ABSTRACT
It is a tradition with training courses for the trainer to ask participants to complete an evaluation sheet at the end of the training. This form is often referred to as the ‘happy sheet’. A study completed in 1989 found that 90 per cent of organisations, responsible for training 80 per cent of the workforce in the UK, utilised this method of evaluation alone (Training Agency 1989). The Social Services Inspectorate (SSI) in their report on targets and achievements of the Training Support programme (SSI 1997) noted that despite moneys being available for evaluation activities, many local authorities focus on gaining immediate feedback from course participants and in some cases their managers. Few had a framework for longerterm, systematic evaluation to measure the contribution of training to the quality of service provision. This means that trainers and the organisation, in the main, receive some feedback on the feel-good factor but not enough information to analyse exactly what course participants have learnt, how much they will retain and how the training will impact on practice.
