I have often been critical of the Training Journal because so many of its articles are written by freelance consultants who are selling their latest concept or programme. Therefore I was attracted to this article because it is written by someone from Saudi Aramco, the major oil company of Saudi. I thought that here we would see a practical rather than theoretical article, and I was also attracted by the emphasis on projects, which is an increasingly important issue for many major companies in international markets.
The article starts off well, addressing the important issue of how best to engage employees in training activities. The point is well made that this engagement often fails to take place because the request comes at short notice, is poorly specified, or is suggested at times when there are other pressures. The author then suggests that some research and analysis is needed to assess whether the engagement is at the right level.
So far, so good. But then the article takes the most bizarre turn that made me wonder whether, if it had been the April rather than May edition, it was an April Fool contribution. The transition from interesting and practical to complex and theoretical starts with a step by step 'methodology' that seemed OK until we got to step 6 which was 'use hypothesis testing to prove the problem'. I don’t know many MTP clients who are attracted by hypotheses so I began to wonder if this is my sort of article
My concern deepened when the author argued that 'statistical hypotheses testing' should be used to accept or reject the claim that training professionals are fully engaged in projects. I still had some interest but this was soon challenged when the equations started appearing. I am probably more numerate than most but I do recall that statistics was not my strong point during accountancy exams; and I was certainly challenged by the equations that now came thick and fast; my word processing package is not capable of sharing the complex formulae which included square roots and a number of signs that I had not seen since my statistics examination days. It was ironical that these were preceded with the author’s comment that these were not real numbers but were made up figures 'for simplicity'.
This extraordinary burst of equations then ended abruptly and the author returned to show the complete questionnaire with a genuinely simple five point scoring system (from strongly agree to strongly disagree) and ten interesting questions that would be useful for anyone who wants to assess the levels of engagement in training activities. So the article finished well, just as it started well, and I was left puzzled by the incomprehensible burst of complexity in the middle. It seemed to be a lost opportunity.
I would be interested to know if anyone out there disagrees with me or understands why a potentially interesting article has been drowned in such a sea of complexity.
Read the article
http://www.trainingjournal.com/feature/2012-05-01-is-ld-engaged-in-projects/
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