# Why Your Company's Training Budget is Being Wasted **Related Reading:** [Further insights](https://skillcoaching.bigcartel.com/blog) | [More perspectives](https://ethiofarmers.com/blog) | [Additional resources](https://leadershipforce.bigcartel.com/advice) The training coordinator at my last company had a spreadsheet. Oh, did she have a spreadsheet. Colour-coded tabs, drop-down menus, formulas that would make Excel cry. She tracked everything: attendance rates, satisfaction scores, completion percentages, budget allocation by department. What she didn't track was whether anyone actually learned anything. I found this out the hard way when I watched three separate teams go through "Advanced Communication Skills" training over six months, only to witness the same passive-aggressive email chains and meeting disasters play out week after week. Same problems. Same people. Same dysfunctional patterns. But hey, the spreadsheet looked fantastic. This is the dirty secret nobody talks about in corporate Australia: we're spending millions on training that doesn't stick. And I'm not talking about the obvious stuff – death by PowerPoint presentations or those cringe-worthy role-play exercises where everyone pretends to be a difficult customer. I'm talking about fundamentally broken assumptions about how adults actually learn and change behaviour in the workplace. ## The Problem Isn't What You Think Most training budgets get wasted because we treat professional development like university lectures. Show up, listen, maybe take some notes, tick the box, move on. This approach might work for memorising historical dates or chemical formulas, but it's useless for developing real workplace skills. Here's what I've noticed after fifteen years of watching training programs come and go: the companies that see actual results from their training investment do three things differently. They focus on application over information, they create systems for practice, and they measure behaviour change rather than satisfaction scores. The satisfaction score obsession particularly drives me mental. "How would you rate today's session out of 10?" What kind of question is that? Of course people rate it highly – they just had a day away from their normal work, probably got decent coffee, and the trainer was energetic and engaging. But ask them six months later what they actually implemented, and you'll get blank stares. I worked with one manufacturing company in Brisbane that spent $80,000 on leadership development over two years. Beautiful program. Internationally recognised facilitator. Lovely venue with harbour views. The problem? None of the newly trained supervisors changed how they conducted their weekly team meetings. Not one. They went right back to reading from their old scripts and avoiding difficult conversations. ## The Retention Reality Check According to most [professional development research](https://www.alkhazana.net/2025/07/16/why-firms-ought-to-invest-in-professional-development-courses-for-employees/), people forget 90% of what they learn in traditional training within a week. Ninety percent! Imagine if 90% of your marketing budget evaporated after seven days. You'd be fired. But somehow we accept this level of waste with training expenditure. The companies getting value from their training dollars understand that learning happens through repetition and application, not exposure. They build practice into the workflow. They create opportunities for people to apply new skills immediately, not eventually. Take customer service training. Most programs focus on teaching scripts and techniques. But the retailers who actually improve their customer experience scores? They focus on creating opportunities for staff to practice handling difficult situations in low-stakes environments. They role-play real scenarios from their own stores. They debrief actual customer interactions. They make learning part of the job, not separate from it. ## The Follow-Up Fiction Here's another uncomfortable truth: most training programs have zero meaningful follow-up. Sure, there might be an email a month later with some links to additional resources nobody clicks on. Maybe a survey asking if you found the content useful. But actual support for implementing new behaviours? Accountability for applying what was learned? Feedback on how you're progressing? Forget about it. I once attended a [negotiation skills workshop](http://espacotucano.com.br/the-role-of-professional-development-courses-in-a-altering-job-market/) that was genuinely excellent. The facilitator was brilliant, the content was practical, and I left feeling confident about applying new techniques. Three months later, I realised I hadn't used a single strategy from the session. Not because they weren't good – they were. But because there was no system in place to remind me, no colleague to practice with, no opportunity to get feedback on my attempts. This is where most training initiatives die. In the gap between learning and doing. The financial services company that figured this out created "learning partnerships" – pairs of employees who attended training together and committed to supporting each other's implementation over the following quarter. They scheduled monthly coffee catch-ups to discuss what they'd tried, what worked, what didn't. Simple concept, but it increased their training ROI by about 400%. ## The Measurement Madness We measure the wrong things. Completion rates, attendance figures, immediate feedback scores – these tell us nothing about whether training achieved its purpose. It's like measuring a restaurant's success by how many people walked through the door rather than how many enjoyed their meal and came back. Real training success should be measured through behaviour change indicators. Are managers having more frequent one-on-one meetings with their team members? Are customer complaints decreasing? Are project deadlines being met more consistently? Are sales conversations becoming more consultative? These are the metrics that matter. But tracking behaviour change requires effort and time. It's easier to count heads in training rooms and compile satisfaction surveys. So that's what most organisations do, even though it tells them precisely nothing about whether their investment delivered results. ## The Quick Fix Delusion Australian businesses seem particularly susceptible to the "quick fix" mentality when it comes to professional development. Send someone on a two-day course and expect them to return transformed. It doesn't work that way. Skill development is more like fitness than education. You can't attend a weekend seminar on marathon running and expect to complete the City2Surf the following week. You need consistent practice, gradual improvement, and ongoing support. Same with [workplace communication skills](https://sewazoom.com/what-to-anticipate-from-a-communication-skills-training-course/) or leadership capabilities. The organisations that understand this create learning journeys rather than training events. They might start with a workshop to introduce concepts, but then they build in practice sessions, peer coaching opportunities, manager check-ins, and gradual skill-building activities over several months. I watched this approach transform a mining company's safety culture over eighteen months. Instead of annual safety training sessions that everyone endured, they implemented weekly five-minute safety conversations, monthly scenario practice sessions, and quarterly skills assessments. Accident rates dropped by 60% because safety became a continuous learning process rather than an annual compliance exercise. ## The Content Trap Here's something that might surprise you: the quality of training content matters far less than most people think. I've seen mediocre material delivered with strong implementation support create lasting change, while excellent content with poor follow-through achieves nothing. This isn't to say content doesn't matter at all. Obviously it does. But obsessing over finding the perfect training program while ignoring implementation systems is like buying the most expensive gym membership available and then never showing up to work out. The [time management strategies](https://www.theknowledgeacademy.com/au/courses/personal-development-training/time-management-training/brisbane/) that actually stick aren't necessarily the most sophisticated ones. They're the ones that get practiced consistently until they become habits. The leadership approaches that create real culture change aren't always the most innovative – they're the ones that leaders actually use in their daily interactions. ## The Manager Factor One factor that determines training success more than any other is whether participants' direct managers are supportive of applying new skills. If your manager doesn't create opportunities for you to practice what you learned, or worse, actively discourages new approaches because "that's not how we do things here," your training investment is wasted. Smart organisations prepare managers before sending their team members to training. They explain what the training covers, what behaviours to look for afterward, and how to support implementation. They make managers part of the learning process rather than passive observers. This preparation doesn't have to be complicated. Sometimes it's as simple as a 30-minute briefing about what their team member will be learning and three specific things they can do to support practice opportunities. But without this step, even the best training programs struggle to create lasting change. ## The Real Solution So what's the alternative? How do you actually get value from training investments? Start by being brutally honest about what you're trying to achieve. "Better communication" isn't a goal – it's a wish. "Reduce customer complaints by 20% through improved front-line service skills" is a goal. "Increase project delivery success rates through enhanced planning and stakeholder management" is a goal. Once you have clear objectives, design learning experiences that create multiple opportunities for practice and application. Build in peer support systems. Train managers to recognise and reinforce new behaviours. Measure the right things – behaviour change indicators rather than satisfaction scores. Most importantly, accept that meaningful skill development takes time. Budget for learning journeys, not training events. Create systems that support continuous improvement rather than one-off interventions. ## The Bottom Line Your training budget isn't being wasted because you're choosing the wrong programs or hiring poor facilitators. It's being wasted because you're treating professional development like a transaction rather than a process. The companies that get genuine value from their training investments understand that learning is ongoing, application requires support, and behaviour change takes time. They create environments where new skills can be practiced safely, where progress is measured meaningfully, and where continuous improvement becomes part of the culture. Everything else is just expensive entertainment. The spreadsheet-obsessed training coordinator I mentioned earlier? She eventually moved to a role in project management, where her attention to detail served her much better. Her replacement took a completely different approach – fewer metrics, more conversations with participants about what they were actually implementing. Last I heard, their training programs were finally creating the behaviour changes they'd been paying for all along. Sometimes the best improvements come from measuring less and focusing more.