The State of the Industry Report is ASTD's annual review of trends in
workplace learning and performance. Sponsored
by Allied Research Corporation and SkillSoft, this years report includes
data from ASTD BEST Awards Winners, ASTD Forum Members and other organizations
from 2002 to date. The 2011 State of the
Industry Report is available on ASTDs Bookstore
and is free for ASTD members.
The 2011 State of the Industry Report findings from more than 400 responding
organizations across all major industries show that overall, organizations
continue to be committed to the delivery of knowledge and the development of
employees at every level. Organizations are just as committed as ever to
learning and development (L&D). ASTD
estimates that U.S. organizations spent $1228 per learner on employee learning
and development in 2010. Nearly two-thirds of that was spent on the internal
learning function, such as staff salaries and internal development costs. The
remainder was allocated to external services such as workshops, vendors and
external events.
The direct expenditure for learning as a percentage of
payroll has fluctuated between 2 and 2.3 percent since 2001. This year,
however, the consolidated percentage increased from 2.2 to 2.7 percent, the
highest direct expenditure as a percentage of payroll recorded by ASTD for the
SOIR. While the learning hours used by organizations remained stable in 2010,
the associated cost per learning hour used increased by 14.2 percent, from $63
in 2009 to nearly $72 in 2010The report also covers 12 content areas. The
leading content area for the consolidated group is management and supervisory
learning. Manager and supervisory content also registered the greatest
percentage increase change, increasing from 10.4 percent in 2009 to 12.8
percent of the content delivered in 2010. The research also found that overall,
many organizations are investing in technology-based delivery systems and
methods, and the growing use of technology to deliver contentespecially through
social media tools.
ASTD encourages readers to use this report as a benchmarking
tool. Typically this report is used by executives and managers to better
understand how learning directly affects employee and organizational
performance, and to help learning professionals support and defend the learning
functions importance and value to improving the bottom line.
