A total of 42 participants attended the training, from  from Angola, Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania, The Gambia, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Participants were also a mix of people from Fixed and Mobile operators as well as policymakers from Government and staff from the Regulatory Authorities.

The purpose of the workshop was to  highlight the link between the learning and development strategy and organisational strategy. Its aim was to show how learning and devlopment impacts organisational performance, the tools and techniques required to measure business impact and how learning and development professionals can use these tools in a unique value propostion to sell learning and development propostions.

Specific workshop objectives:

• Tools and techniques used to measure the Return on Investment (ROI) learning and development
• Learning and development as a business strategy
• Linking HR strategy and business strategy
• The balance scorecard framework, aligning learning and development and business strategy
• The training value proposition within the context of human performance improvement
• Evaluating performance improvement initiatives, a specific focus on training evaluation
• Change management

Two experts from the region were used in this event. This paid dividends because they understood the context in which the participants came from and were able to give examples and exercises that the participants were at home with.  The participants felt a deep sense of value which manifested through their positive responses and open participatory approaches during the training. Most of them recommended that the trainings be more frequent and even recommended  other areas for training in the future.

The hosting organization ZICTA, was excellent in every respect. Participants were given the opportunity to have a boat ride on the majestic Zambezi River, which flows into the Victoria Falls.  For those who did not have the opportunity to attend there are pictures of the events in Livingstone, enough to whet the appetite.