david van adelsberg

Many of today's business leaders champion learning as essential to business success, backing their belief with massive investments in Training and Development (T& D). In fact, T& D investments reach $56 billion per year in the U.S. alone. In this era of unprecedented opportunity, the time is right for T& D to become a full-fledged "player" in the world of business.

At issue, the authors contend, is T& D's inability to seize this opportunity and deliver unmistakable value to its most influential customers-the exectuvies who pay for trainiing services but are unable to see clear business value being returned on their companies' training investments. The authors also contend that T& D must alter the traditional precepts that keep it "separate form the business" and "out of the loop" strategically.

Van Adelsberg and Trolley suggest that the key to delivering unmistakable business value lies in transforming T& D-in spirit and in practice-from a funciton to a business. The authors draw on their experiences working inside Moore Corporation, DuPont, Mellon Bank, Kaiser Permanente, Texas Instruments, and other top businesses to illustrate how "Running Training Like a Business":

1. Eliminates the many hidden costs of training;

2. Re-focuses T& D from delivering training content to addressing business issues;

3. Makes T& D a full stategic partner in business decision making;

4. Ensures that training measurement is "baked in, not bolted on";

5. Improves the effectiveness and efficiency of internal and/or external T& D organizations.

Trolley and van Adelsberg lead the reader through a proven four-step process for transforming traditional training organizations into training enterprises capable of delivering unmistakable value, quarter after quarter and year after year.