Why doesn't Hone conduct a pre-assessment before running Private Programs?

Pre-Post surveys are common to measure change. It makes sense that to see a change, you would take a baseline before implementing a change. While this is effective in some industries, research has shown that it is not an effective strategy for measuring Level 3 behavior change as a result of a training program.

Levels of Training Impact

1. “Did I like the training?” (Level 1)
2. “Did I learn anything?” (Level 2)
3. “Did I change my behavior when I returned to my job?” (Level 3)
4. “Did changing my behavior make me more productive?” (Level 4)
5. “Was it worth the investment?” (Level 5)

Initial self-assessments tend to be inflated and can lead to a reported decrease in performance afterwards. As Paul Leone, PhD describes it in his book Measuring and Maximizing Training Impact: Bridging the Gap between Training and Business Result “employees have a tendency to think they know more or are better at something than they really are. Then of course after taking some in-depth training and gaining new skills in a particular area, they realize they were relatively bad to begin with.” 

Additionally, the pre-post survey model introduces some unnecessary complications. Often, the learners and their colleagues participating in a 180 do not equally take both the pre and post survey. Employees may miss a reminder email, may leave an organization, or simply not take the time to take a post survey even if they took the pre-survey. This leads to inaccuracy based on participation.

The most accurate and easiest way to deploy a survey that measures behavior change is to ask learners and colleagues to reflect on how their behavior has changed.