Only 1% of Human Resource professionals measure return on investment in training - is this good enough, when £23.5 billion is spent on training in the UK every year? 6% of those surveyed by The Gray Partnership claimed to be "too busy" to follow-up their training investment. It is easy to see why training budgets are always the first to be axed when we are heading for a recession - companies are just not collecting sufficient evidence of their return on investment.

However 75% of people surveyed said they were confident of their training spend being well assessed. When probing further however, the researchers found a lack of consistency in training evaluation - 35% of those surveyed evaluated training using indirect measures such as annual performance appraisals or 360° feedback methods; 17% rely exclusively on delegate feedback after the training courses to measure the success of their spend.

"Organisations do need to ask delegates for feedback after training courses. It is a mistake however to believe that such feedback alone constitutes evaluation," says business psychologist Liz Rider of The Gray Partnership. "Evaluation needs to start before training and continue after the events, and to be collected and analysed systematically at an organisational level."

The Gray Partnership were concerned that 87% of delegates stated that training was effective in their organisations because it increased staff morale and aided staff development. "Of course staff motivation is important, but training needs to be seen as a real business issue and not just something that makes people happy," stated Annie Gray during a fringe event at the conference entitled 'Is Training the Answer?' "if training isn't connected to the bottom line, then training is not serving its full purpose."