About the Presentation
Great training. Employees learned. Performance didn’t improve. Now what?
Join us for The $2 Million Training Question: What Happens When Great Training Doesn't Improve Performance?
In this practical, research-informed session, Dr. Mike Saunderson will explore why even well-designed training can fail to produce sustained workplace performance—and what organizations can do about it.
You’ll explore the shared responsibility of employees, supervisors, managers, and learning professionals in turning learning into performance, along with practical approaches to reinforcement, coaching, accountability, and learning transfer.
If you work in L&D, HR, performance improvement, operations, or organizational leadership, come away with ideas you can put to work immediately.
Learn more and register:
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#PerformanceImprovement #LearningAndDevelopment #TrainingEffectiveness #LearningTransfer #ISPI
Previous Events
September 2026
Derailers, Detours, and Dead Ends: Avoiding Pitfalls in PI Projects
Presenters: Dawn Snyder (Dawn Snyder Associates) and Lisa Toenniges (Innovative Learning Group)
Overview This session, hosted by ISPI of Hampton Roads, featured a presentation by Dawn Snyder (Dawn Snyder Associates) and Lisa Toenniges (Innovative Learning Group) titled Derailers, Detours, and Avoiding Pitfalls in Performance Improvement Projects. The discussion drew on the presenters' combined decades of experience in instructional design, performance consulting, and organizational learning. The session explored why performance improvement projects go off track and offered practical, categorized fixes to help practitioners navigate common challenges. Participants were encouraged to contribute their own experiences and insights throughout.
Click to view the replay on YouTube
May 2026
7x Learning? See How First Principles + AI Make It Happen
Presenters: Max Cropper and Tim Stafford
Max provided background on David Merrill's instructional design theory, which emphasizes real-world tasks, activation, demonstration, application, and integration, noting that courses evaluated using Merrill's rubric often scored very low. Tim demonstrated AI tools developed through his RU Institute that help instructional designers evaluate and improve course designs based on first principles, showing how the tools can analyze existing course materials and provide feedback on strengths and weaknesses across the five principles.
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March 2026
The Performance Improvement Maturity Model: Ten Years Later
Presenter: The Hampton Roads Chapter of the International Society for Performance Improvement.
AI Recap
This meeting was a chapter meeting of the ISPI Hampton Roads chapter where Scott Weersing presented an updated version of the Performance Improvement Maturity Model, which he originally developed in 2015. Scott reviewed changes in learning and development trends over the past decade, discussed the four-level maturity model (Recognize, Understand, Manage, and Mastery), and had participants evaluate various organizational scenarios to determine their maturity levels. Attendees, including Irwin, Mark, Vance, and Marcia, shared experiences from their organizations and provided feedback on the model, with Irwin suggesting relabeling the categories to better reflect performance improvement practices and emphasizing the importance of measuring business impact rather than just ROI. The group discussed challenges in demonstrating value and the difficulties learning departments face in being perceived as strategic partners rather than just vendors.
Click to view the replay on YouTube