What level of training attendance should you aim for?

When speaking to L&D managers recently, a common issue seems to be low attendance on training courses. One colleague said that she had to cancel a course when only 4 of the 8 that had enrolled actually showed up.

Speaking to others, attendance seems to range from 30-90% depending on the organisation and nature of the course.

But what should we aim for?

I would advocate that you should aim for 110%.

‘110%’ is my way of saying that we should aim not only to ‘fill the room’ but also to help employees share what they learn with others.

After all, L&D’s role is to support all employees to learn, not just the ones ‘in the room’.

So that extra 10% would be achieved if just 1 in 10 attendees shared what they learned with just one non-attendee.

In reality we can achieve much more (200%?), but as someone with a management science / statistics background, I felt uncomfortable enough with 110% already 😉

As W. Clement said: “Aim for the moon. If you miss, you may hit a star.”