Sunny's portfolio      

This LSDD competency sets the ‘begin’ and ‘end’ points for the design and development process. Ideally, every project begins with a Needs Assessment and ends with a Summative Evaluation. When I think about “needs assessment” I think about closing performance gaps and seizing performance opportunities. While I am sensitive to performance issues that can be addressed with learning systems, I also recognize the significant of other (i.e., non-learning related) factors on performance.

When I think about “evaluation” I think about identifying, collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data to determine if efforts to close performance gaps and seize performance opportunities were successful. As with needs assessment, while I am concerned with evaluating the impact of learning systems, I also recognize the impact of these systems will be influenced by factors outside the realm of learning and instruction.

Both needs assessment and evaluation can happen at various levels. Needs assessment can be as narrow as identifying the training needs of a few new hires. Or it can be as broad as determining why an organization is not meeting its goals. Whatever the scope, the needs assessment process helps protect against the “spray and pray” approach to performance improvement (i.e., spray training everywhere and pray it makes a difference).

As my needs assessment knowledge and skills have developed, I have come to appreciate the central role data plays in the process. At the same time, I’ve come to appreciate how important it is to have models to guide the needs assessment process and maintain a systemic perspective. For example, the Performance Pyramid Model helps keep the needs assessment process grounded in data while striving to maintain a wholistic perspective. Wedman’s Pyramid is a clear departure from Mager’s flow chart” approach and more comprehensive and easy to apply than some of the other performance improvement models.

Evaluation is similar to needs assessment in that it can happen in narrowly defined projects or sweeping initiatives. Whatever the scope, evaluation should be integral the design and development process AND conducted after the learning system has been implemented. Put another way, formative evaluation occurs in conjunction with design and development efforts, thereby informing these efforts.  And summative evaluation occurs after the system has been implemented at a scale sufficient to provide impact data.

The artifacts below demonstrate my mastery of the needs assessment and evaluation competency.

Area	Artifact	Description	Reflective Comments
Needs Assessment	Needs Analysis of Claims Adjuster Time Management Issues [click]	Identify the reasons why… [click]	This needs assessment project was one of two projects I had… [click]
Evaluation	Custody, Inc. Basic Verbal Judo Training [click]	Insert start of Description… [click]	Before I took this course, I thought that I understood what an evaluation was and somewhat how to do one. However … [click]