Person-centred approaches

These approaches to leadership development such as mentoring, coaching and action learning are much more clearly focused on personal development which is not fixed to any specific learning outcomes. Although it is possible to apply a chain reaction approach to person centred learning, it is unlikely to produce helpful results. Rather than 'proving' the value of the development initiative, evaluation in this case is much more likely to focus on 'learning' and can be a collaborative activity between trainer (or coach/mentor) and learner. This does not mean that quantitative techniques cannot be used; in fact, when the evaluation focuses on one person, it is easier to produce figures to show how their learning has had an impact on the business. Later on in this chapter, we examine how certain evaluation techniques normally used in person-centred learning can be successfully transferred to abstract learning activities.