Study Shows Significant Drop in Employee Learning and Development Spending for Second Year

Corporate learning and development (L&D) spending dropped sharply in 2009, leading to much leaner budgets and staffs. Spending dropped 11 percent in 2009, for a total of 22 percent over the two years, according to The Corporate Learning Factbook 2010 by Bersin and Associates.

"The past two years have been a wake-up call for L&D. In order to survive, they've had to improve alignment with the business, centralize learning functions and focus on those training initiatives with the highest impact," said Josh Bersin, president of the company. "As a result, they're in a stronger position today - as the economy stabilizes and improves - to help their organizations gear up for new programs to support growth."

Conducted in partnership with Workforce Management magazine, the study is based on a survey conducted in August 2009. The survey resulted in data from more than 1,400 organizations of all sizes and across a wide variety of industries.

• After a decline in 2008, the percentage of training funds directed toward leadership development rebounded to 24% - an indication that companies are moving beyond a short-term, crisis management mode and are looking to strengthen their leadership teams for future success.

• Although instructor-led training (ILT) remains the dominant delivery method, its use declined from 67% of training hours in 2008 to 60% in 2009. Some ILT hours were replaced with virtual classroom training (vILT), which uses a live, remote instructor broadcast online or over video. Use of vILT increased from 8% of training hours in 2008 to 13% in 2009. It allows organizations to maintain the benefits of live instruction, while avoiding the costs associated with travel and facilities.

• More companies adopted newer technologies to facilitate learning through knowledge sharing and collaboration. Blogs and wikis both posted significant gains in 2009, with 14% of organizations using these tools in a learning context. Communities of practice also remained popular, used by 24% of companies for learning. These tools are not only cost-efficient but appeal to the collaborative and self-directed learning styles of today's workforce.

Results of ASTD's Learning Circuits eLearning Survey

Forty percent of companies using elearning use it for customer service training, according to a survey of 205 respondents during ASTD's Learning Circuits annual elearning survey in November and December 2009. An almost equally high number (37.4 percent) use it for general business training such as leadership and sexual harassment information. Over half of elearning is targeted toward company employees.

For all results of the study, click here.