Participation in Corporate University Training: Its Effect on Individual Job Performance

Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences, Dec 2004 by Morin, Lucie, Renaud, Stéphane

Abstract

This study investigates the effect of corporate university training on employees' job performance. The popularity of this strategic training approach has grown considerably in both North America and Europe over the last decade; however, no scientific research known by the authors has evaluated the effectiveness of corporate university training on work-related outcomes. Using a data set of 1,484 employee observations from a Canadian financial institution's computerized personnel files, results from a regression analysis reveal that participation in corporate university training had a relatively small effect on individual job performance after controlling for pre- training job performance as well as job and individual characteristics. Furthermore, this finding indicates a positive linear relationship between the number of corporate university training courses completed and job performance. Results also show a significant interactive effect of corporate university training and pre-training job performance on post-training individual job performance. We discuss theoretical and practical implications as well as limitations and suggestions for future research.

Résumé

La recherche qui suit est une enquête sur l'impact de la formation de l'université d'entreprise sur la performance des employés. Au cours de la dernière décennie, cette approche stratégique du développement des compétences a connu un succès remarquable en Amérique du Nord et en Europe. Pourtant, à notre connaissance, aucune recherche scientifique n'en évalue l'efficacité sur les indicateurs de la performance au travail. En appliquant l'analyse de régression à 1 484 observations d'employés provenant d'un fichier informatique d'une grande institution bancaire canadienne, l'étude révèle que par rapport à la performance pré-formation et aux caractéristiques individuelles, la participation à un programme d'université d'entreprise a un impact relativement faible sur la performance individuelle. Les résultats indiquent également qu'il existe une relation linéaire positive entre le nombre de cours complétés avec succès et la performance individuelle. Par ailleurs, l'université d'entreprise et la performance pré-formation ont un effet interactif remarquable sur la performance individuelle post-formation. Pour finir, l'article examine les implications théoriques et pratiques de l'étude, passe en revue ses limites avant de proposer des pistes de recherche future.

Organizations have been investing in training activities at an increasing rate. This is in part due to a shift towards a knowledge economy that requires a high level of competency development (Tannenbaum, 2002). In Canada, a survey conducted by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, using a sample of its 102,000 members in 2002, indicated that more than half the respondents had noted an increase in their training investment over the previous three years in terms of time and money (Dulipovici, 2003). In 2003, U.S. organizations with 100 or more employees budgeted over $50 billion in formal training ("Industry Report", 2003). To remain competitive in the new economy and the rapidly changing environment, corporations and even small businesses ... need to keep employees working at the top of their games once they are hired. And one of the most fundamental and cost-effective ways to do this is to train the employee at the corporate university (Gerbman, 2000, p. 101).

Organizations are increasingly turning to this training approach to deal with their ever-growing employee development needs, from job-related skills to general organizational values, because corporate universities offer a company-wide training solution. The popularity of this approach has grown considerably in both North America and Europe over the last decade (Meister, 1998); however, no scientific research known by the authors has evaluated the effectiveness of corporate university on work-related outcomes.

This article makes three key contributions to the scientific literature on corporate university training. First, it provides an organized review of the literature on corporate university training, which may serve as a valuable resource for future research. second, this study is a first attempt to empirically test in a field setting the effect of participation in corporate university training on a behavioural criterion, namely individual job performance. Too little attention has been paid to the evaluation of corporate university training. Third, this study examines the effect of a training approach while empirical research usually tests the effect of a single training activity on performance (see Arthur, Bennett, Edens, & Bell, 2003).

In this article, we first review the concept of corporate university training to increase understanding of what it encompasses. We then discuss training effectiveness criteria, followed by methodology and results. We conclude with a discussion of the theoretical and practical implications of our findings as well as suggestions for future research.