How to do a training needs analysis

Three levels of training needs

Needs appear at three levels, and a useful TNA looks at all of them. Skipping the organization level produces training that nobody in leadership cares about; skipping the individual level produces courses that half the room did not need. Work from the top down, so individual needs are judged against where the business is going.

• Organization: new products, a new plant, new regulations, a change in strategy
• Role: the skills each role needs compared with the skills its people have today
• Individual: gaps from appraisals, new joiners, promotions and role changes

Where to find evidence

Opinions about training needs are plentiful; evidence is better. Collect it from sources that already exist before running any survey. A survey alone tends to produce requests for popular courses rather than for the skills the business is short of.

• Appraisal ratings and comments on competency goals
• KPIs such as error rates, rework, complaints and missed targets
• Audit findings, safety incidents and near misses
• Customer complaints and feedback
• Short interviews with managers about what their team struggles with
• Exit interview themes
• Upcoming changes, such as new software or a new process

Is it really a training problem?

Many gaps that look like skill problems are not. Ask one question: if this person's job depended on doing the task correctly tomorrow, could they? If yes, training will not fix it; the cause is elsewhere, such as unclear process, missing tools, workload or incentives. At a Ludhiana factory, late dispatch documents were blamed on the dispatch clerks' skills. The TNA found the real cause: one shared printer for three loading bays. A second printer fixed what a training program would not have.

A simple template and worked example

Use one row per skill gap with these columns: role, skill, current level on a 1 to 4 scale, required level, number of people, business impact, training method and priority. At a Kochi insurance broker, 12 customer service executives score an average of 2 on claims documentation against a required 3. Impact is high, because incomplete documents cause claim delays and complaints. The chosen method is two half-day classroom sessions plus a documentation checklist, and the need is marked priority 1.

Step by step

1. Start with business priorities. List the year's business goals and changes, such as new products, sites or regulations, and the skills each one will need.
2. List required skills per role. For each role, write the four to eight skills that matter most and the level each requires, on a simple 1 to 4 scale.
3. Gather evidence of gaps. Pull appraisal comments, KPIs, audit findings, complaints and manager input. In ZeniaHR, competency goals recorded in review cycles show which skills each role was expected to build.
4. Check whether training is the fix. For each gap, ask whether the person could do the task if their job depended on it. If yes, look for a process, tool or incentive cause instead.
5. Fill in the TNA sheet. Record role, skill, current and required level, number of people, business impact and the proposed training method for each genuine gap.
6. Prioritize the gaps. Rank gaps by business impact, number of people affected and urgency, then fit the top priorities into the budget.
7. Build programs and enrol people. Turn priorities into programs on the training calendar. In ZeniaHR, create each program in Learning and enrol the employees who need it.
8. Recheck the gap after training. Reassess the skill level and the business measure a quarter later, and carry unresolved gaps into the next TNA.

Frequently asked questions