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Scott D. Pattison is executive director of the National Association of State Budget Officers (NASBO). Previously, Pattison served in a variety of capacities in state government, including as Virginia’s state budget director. Contact him at spattison@nasbo.org or via Twitter @NASBO.

Scott Pattison

Spring 2014 - The Public Manager

The Federal Shutdown's Impact on States

One of the biggest challenges of leadership is creating a culture where employees feel safe to share their ideas, concerns, feedback, and suggestions. Many have worked for organizations where leaders talk the talk but don’t walk the walk. They ask their employees to speak up but seek only praise and approval themselves.Great organizations develop employees by developing leaders. Leadership is more than a title, it’s a mindset. Joseph Grenny, coauthor of the New York Times bestseller Crucial Influence, once defined leadership as “intentional influence.” Coauthor Kerry Patterson adds, “At the end of the day, what qualifies people to be called ‘leaders’ is their capacity to influence others to change their behavior in order to achieve important results.”Here are four ideas that can help you develop an influencer and manage employee contribution.Solicit SincerelyIf you don’t want their ideas, don’t ask for them. Little contributes to a culture of silence more than insincerely soliciting feedback. So, if you already know what you’re going to do, be sure not to hold a perfunctory brainstorming session.Also, some people want to be seen and heard, but everyone wants to be valued. Employees share their ideas to contribute value. If those ideas aren’t sincerely valued or appreciated, the employee won’t feel valued.You can solicit ideas sincerely by focusing less on being right and more on getting it right. When you gather input and perspectives from others, you expand your pool of meaning, which leads to more informed decisions, actions, and results.Establish ExpectationsMake sure your employees understand that not all ideas can or will be implemented. Establishing proper expectations can help minimize frustration. Let employees know that while their ideas may not be implemented, they do inform the final decision. Their contributions may confirm current thinking or spark new ideas for a better course of action.It’s important that employees know that while they may not be a part of the decision-making team, their contribution as part of the data stream is invaluable. They are often closest to the problems you are trying to solve. Additionally, when employees serve as contributors, they are more likely to adopt the new solution (even if it’s not their own) and serve as champions to encourage others to do the same.Communicate ConstraintsWith limited insight into organizational constraints, employees often share ideas that are beyond the scope of what the organization can do. What resources are available? Is there a budget? What’s the timeframe or the level of quality required? Communicate your constraints so employees can offer suggestions and share ideas that work within them. When suggestions aren’t implemented, it’s generally not because they are bad, but because they are outside the constraints. Communicating constraints will lead to a greater chance of implementation. It also offers transparency and allows employees to see clear reasons should their ideas not be implemented.Reveal ResultsMore often than not, employees realize that all their ideas won’t be implemented. When people get frustrated or angry, it’s usually not about implementation but more likely because they feel their ideas were not considered. So, when people contribute ideas, let them know where things stand. If their idea was not implemented, explain why. Remind them of the expectations that were established and the constraints that were shared.Encouraging employee innovation and creativity is key for organizational success, as well as for engagement and retention. Managing the process can be challenging, but healthy organizations will always have more ideas than they can implement. Creating a process built on safety and rooted in sincere solicitations, established expectations, clear constraints, and transparent results will aid your efforts.

Working With Employee Input

ATD developed the talent development framework and puzzle to help practitioners understand the different components of talent development and how organizations can build their own frameworks to address their unique needs. This blog series explores each component of the talent development framework, why it’s important to the field, and what resources ATD offers to practitioners who want to learn more.Evaluating Learning ImpactEvaluating learning impact involves the use of learning metrics and analytics to measure the effectiveness of learning solutions. In Utilization Focused Evaluation: The New Century Text, Michael Quinn Patton defines evaluation as “the systematic collection of information about the activities, characteristics, and outcomes of programs to make judgments about the program, improve program effectiveness, and/or inform decisions about future programming.” Evaluating learning impact has long been considered a daunting task. And, as a recent ATD study shows, only 35 percent of talent development professionals “reported that their organizations evaluated the business results of learning programs to any extent.” A different approach is needed. First talent development professionals who want to evaluate learning impact must know what specifically they want to measure and how they want to measure it. According to learning expert Patti Shank, the biggest mistake many make in evaluating the impact of learning is just testing recall. Just because people have learned something does not necessarily mean that they’ll apply it or understand its importance on the job. Real assessment comes from observation, providing feedback, and evaluating results. There are several models to evaluate learning, such as Kirkpatrick’s Four Levels and Phillips’ Evaluation Model. Kirkpatrick’s Four Levels is likely the most commonly known evaluation model, with a four-level program that follows a path of reaction, learning, behavior, and results. The fourth step is the most important, because the results show outcomes and overall effect of the learning in practice. Regardless of the evaluation strategy used, when collecting data, it is also important to use a variety of tools such as surveys, interviews, and analytics to get a full picture. To be competent at evaluating learning impact, the ASTD Competency Study (Updated now to ATD Talent Development Capability Model™)  identifies skills that talent development professionals need to exhibit:• Identify customer expectations.• Select appropriate strategies, research design, and measures.• Communicate and gain support for the evaluation plan.• Manage data collections.• Analyze and interpret data.• Apply learning analytics.• Make recommendations to aid decision making.Measuring learning impact encourages higher-quality work, resource prioritization and allocation, and accountability. Measurement data are invaluable to organizations that are strategically using talent development efforts to achieve growth and efficiency objectives. Competency in evaluating learning impact is imperative to becoming a real business partner in the organization.We’ve assembled some additional resources to explore:• Use analytics to improve your organization’s evaluation of learning. • Discover new ways of measuring learning. • Learn how improving performance management can help learning impact. • Measure learning using evaluation and not testing. • Consider a new way to look at Kirkpatrick’s four levels. • ATD Research: Evaluating Learning: Getting to Measurements That Matter•Evaluating the Impact of Training by Scott B. Parry• For more information on training delivery and other major components of talent development, check out the ASTD Handbook, 2nd Edition (Updated now to the TDBok™ Guide, 2nd Edition). • Take a deeper dive into evaluation with ATD’s Evaluating Learning Impact Certificate Program.

The ATD Talent Development Framework: Evaluating Learning Impact

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