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5. Chapter Five Perceived Benefits

Benefits for employees

5.1. The learner survey showed that most learners felt they had benefited from participation in the BLA training/learning. More than 80% felt that participation in the BLA programme had increased their skills needed for their job, stated that they felt more confident about doing their job as well as a sense of achievement. More than 70% of respondents were more stimulated to take up further training as a consequence of participating in the BLA programme. For more than one third of respondents participation in the BLA programme led to additional job responsibilities. More than a fifth of learners felt encouraged to seek a promotion.

Figure 4.1: What benefits did you gain from the programme

5.2. In terms of future learning activity, respondents were also very positive. 94% stated they would participate in further training to help them with their job and 85% would consider participating in more training provided the company pays for it. Over one quarter would consider participating in more training even if they had to pay for it themselves, although 39% stated they would not. 71% of respondents would also consider participating in other training for personal development or to do with their own interests.

Table 5.1: Future training aspirations

Source: CPC Postal Survey (Learners)
Note: Respondents were asked to tick yes, no or maybe boxes for each of the possible answers. Some respondents left a number of lines empty (i.e. ticked no box) which explains why the total number of respondents varies.

Benefits for companies

Importance of the financial support package

5.3. The case study company analysis shows that financial support appears to be the main reason for case study companies to get involved in the BLA programme (see also chapter 2) but that companies rarely refer to money when asked about the main benefit of their involvement. About half of the case study companies indicate that the BLA programme's main benefit is that someone comes in and 'forces' them to sit down and make time for training.

5.4. These findings are partially mirrored in the employer survey with again about half of survey companies agreeing with the statement that the main benefit of the BLA programme has been to force them to make time for training. However, survey companies disagree with the case study companies in the importance they attach to the financial support package: three quarters of companies identify the BLA funding as the main benefit of their involvement.

Table 5.2: Main benefit of the BLA process

Source: MORI/ CPC Telephone Survey (Employers)

5.5. It is important to note that survey companies interpreted the questions about the main benefit of their BLA involvement as non-exclusive: 47% of the survey companies had no difficulties in identifying both the financial support and the fact that they had been forced to make time for training as the main benefit of the BLA programme. As such, to some extent the survey results can be interpreted as companies considering the financial support as 'a' benefit of their BLA involvement - in which case the high scores are hardly surprising. This interpretation is reinforced by the survey finding that almost two in five companies who had opened a BLA account - including one third of companies who identified the financial support as the main benefit of their involvement - said that they would have got involved in BLAs even if no public funding were available.

5.6. In any case, only 11% of survey companies disagreed with both statements about the main BLA benefit which seems to confirm that the financial support and the fact that companies are forced to make time for training are indeed the two key benefits of BLA involvement as perceived by participants.

BLA potential for business growth

5.7. One of the eligibility criteria for BLA training activities is that training activities must be related to clear business objectives and hold a potential for future business growth. Local delivery agents all confirmed that they systematically embedded the TNA exercise in a wider discussion on company performance and business objectives.

5.8. The employer survey asked companies to point to the main business need identified during the BLA programme. More than a third of companies saw a need to develop staff skills and knowledge. More than a fifth of companies identified dealing with new changes or expansion, providing a better service to customers or increasing business performance as key business needs.

Table 5.3: Main business need identified in training plan

Source: MORI/ CPC Telephone Survey (Employers)
Note: Percentages do not add to 100% because of multiple answers.

5.9. The employer survey shows that employers see a link between their BLA training activities and business growth. 70% or more of survey companies had already noticed an increase in employee job satisfaction, business efficiency and professionalism. The importance of increased job satisfaction is attested in a number of case study companies as well. A smaller proportion, but still almost half of the survey companies indicated that they had seen business profits increase through the BLA programme.

Table 5.4: Business changes arising/expected from BLA training

Source: MORI/ CPC Telephone Survey (Employers)
Note: Percentages do not add to 100% because of multiple answers.

HIE roll-out case study

The manager of a company in the HIE roll-out area identified increased staff self-confidence as the main (expected) benefit of the BLA programme. He pointed out that the staff all had a lot of experience and expertise, but no up-to-date qualifications confirming this expertise. He was hopeful that staff would be more confident with their qualifications updated. He was convinced this would benefit the company, not only because the staff would feel that the company was investing in them, but also because they would feel more comfortable taking on additional tasks - without self-confidence, " staff would not push themselves and the company forward quite as much".

5.10. Unsurprisingly, predictive statements about what employers expect to see changed in their business because of the BLA programme lay substantially higher than the changes already identified. This is especially the case with increased profit margins with more than three quarters of companies expecting positive results compared to a little under half reporting actually increased business profits.

5.11. The major setback of the employer survey is that the short timeframe of a telephone interview does not allow the interviewer to go beyond general statements about the (expected) impact of the training on the company. The company case studies provided an opportunity to try to achieve more in-depth information and find tangible evidence and measurements about, for example, increased business profits and, importantly, attribution of the impacts to the BLA programme. Unfortunately, most case study companies struggled to specify what exactly they expected to see or (for those companies that had completed the training) had seen changed in their companies and how they could measure that change. More than one case study company responded to the CPC questions with the remark that the local delivery agent had asked similarly " difficult" questions.

HIE pilot case study

The manager of a micro company in the HIE area got involved in BLA programme because she wanted to go on a learning trip abroad. She confirmed that her BLA involvement had been beneficial for her business, but when asked to clarify she explained that the learning trip was an example of learning possibly leading to growth in future - currently, it was not yet possible for her to apply the processing methods she had observed abroad.

Tourism pilot case study

The HR manager of a restaurant gave a number of clear examples when asked to explain the benefits of the BLA programme on her business: for example, if you teach staff to systematically ask customers whether they want to have a drink while they are looking at the menu, they might end up spending more; information management skills mean you can call hotels in the area to let them know that you still have some free tables. When asked about possible ways of measuring these benefits, the managers thought it could be done through customer feedback or financial performance analysis, but admitted that she had not measured the BLA's impact in this way.

SE geographic

A beauty company manager in the SE geographic pilot explained how the BLA programme had benefited her business: when staff are trained in more massaging techniques, the business can offer a wider variety of services to clients; new massaging techniques come up all the time, people hear about them and expect these to be available in their beauty salon. The manager noticed that she was getting more and more business because her diary gets filled up more and more. However, she admitted that she did not really measure this (or its attribution to training) in any way.

Manufacturing pilot case study

A manufacturing company agreed that the BLA programme had brought direct business benefits: they were doing a lot of government projects and there are strict health and safety regulations you have to adhere to if you want to work for the Government. The other (not health and safety related) courses in the training plan, such as the IT training, were about increasing business efficiency. The manager pointed out that he has noticed that training just makes him perform better, but he conceded that he could not indicate how to measure the benefits. He suggested a number of possible measures one could use in the longer term: maybe employees would stay longer in the company, because they would notice that the company was going in the right direction and because their wages would go up (because of additional Government assignments).

5.12. Overall, company perceptions about the benefits of the BLA pilot are positive, but it is not possible to draw any firm conclusions concerning the impact of the BLA pilot on business performance.

Additional benefits

5.13. Finally, it is possible to identify a number of additional benefits for the different agencies involved. Benefits to RACE are considered to have been " massive" both in terms of new company contacts which RACE staff are planning to stay in touch with, and in terms of learning " a new, interesting approach". Whether or not additional funding will come forward, RACE is planning to continue to use the BLA approach. They were already offering a similar product to their clients (Company Training Scheme), but this scheme was mostly about certified training and did not use the services of the local delivery agents. RACE is planning to continue to work with the local delivery advisors whom they consider to be key to the success of the programme. Likewise, they hope to be able to adopt the flexible approach to learning (as opposed to training).

5.14. LDS have also benefited in that participation in the BLA programme has enabled them to enhance their database (with around 240 additional training providers included throughout the BLA programme). The fast-track inclusion process has meant that a wider range of training providers is now available through the LDS database searches. Since the LDS database is available online, the benefits go beyond the agency. There is little information about the extent to which the BLA programme enabled LDS to widen its future client base, but the limited name recognition of LDS among companies - the set-up of the BLA programme was such that many employers only dealt with the local delivery agent - indicates that new company contacts have not been substantial.

5.15. SE did not really achieve that many new company contacts, since the LECs approach to engaging with BLA companies mainly consisted of referring companies to the lead LEC as and when they came across them. However, as stated in the introduction, the SE objective for the BLA pilot was formulated in terms of learning about barriers to training. SE stakeholders confirm that throughout the BLA process they learned a number of lessons which were incorporated into subsequent BLA delivery. Also, the BLA experience and interim evaluation informed the internal SE review of workforce development products.

5.16. Finally, the constructive cooperation between the LDS training partners and the different local delivery agents (including LECs and Business Gateways) holds a promise for the further development of the relationship between the three main actors on the Scottish business support scene and their integrated support offer.

Perceived benefits - conclusions

5.17. Employees and employers alike are positive about the benefits of the BLA programme: more than 80% of employees felt that participation in the BLA programme had increased their skills needed for their job and 70% or more of employers had already noticed an increase in employee job satisfaction, business efficiency and professionalism.

5.18. It is very difficult to assess to what extent BLAs have led to business growth: the set-up and timing of this evaluation have meant that only a small proportion of companies (12%) had completed their BLA training activities when they were contacted for the telephone survey. The survey evidence that is available points towards increased business profits in half of the BLA companies, but qualitative evidence from in-depth company case studies put these findings in perspective: case study companies struggled to clearly indicate how to measure improved performance and, crucially, attribute this performance to the BLA programme.

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