Measuring the impact of learning with Kevin M. Yates, the L&D Detective

Measuring the impact of learning with Kevin M. Yates, the L&D Detective

Adding the L&D Detective Kit to your toolbelt

I'm excited that you're joining me. I have a great interview for you on a hot topic that is always trending in talent development, learning and development and that is measuring the impact of learning with my friend Kevin M. Yates. If you don't know Kevin or don't follow him on LinkedIn, he is known as the L&D Detective. He's constantly posting great articles and input on measuring the impact of learning and development on LinkedIn and other places. Kevin and I have become good friends. We met first on LinkedIn and we had phone calls and met in person.

He spoke at my conference, the Talent Development Think Tank, about measuring the impact of L&D. He also spoke at the Talent Development Virtual Summit in September 2020. I'm excited to have him on the podcast. We recorded this one live on LinkedIn to announce the debut of his brand new eBook, the L&D Detective Kit, which is designed to help you out there measure the impact of training and development programs and what he says, solving impact mysteries. If you are interested at all in learning about how to get better at measuring the impact of your learning and development programs, this is the interview for you.

A couple of quick notes. One, we've recorded this live on LinkedIn. Number two, if you want to get Kevin's new eBook, it is available now. You just need to go to his website, KevinMYates.com and it should be right there on the homepage. Number three, as you know, I run a membership community called the Talent Development Think Tank where we have over 60 talent development professionals, leaders and experts coming together on a regular basis. We have a call every Wednesday. If you're interested in being part of a cool community, we'd love to have you come join us. The website is TDTT.us or you can reach out to me for information.

The last thing I'll add is I also released my report of The Top Five Trends in Talent Development. I mentioned that measuring impact is always trending. It doesn't matter what year it is. If you want to know what are the hottest trends for 2020 in L&D, go to TalentDevelopmentHotSeat.com and you can download my free report right there of The Top Five Trends in Talent Development. There you have all the information. We're going to talk more about measuring L&D with Kevin M. Yates in my interview. His L&D Detective Kit is available at KevinMYates.com. Without further ado, here is my interview with Kevin.

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Kevin, welcome to the show.

Thank you, Andy. It's always good to see you.

I'm excited to have you on. If you are in learning and development, talent development, HR especially, you're going to want to check this out. Kevin, let's start with the L&D Detective Kit. Where did you get the idea for this kit and why did you decide to put it together?

I have been writing a lot of blogs and articles over the past few years and have joined a lot of podcast interviews. I have done a lot of workshops and conferences including yours and have done a few live streams. All of that has been talked about measuring the impact of training and learning. Andy, I got tired of hearing my own voice. What I wanted to do is figure out a way to put all of that insight, thoughts, and ideas into one place so that those thoughts and ideas are scalable. Also, so that people have access to them and they don't always have to wait for me to speak at a conference or to do a live stream or podcast interview. What I wanted to do is put all those thoughts and ideas in one place, and that's what prompted the idea for the L&D Detective Kit. The other thing is that the L&D needs some actionable help when it comes to measuring impact. That is what drove me.

Measuring Impact

You and I both have done a lot of work in L&D. We've become good friends and we've talked about this a lot. Why do you say the L&D community needs help in this area?

Because quite candidly, we're struggling with measuring impact. We do a lot of talking about it, myself included. Full transparency, sometimes, I get tired of hearing my own voice saying, “We need to measure. We’ve got to show impact,” and it's not happening at the extent to which it should or can. There are some learning and development organizations or some training teams that are having success with measuring impact, but then there are some learning organizations that are still struggling so we need some help.

What I've provided in the L&D Detective Kit for Solving Impact Mysteries is some help. To answer your question on why we need this, we need this because it's important for us to have some facts, evidence, data and proof for the results of our work, and we don't have it. What we have is operations data and there's nothing wrong with that. Don't get me wrong. How many people do we train? How many courses do we offer? How much are we spending on training and learning? That's operational data and that's operational insight.

There's nothing wrong with that but that tells a story about how learning and performing is a function. None of that speaks to what is the result of what we're doing. None of that speaks to whether or not behavior, actions, performance and business goals are impacted by the work that we're doing. The L&D Detective Kit moves us a little closer to figuring out how to measure the impact of training and learning with facts, evidence, and data as proof.

You and I have talked about this. I've gone to a lot of HR and learning development conferences over the years in oftentimes, Alaska. What are the things that you're most concerned about and that always comes up at the top of the list, “How do I measure the impact of the programs that we're creating?” Let's start there. Talking about the data. What is your definition of impact? How do we think about this concept of measuring impact?

My definition is simple and that's why I like it. Andy, pay attention to this one. It's going to blow your way. Impact is when learning activates performance in a business goal. It is no more complicated than that. You don't have to think really hard about that. For me, learning fulfills its highest purpose when it's doing that. I like to say that training and learning fulfill its highest purpose when it measurably activates performance in business goals. My work as an L&D Detective is measuring the extent to which training and learning are fulfilling its purpose.

L&D Detective Kit

It makes it simple for all of us to think about what is impact? What should we be thinking about? How should we be approaching this? That brings me to my next question, which is going back to your Detective Kit that you're creating. This is something that people are struggling with for many years. There must be other directives and guidelines out there on measuring impact. What makes yours different?

Where I believe our L&D brothers and sisters around the world are struggling is not proactively planning for impact. In terms of simplicity, it is no more complicated than that. Here's what happens. Here's the traditional relationship. It almost feels like we're working at a fast-food restaurant. What happens is this, Andy. A stakeholder business partner comes to us and says, “Training, I'd like 1 classroom, 2 eLearning, and a side order of digital learning to-go.” We take that order, fulfill that order, go off and make our thing. We then go back to the counter and then we serve it up.

That is a fulfillment center type relationship. What you'll find in the L&D Detective Kit is a way to transform that relationship. What I have in the L&D Detective Kit is an engagement model called the impact opportunity interview where we are having conversations and discussions with business partners and stakeholders that focus on business goals and performance requirements to achieve those goals. Also, focus on key performance indicators that show how performance is activating a business goal. That's a different conversation than one eLearning and a side order of instructor-led to-go.

Where the L&D Detective Kit is going to make the biggest impact, pun intended, is with the impact opportunity engagement model. There are nine questions that I've identified and I'm willing to bet the mule and the house on the idea that if you ask these nine questions, you will be uniquely positioned to build a learning solution that measurably impacts performance and business goals. The key here is that it's a proactive conversation. Because the other thing that happens, Andy is that more often than that, we will build or create something and then we'll launch it and it'll be out in the world.

The question is, what's the impact? How do we measure impact? I'm telling you from twenty plus years of experience that it's going to be either difficult or impossible to measure the impact after it's already been designed and deployed and people are engaged in it. Why? Because there was no proactive impact intention upfront. What I know to be true based on my years of experience is that you have to bake impact into design. By the way, I show you how to do that in the book.

Impact is intentional, purposeful and targeted. All of that has to be considered upfront, even before you design anything. In terms of where we're struggling, we're struggling with measuring impact because we aren't thinking about it upfront. We have on our fulfillment center hats so we're just thinking that the thing that we create is the deliverable. What I say is no, our deliverable is impact. There's a big difference between the two. Those are the answers to your question.

You're hitting what people are thinking about. To take it all the way back to your metaphor of taking that order, going back to McDonald's where you used to work.

L&D Detective Kit

Not behind the counter.

You were in the corporate office. You were in the crystal palace and not out there with people. There's nothing wrong with that but a lot of times, we have the L&D department and we have the executives in the business coming to L&D saying, “I noticed our salespeople need to get better at negotiations. Will you please create training for that?” That's the example I was going to because I've gotten that request before.

That's what a conversation is.

“Yes, I will. How many people have you got?” It goes from there and later, they might think, “How do we make sure that we measure the impact of this?” I know you say there's a big problem with that because it needs to start at the beginning.

With that example that you gave, which was a perfect example. With that business leader coming to us and saying, “I need sales training.” Rather than us saying, “How many people have you got? When do you need it?” The question to that is, “Talk to me a little bit more about the business goal. What was the context for what you believe people need sales training? What are the performance requirements that will help people be successful in achieving whatever the business goal is? By the way, can you compare and contrast where performance is now versus where it needs to be?”

“While we're talking about that, what are some of the key metrics and key performance indicators that you're using to determine the extent to which the business is successful in achieving this business goal? What are some of your thoughts and ideas for how we can use performance metrics for people to show the extent to which we're filling that gap where people are today versus where they need to be to achieve this business goal?” Did you notice, Andy, in just those few words, I didn't say anything about training because the first discussion should not be about training, period, end of story. If you find yourself in that first discussion having a conversation about training, you're having the wrong conversation.

Kevin, I work in L&D and I got into this to create cool training programs. I'm excited to create training and you're telling me in that first meeting, I'm not talking about training?

That's what I'm telling you, Andy. There will be opportunities to talk about doing that thing that you love. The exciting opportunity is that we can elevate that thing that you love to do by ensuring that that thing you create has some measurable ways to show the extent to which that thing that you created changed behavior, actions and performance. Training is part of the discussion. It's an unavoidable part of the discussion, but you’ve got to have that discussion at the right time. That's what I'm saying. You’re trying to give me some trouble.

First things first. One thing I've learned from you is that if you want to talk about measurement, it needs to start at the beginning. It can't come in at the end and say, “We ran this training program and now we want to figure out how to measure it.” You've told me many times that that's one of the biggest challenges that come up. The L&D people come to you and say, “I ran this program. How do I go back and figure out how to measure it?”

That has been the biggest challenge for me, particularly, in the past few years, where I've had this epiphany and focus on measuring the impact of training and learning. I'm empathetic though because here's the thing. I didn't always have this mindset for measurement.

[bctt tweet=”Impact is when learning activates performance in a business goal.” via=”no”]

You weren't born with it.

I've been in L&D now for more than twenty years. My point here is that I totally get that it’s difficult and we have to shift because I was there. I remember a few years ago, I was thinking all I need to do is get some smiley sheets and I'm good to go. If people like me and they like the training, thumbs up. We're good. If people had a good time while they were at the training, thumbs up. One of them had an awesome Kumbaya moments and the food was great. The facilities were off the chain and everybody enjoyed the dinners after the training, we did a good thing. That was me but now, that's not going to work. Particularly, it's not going to work because that kind of training is going away. Nobody is coming together for nothing.

You can't rely on good food, great snacks and coffee to bring people through anymore.

Mother Earth says, “It’s your own house. Everybody's at home.” I said all that to say I digress. My point here is that I totally get that it's difficult or different or uncomfortable to make this transition. Because quite often, I think to myself, “Why have we not come along in this measurement journey a lot further than we already are?” That's because we have some embedded habits and some ways of working as a profession that is difficult things, and I get it. I'm empathetic to that idea, which is why I have the L&D Detective Kit for Solving Impact Mysteries because that will help people come along in the measurement journey.

The thing that I like about the Detective Kit, Andy is that it's not just me pontificating and spouting out these thoughts and ideas about what people should be doing and all that. I got some actionable stuff in there. I even have templates, which is why I had to delay the launch. I’m thinking, “I’ve got to have some templates here so that people can take what's here and apply it on your roles day-to-day.” The L&D Detective Kit is unique in that way because it's not just me saying, “We need to measure it.” It's me saying, “Here are some thoughts and ideas about how to measure the impact of training and learning, and here are some ways in which you can make them actionable by using the templates that are provided.” That’s the answer to your question. Am I being long-winded?

You're given such great value, Kevin. People like it. I want to get to your nine questions. Can we share the nine questions?

You’re going to have to read the book for that. You're trying to test my memory.

I got your definition here. “Impact is when learning activates performance and a business goal.” We had a comment from Lawrence Henderson. He said, “Louder for the people in the back, Kevin.” You talked about some of the challenges. We're all guilty of some of those. Some comments from Kate Nash who said, “I love it.” Kate said, I totally agree with it and I have seen this time and time again. I’m sure many of us have. The issue I discussed in the Talent Development Think Tank, the community that I run, you're going to be speaking in that community. Gloria asked, “Is the book out now?” Let's address that one. Kevin, the eBook is available now. Where do people go to get it?

If you go to my website, KevinMYates.com, right there on the homepage, you can request a free copy and you'll get it personally sent to you by me.

Questions To Ask Before Going Into A Learning Program

We will not go into all nine of the questions but what are a couple of the big baseline questions that people need to be asking going into a learning program like this?

The one that is top of mind for me is the question about performance, and this particular question is the foundation for measuring impact. It's the question about where performance is today versus where it needs to be in order to achieve the business goal. That is huge because what we need is a baseline to measure impact. The baseline is where people are and that's what we're going to measure against because we know we need them to be here. In order to determine the extent to which we've moved them from here to here, we got to know what here is.

Impact Of Learning: The L&D needs some actionable help when it comes to measuring impact.

Full transparency, it's not always an easy question to answer. One of the most critical questions of the nine is, where is performance now versus where does it need to be in order to achieve the business goal? The other important question is, who is coming together to achieve this business goal? Here’s why that one is important. Winning is a team sport and training and learning will never ever activate performance or business goals by itself. We need to have visibility into all the different cross-functional departments who are coming together to achieve that business goal so that they can leverage what we're doing.

Potentially, we can leverage what they're doing but also manage everybody's expectations because training is not a silver bullet. If we have a clear insight into all the cross-functional partners that are coming together to achieve this business goal, we manage everybody's expectations including ours to say, “We are going to come together to do this.” Training and learning will not do it alone so we got to be clear about that. One of the other important questions is, what are all the activators for performance? Training and learning are just one.

Here are some other activators for performance, Andy. How about rewards and recognition? Compensation, we all want to get paid. I know I do. I got a mortgage. There are rewards, recognition, and compensation. How about tools and technology? How about managers' support? How about natural ability? Some people are naturally good at some stuff. All of those things activate performance. The other thing that activates performance, maybe training and learning. When you ask the question, what are all the activators for performance? What you're getting insight into is, what is going to complement what you're doing as a training and learning professional? What can you potentially support and complement in order to activate performance? Those are three that rise to the top of it.

I got a fourth one. They're all coming back to me, but they're not coming back in order. The fourth one and the important one is, how are we going to measure a change in performance? Impact happen when learning activates performance in business goals. We got to know what good performance looks like and what the indicators are for that. I have some examples of what performance measures are but I'm not going to give that away. You got to get the eBook. I got to create some type of motivation.

There's got to be some carrot in the stick. People are going to go get it either way. We had a question that came in. What if the baseline data isn't there to measure the impact?

That's an awesome question because there will be instances when there is no baseline data so the opportunity then is to create it and it's no more complicated than that because if it doesn't exist, it doesn't exist. I'm not going to give some type of hocus pocus answer or some type of amazing epiphany. The simple answer is if you don't have baseline data, you have to create it but that then means that whatever that metric is that you create, it then means that it becomes the baseline and then you're going to have to monitor it over time.

The Birth, Impact, And Takeaways Of The L&D Detective Kit

Sometimes, you’ve got to figure out what that needs to be. Let's go back to your eBook. You and I have been talking regularly all year long. Sometimes, we text every morning so I know sometimes what you're working on. We started talking about it back in January of 2020. I've been working on a book all year long and you started working on this as well.

In 2017.

Why did it take so long?

That's an interesting story. I'm going to deviate a little bit, but maybe this will help some of our readers. In 2017, Andy, I went off and got on the scene in measurement data analysis when people start to know who I am or what I do. Everybody was saying, “Kevin, you need to write a book.” I was like, “I'll write a book.” I would sit down and try to write a book. Now granted, I write articles all the time but writing a book was different. I would sit down and I would try to write something and nothing would come out. I will put it down for a couple of months and then I will go back to the computer and try to get some stuff out of my head, and nothing will come up.

[bctt tweet=”Impact is intentional, purposeful, and targeted.” via=”no”]

I finished this eBook within three months. What was taking me three years to get done, I did in three months, and here's why I had an epiphany. I wasn't trying to write a book because I wanted to. I was trying to write a book because people in the industry were telling me it is something I needed to do. There was no internal desire to write a book and that is what made it difficult. I didn't have the desire to write a book so I couldn't. I did have the desire to create something that would help the global learning and development community and that set me on fire.

I was able to write this eBook in three months and I was on fire because of purpose versus what people were telling me I needed to do. I appreciate the global learning development community wanting to hear from me that way but it needed to be something that I wanted to do. That's why I was able to write this eBook as quickly as I did. The other thing in this eBook, the L&D Detective Kit for Solving Impact Mysteries, is I'm not interested in being a world-renowned author. I'm not interested in this book making money for me. I don't need that. I don't need that in my career.

What I want to do is be a servant in the global learning development community. I am being of service to the community by putting my thoughts and ideas down onto digital paper and providing this eBook to the L&D global community for free. All you’ve got to do is go to my website to get a copy. Free means scalability and accessibility. I’m committed to helping the global learning and development community in the largest way possible. I don’t want a dollar sign or a euro or any other type of monetary thing to get in the way of someone having access to this. I want everybody to have access to it.

When I knew what my purpose was and I'm clear about fulfilling my own purpose, I got on fire when it came to writing this. My purpose and my goal is scalability, accessibility and being of service to the community. The best way that I can do that is by making it available with no dollars attached, making it readily accessible and most importantly, making it actionable. When I thought that that's what I needed to do as opposed to writing a book, I was able to get it done quickly. That is why it took me three years. Over 2.5 years, Andy, I was sitting down to do something that I wasn't driven to do. It’s absolutely okay because I'm fulfilling my purpose, so I'm good.

What I've learned through all the projects and things I've worked on for the last few years, even though I don't like the misery of putting things off, oftentimes, the longer we wait, the more input and the more wisdom you have, the better they're going to be. It's probably better now than it was 2 or 3 years ago and you're doing it for the right reasons. I was going to say you're doing it because people are asking for it and you feel like you need to give it to the people. I've been working on a book because I want to write one. Nobody asked me to write this book and I'm going to sell it.

You'll do well and you'll probably become a millionaire from the sales of your book.

Hopefully, it'll do well. A quick plug on that. My book is called Own Your Career Own Your Life. Going back to your eBook, you got it done and you got it out. We got a great question from Jack Sylvester. “Kevin, that's great. How do you measure the impact of your book?”

This one is going to be an easy, Jack. I'm going to measure results in impact from my book by the number of downloads and hopefully, that will give me some insight into the number of people who are using it. The first metric, Jack, is going to be the number of downloads. That'll be my first metric for the impact of the L&D Detective Kit for Solving Impact Mysteries.

I would think about it similar to how I do. I look at this show sometimes and other things. You can look quantitatively at the number of downloads, but for me, the more fulfilling thing is when someone sends you an email or a message saying, “Kevin, I downloaded your kit. It was helpful to think through X, Y or Z.” You know that it’s making an impact. The biggest way is one day, you're going to hear from someone who says, “Kevin, I read that interview you did with Andy. I downloaded your kit and we put it into practice. We just measured and found that the program we ran was effective. It saved our company $10 million. Thank you.”

You answered that question so much better than I do.

That's what you're going to know. Some of it is qualitative and some of it is quantitative. You never know who's reading this interview and what's going to come from that. Speaking of people reading this interview, we will wrap things up. Let's go back. By the way, for people that don't know what’s in our whole thing, I will plug. A lot of people out there say, “In this COVID pandemic, we’re remote. It's hard to network and connect with people.” Kevin, you and I met on LinkedIn. It started with messaging each other and then we got on the phone. We hit it off and decided we're going to be friends. Because back in the old days when we were able to travel, I went to Chicago for client work and we had lunch. We started to build a relationship from there. You spoke at my conference and we've become good friends. It all started on LinkedIn where we are all building connections and networking on a daily regular basis. There's so much opportunity out there to connect with other people and find out what's going on, enhance your network and build friendships and relationships as well.

Impact Of Learning: Training and learning fulfill its highest purpose when it measurably activates performance in business goals.

Hopefully, I’m not digressing too much, but maybe this will help someone. Our working relationship is a good example of all the good that comes from LinkedIn. You can always find the bad and all the things you do not like about LinkedIn. When I think about people like you and other amazing, talented and incredibly smart people that I've met on LinkedIn that are in the learning and development community and even outside of the learning development community. It makes it real for me how you can harness the power of LinkedIn for good. I'm amazed. I have a large number of followers on LinkedIn and I don't want to brag, so I'm not going to put the number out there.

It's at least 3,000 or 4,000?

It's 4,000 but all jokes aside, what I've realized though with that following is that I have to be responsible with what I hear and with what I say. With that kind of following, you have to be responsible because people are watching and people looking to me for advice, so I take that seriously. LinkedIn is amazing because of the people I have been able to connect with around the world.

I talked about in the book the importance of building a network and building a brand. If you're in the corporate space being on LinkedIn, how do you measure the impact of that? It's the number of connections you have, the quality of the connections you have, being able to have conversations like this to reach out to people and learn about maybe that next job or career that you want to get into. Let's get back to giving a little more impact for our readers in L&D. What's the biggest takeaway from the L&D Detective Kit?

I have five guiding principles in the L&D Detective Kit and the third guiding principle for L&D Detective work is if you don't plan for impact, in the beginning, it will be difficult to measure in the end. That's another mic drop moment. I'm going to add a little bit to that. It'll be difficult or impossible to measure in the end. The biggest takeaway for me from the L&D Detective Kit for Solving Impact Mysteries is the model I created for the impact opportunity interview because that goes back to those nine questions. Those nine questions to proactively plan for impact before anything is designed, consumed or utilized, that is the secret to my success. For me, the biggest takeaway for the L&D Detective Kit is using those nine questions to proactively plan for impact in the beginning so that it will be easier to measure in the end.

Starting from the beginning, knowing what you want to measure, having those questions at hand, knowing the questions you want to ask, and downloading that kit. Where can people get a copy of this L&D Detective Kit again?

If you go to the website, KevinMYates.com, on the home page, you'll see where you can request a free copy of that. I changed the image on my homepage and I’m excited about it. It’s these kinetic balls. We know how the energy works because it's all about impact so I put kinetic balls there.

Speaking of homepages, if you go to the website for the Talent Development Think Tank membership community I run, which is TDTT.us, you should see a picture right on the homepage of me and Kevin together at the Think Tank conference proving that we're friends. Kevin will be speaking and doing a live Q&A inside our community by popular request after the Virtual Summit. I know we're going to get that scheduled. Kevin, any final thoughts or takeaways for people in L&D to be thinking about as they go off into their measurement journey?

It's a repetitive message, Andy. All jokes aside, this is probably the 3rd or 4th time that you’ve heard me say it but I’m saying it again because this is where I see the L&D community struggle the most when it comes to measuring impact. If you don't think about impact in the beginning, it'll be difficult to measure in the end. I want to encourage all my L&D brothers and sisters out there to have a different kind of conversation. Move away from that order fulfillment relationship where someone comes to you and says, “Give me one eLearning and a side order of instructor-led.”

Instead, have a conversation that is more focused on discovery because what you want to discover is what are the business goals? What are the performance requirements to achieve those goals? What does performance look like now versus where it needs to be in order to achieve that goal? What are the metrics and what are the key performance indicators that are in place that are going to help us determine the extent to which impact actually happens for behavior. That our training and learning solutions and measurably activated performance and business goals. My parting thought is if you plan for impact in the beginning, it will be easier to measure in the end.

Wise words from Kevin M. Yates. Thank you so much being here. I appreciate it. There are a lot of great insights here. For those of you reading the blog, that is KevinMYates.com to go get that L&D Detective Kit and TDTT.us if you want to come join us in the Talent Development Think Tank community. We will have Kevin to do a live Q&A soon. Thank you everybody for reading.

• Kevin M. Yates
• LinkedIn - Kevin M. Yates
• Talent Development Think Tank
• Talent Development Virtual Summit
• L&D Detective Kit
• The Top Five Trends in Talent Development
• TalentDevelopmentHotSeat.com
• Own Your Career Own Your Life
• https://www.LinkedIn.com/posts/andystorch_kevin-m-yates-the-ld-detective-activity-6722538144123633664-lNzN