operating in full compliance. Schoox allows the organization to create a “single port of call” for the two learning tracks—and access simplified reporting for each. 

“Schoox allows us to report on thousands of learning insights and compliance metrics for our staff and travel advisors,” said Alex Frady, Manager of Learning & Development. “The reports help us spot gaps in training and learning and increase our percentage of enrollments and graduates. Now we can send specific messages to groups of people or design campaigns to increase enrollments.”

Learn more about Celebrity Cruise success and Schoox’s “secret sauce” for measuring learning ROI in our new report, Real-world Learning for Frontline Workers: Top 5 Learning & Development Must-haves for Employees Working on the Go.

Want to learn more about measuring learning ROI with Schoox? See our four-part blog series, Measuring the Business Impact of L&D, starting here.