The get-it-done guide to Training Needs Analysis

What is a Training Needs Analysis and why do we do it? We do a Training Needs Analysis in order to understand: what are the knowledge, skills, and capability gaps that we need to give to each team or member of the team to know what training we need to design? 

So you'll have already done your Change Impact Assessment and you'll know the current state and future state. If you have a Process Analyst working on your team with you, or working with the project, then sometimes they'll have done a lot of the work, thinking about: here's the very specific details about what somebody needs to do differently in their role from a process perspective. If you have other people working on your change with you, such as an Operations Lead or a Trainer or somebody from the Leadership Capability Team, then you might start to also look at what are some of the other supporting skills / leadership skills that need to get built into the training. You'll have a bit of detail already. 

And then the Training Needs Analysis is about going: “Okay, in order to get these people from here, from the current state to their future state, what are they going to need to know, what are they going to need to do differently, and what do we need to make sure that we've trained them on in order for them to be ready?” It doesn't matter if you're doing a big bang launch, it doesn't matter if you're doing little bits and pieces of launch (like small drops along the way), training is often done prior to anything that's being released out to an impacted team. 

There's a couple of ways that we can do this. You're not always going to be the person who does this, but it is good to know how to do it or what to do if you do want to. 

Training Needs Analysis - By role

So the first option that you have is to split your training approach up by role. You could have leaders, team members, teams - however you want to split up your stakeholders. What do they need to know to get them from A to B? For example with a system change, a leader may need to know about the change (an overview), how to coach their team through the change, and how to escalate issues. A team member might need to know the overview as well, but also how to actually do the new process in the system. And then different teams may require specific training, for example the IT Help Desk may need to be trained on the administration side of the system, not just the user interface side, and how to escalate any issues to the provider / vendor of that technology. And there might be more work to do to get their commitment to supporting the system in future. They might need to know how to escalate any issues to the provider of that technology, who we call a “technology partner” or a “technology vendor”. Once you’ve worked out what each role needs, you can then think about the best training channels or formats to deliver these different outcomes such as face-to-face training, guides, FAQs and more. 

Training Needs Analysis - By content

The other option is to actually do it by content. For example, if all three groups (leaders, teams and IT Help Desk) need an overview of the change, you're only going to ever create that content once. Whether it’s via slides, a video, a flyer or some other delivery mechanism, you’re probably only going to create it one time but give all three roles the same overview of the change. It’s the same change and the why should be the same so everyone is singing from the same hymn book (especially if you’ve crafted an Inspirational Change Vision of the whole end-to-end experience like I teach in my Leading Successful Change program). So you can start to list out all the knowledge, skills and capabilities that anybody would need and then how could we get those out to people, then think about which stakeholder groups or teams would need that topic. That is another way of doing it. There's no right or wrong, it's completely up to you how you want to do it. You can go “by role” where you're really listing out in detail everything each role would get. Or you can go “by content” which can sometimes actually end up being an easier way of going about it and you can still run a workshop doing it this way. 

At a high level, that’s what a Training Needs Analysis is. It's a little bit like the Change Impact Assessment where it sounds really complex. But at it’s core, its super simple. 

All my belief, 

Lata xx

P.S. In my Leading Successful Change program, I delve deeper into real-world training examples, the types of training activities you can do, how to deliver training, and how to engage different personalities and people in the training experience. For the first time ever, I’ll be running my Leading Successful Change program live in-person in Sydney (I’ll share more information super soon). In the meantime, here’s 5 ways I can help:

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4. Download my free Underpaid and Overlooked Coaching Action Guide for inspiration and step-by-step instructions to change careers with confidence and earn your worth: click here to download
5. Get my Intro to Change Management webinar to start or step up in your Change Management career: click here for instant access