KS Tips for Getting Started with Your Assessments

Making a positive start with your KS assessment program is a key part of generating momentum in your wider learning and development plans.  Here is a brief guide which walks you through the right steps to make sure you get off to a flying start!

1. Discuss your goals. What do you want to achieve?  How will you define success?  Do you have management buy-in to support your plan?

2. Select your KS system administrators.  Decide who will have global access and who will have regional access.  Do you want to include sub-admins?

3. Book your KS Getting Started web meeting with the KS team and/or training partner.  Review the information on the Settings > Resources page of your KS dashboard.

4. Set up your KS accounts.  Do you need one main account or multiple linked accounts?  Add your company branding to your dashboard, test UI & reports.

5. Agree your message and decide how to communicate your plans to your team.

6. Identify a list of users to be tested.  Do you have any positive-minded ‘super users’ or champions who can be relied on to assist your plans?

7. What topics will you include in your test program?  Will you use the KS library ‘off the shelf’, or will you make some changes?  Do you want to add any custom questions of your own?

8. Build your user list.  Filter your user list into groups.

9. How much user feedback do you want to provide in your reports?  Include coaching?  Include links to learning?  Include additional user data capture?

10. Create a schedule of invites.  Who, where, when, what?  Do you want to send a custom invite message?  Will you test new hires at interview?  Who will help to administer this?

11. Send your test invites.  Monitor progress on the Invites > History page.  Set up reminders.

12. Monitor overall test progress and results.

13. Schedule results analysis workshop/web meeting with the KS team and chosen training partner.

14. Create reports and feed KS results data into your wider training and learning program. Include your preferred training partner in this phase of activity.

15. Re-test after training to monitor effectiveness of your material and measure performance improvement.


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KS Help Notes_Admin 01_Checklist

KS ADMIN CHECKLIST

Here is a checklist for KS admins to use, when planning their skills assessment program.

• Sign KS subscription agreement/renewal
• Identify Technology, HR, L&D and Management sponsors
• Agree on your goals; how will you measure your success?
• Identify KS admins; who will coordinate your assessments?
• Decide on account hierarchy; one account or several?
• Schedule KS admin web trainings
• Decide on your library content; ‘off the shelf’ or customize?
• Agree on your message to users; clear communication is important
• Feedback and coaching options
• Include assessments for new hires at interview?
• Send out your invites
• Monitor your assessment activity
• One-month review
• Post-assessment review; analyzing your results, charting and reporting
• Follow up activity and training
• Post-training assessments; measure improvements 
• New features?
• New assessment titles?

Sponsors

The first task is to identify who your main contacts will be across your organisation, who will help support your skills assessment activity. Experience shows that it is helpful to gain support from the following key business areas:

• Technology & BIM

• HR and Learning & Development

• Management

Goals – Measuring your Success

Think about your goals.  What do you want to achieve from your assessment program?  Is it better visibility of training needs? Is it a benchmark for minimum performance? Is it a team by team breakdown? Do you want to compare different offices? Or different countries? What are the most important assessment topics for your organisation? Do you want to make the assessments optional or mandatory? (Historical evidence suggests that it will help your % completion rates if there is a clear message from management, that this is a mandatory exercise).

How will you measure your success?  What training resources do you have access to (in-house or 3rd party)?  Do you have a formal training partner? Do you have access to E-Learning material?  Do you have a LMS or HR database?  Do you have a company Intranet?

Your Account Structure

Think about your KS account hierarchy and any additional administrators who will be responsible for coordinating assessments for their teams or offices.

For example, you can administer your assessments from a single account, or you can set up multiple accounts, representing different offices or business groups, within your organisation.

You can decide which admins will have ‘global’ access to your assessment data and which will have more restricted admin permissions.

Admin Training & Support

Schedule some web trainings for your KS admins. There are a range of help guides available for using the KS tools, which will help you and your team quickly get up to speed.  

It is helpful to schedule a getting started webinar, to walk through the system, answer any questions and share some ideas on good practice for successfully managing your assessment program.  The KS team will be available to help you, as you get up and running.

Library Content

Think about your assessment library.  Do you want to include any custom content, or simply use the KS library unchanged?  Most firms tend to use the material ‘off the shelf’, at least to begin.  Over time, as you become more familiar with the library questions, you’ll likely make some changes and add your own material.

Communicating Your Plans

Think about how you wish to communicate your plans to your teams. Good communication is essential in explaining to your users what you want to achieve. Review the KS guides on managing your assessment program, together with the user Q&A information and video.

How much feedback do you want your users to see at the end of their assessment? Do you want to include coaching notes or links to learning?  Do you want to assess new hires at interview?

Review Your Progress

One month review; schedule an interim update call with KS, to make sure everything is on track. It’s still early days, so it sometimes helps to share any technical issues or queries you may have at this stage.

Sending Your Invites

Send out your invites and commence your assessment program.  Monitor progress and chase up any missed appointments.  The KS team will be on hand to assist with anysupport issues you encounter.

Analyzing Your Results

Post-assessment review; schedule an update call with KS, to discuss progress and analyze your results in detail. Look at options for charting and reporting your data. Discuss skills gaps and training needs. Will you involve a training partner at this stage?

Training

Feed the skills gaps data from your assessments into a continuous improvement program of training, lunch & learns, seminars, E-Learning, mentoring.

Post-Training

Post training assessment. Use the KS tools to measure the effectiveness of your training and how much information people have retained.

Feedback

New features & feedback; please share your thoughts with us on what you would like us to develop or improve in the KS dashboard.  

New library material; do you want us to add any new titles to the KS library?

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