New survey reveals biggest Barrier to Compliance Training Effectiveness
A major new study published today, reveals that over two thirds of organisations fail to engage their employees with their compliance learning programmes despite improved engagement being an objective for 98% of participants. Compliance training’s poor reputation was also cited by over half of respondents as negatively impacting the success of their programmes.
The independent survey conducted by the benchmarking research organisation, Towards Maturity in conjunction with SAI Global, gathered responses from compliance and learning & development professionals from 136 organisations with a combined workforce of 2.3 million employees. It revealed that 87% of companies carry out annual compliance training, with 77% of those using learning technologies as a major component of their programme.
In addition to improving employee engagement, key objectives for 98% of respondents were more effective risk management and positively impacting staff values, attitudes and behaviour. However the study highlighted a significant gap between objectives and achievement, with just a quarter of participants consistently achieving against behavioural objectives and only 1 in 5 reporting improvements in employee engagement. Organisations that are more mature in their use of e-learning were however 75% more likely to report positive impact on behaviours and twice as likely to change working culture as those in the less mature category.
Laura Overton, Managing Director of Towards Maturity said, “Despite a hunger to change behaviour and attitudes, it is clear that the majority of organisations rely on self-paced e-learning courses that focus on measuring the ticks rather than tackle the bigger issues of changing behaviour. There are lessons to be learned from the more mature organisations that are more successful in engaging staff and influencing lasting change. Mature organisations are more focused on aligning learning to business needs, tailoring learning to the individual through effective storytelling and diagnostics and engaging staff using a wide range of learning and performance support technologies.”
“Given the severe consequences of compliance breaches, it’s not surprising that businesses are setting themselves high goals for their compliance learning programmes – it’s about cultural change, not just completion rates,” said Iain McLeod, Regional Director (EMEA), at SAI Global Compliance. “Businesses obviously recognise that success depends on the ability of their training to challenge existing attitudes towards compliance and positively impact employee behaviour but to do that they have to challenge how they are currently ‘doing’ compliance to overcome the engagement barrier. The study clearly demonstrates that the more mature organisations are more successfully achieving against their learning and business objectives and reinforces the quantifiable benefits that can be delivered through good practice.”
The report, Reinvigorating Compliance Training is available www.towardsmaturity.org/in-focus2013/compliance
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For more information contact:
Marnie Threapleton,Towards Maturity -Tel: 0208 542 2331 Email:[email protected]
Kate Dodds, SAI Global - Tel: 01926 523119 Email: [email protected]