After onsite or online training it’s important to evaluate the effectiveness of the course. If the instructor was boring and unengaged, chances are your trainees learned very little. If the instructor was great but the course didn’t provide relevant information, you haven’t got your money’s worth from training either. Is hiring the training company for future sessions a good investment? Post-training survey questions can help you answer this question.

5 Essential Post-Training Survey Questions

Having trainees fill out post-training survey questions immediately after training provides you with measurable data, but only if you ask the right questions. Take a tip from training organizations’ own survey questions. When they ask students to fill out surveys, training companies usually ask the following:

  • Would trainees recommend hiring the instructor again?
  • Did training deliver on promised content?
  • Did trainees learn something new?
  • How actionable was the information taught?
  • How do trainees rate the presenter?

Would Trainees Recommend the Instructor?

This is one of the most important post-training survey questions as it’s easy to use to calculate what’s known as a Net Promoter Score, or NPS. Training companies use NPS to determine overall satisfaction in their offerings. A high NPS equals high trainee satisfaction.

Ask trainees to answer the question on a sliding scale of 0 to 10, where 0 stands for very unlikely, and 10 for very likely. Here’s training companies interpret the data:

  • 0-6: Detractor—individual is unsatisfied with the course.
  • 7-8: Neutral
  • 9-10: Promotor—individual is extremely satisfied.

Here’s how to calculate a training course’s NPS. Let’s say a survey of 30 people includes 6 detractors and 10 promoters: 33 percent of the trainees were promoters and 20 percent of respondents were detractors.

To get your NPS score, subtract the percent of detractors from the percentage of promoters. This provides a range between -100 and +100. In our example, you have an NPS of +13, hardly an impressive score.

Did Training Deliver the Promised Content?

This question can also be asked on a sliding 0 to 10 scale, with 0 indicating the course delivered none of the promised content and 10 indicating it delivered all promised content. Using the same formula used for calculating NPS, you can determine what percentage of trainees were satisfied with content.

Did you Learn Something New?

This is one of the most important post-survey training questions. If your trainees mastered the skills offered in a course prior to training, the course is a waste of money. Again, you can use a sliding scale, but leave room for trainees to write comments on what they learned—their insight can be telling and give you a better idea of where your workforce’s strengths and weaknesses lie.

How Actionable is the New Information?

Ideally, information learned during training can be applied on the job immediately. Doing so helps trainees practice and remember what they’ve learned. Not being able to put new skills to use reduces long-term retention of those skills.

How Would You Rate the Presenter?

This is perhaps the most subjective of the five post-training survey questions listed here. An inexperienced, dull instructor makes even the most interesting course boring. On the other hand, a fantastic, engaged presenter can make trainees overlook deficiencies in the content taught. It’s a question worth asking but be aware of the limitations of judging a course on this question’s responses.

Taking time to evaluate instructors prior to training helps ensure your trainees get the most out of a course—a trend that will be reflecting in post-training survey responses. Look for instructors with both teaching experience and experience working in their field of expertise. Training courses willing to adapt content material to your facility’s unique needs are also recommended.