The 2004 report is a indicator of current trends in workforce development and includes data from 1999 through 2003.

Full Executive Summary

Purchase Report

Some Key Findings:

• The average annual expenditure per employee in ASTD?s broadest sample of organizations (BMS) has remained steady at about $820 since 2002. Average expenditure per employee in our sample of large organizations (BMF) was consistently higher, but decreased from $1,366 in 2002 to $1,190 in 2004.
  
  
• The average percentage of payroll invested in learning increased from 2.2 percent in 2002 to 2.52 in 2004 in BMS organizations, but decreased from 2.47 in 2002 to 1.99 in 2004 in our sample of large organizations (BMF).
  
  
• The percentage of expenditure for external services has risen steadily since 2002, with the average now being 27 percent in BMS organizations, and 36 percent in BMF organizations.
  
  
• The number of hours of formal learning per employee has averaged about 28 hours in BMS organizations and about 38 hours in the larger BMF organizations from 2002 to 2004.
  
  
• The average cost per learning hour provided was $596 per hour in BMS and $1,430 per hour in BMF organizations in 2003. However, the average cost per learning hour received was $56 in both BMS and BMF organizations, because BMF organizations, being larger, have greater reuse of each hour of learning that is provided.
  
  
• Expenditure per employee group was greatest for customer service employees in 2003, with an average of 18 percent of expenditure going to that single employee group. However, an average of 28 percent of learning expenditure went to employees with managerial responsibilities (first-line supervisors, middle and senior managers, and executives combined).
  
  
• In both BMS and BMF organizations, managerial and executive development combined were allocated the most learning content in 2003 and 2004, followed closely by information technology, business processes, and industry-specific content.
  
  
• Use of technology for delivering learning continued to increase in both samples (BMS & BMF). The projections for 2004 are 29 percent in BMS, 35 percent in BMF, and at least 29 percent in BEST organizations. More than half of technology-based delivery was online in 2003 and 2004, and at least 75 percent of online learning was self-paced.
  
  
• The percentage of BMS organizations doing Level 1 evaluation (based on Kirkpatrick?s 4-step model) in 2003 was about the same as in 2002 (74 percent), but the percentage doing Levels 2, 3, and 4 declined in 2003, to 31, 14, and 8 percent respectively. The case is very different in BEST organizations; all BEST organizations are doing Level 4 evaluation to demonstrate the link between learning and organizational performance.