Toshiba, an

ASTD BEST Award winner,

finds training ROI by
not focusing
on the numbers.

By Eva Kaplan-Leiserson

The ROI
ofSWAT
Anthony Codianni, director of training and dealer development at Toshiba America Business
Solutions, doesn’t at first know the cost of his flagship SWAT (Special Weekly Acquisition Train-
ing) program. In an age when training managers are being told to talk in numbers to executives
and prove the return-on-investment of their programs, Toshiba is a rare breed of company.
“[Management] invests in training,” Codianni says. “We’re not a profit center.” He says
proving training’s ROI is not something Toshiba is concerned with. But the irony is two-fold.
First, given 30 seconds, Codianni can calculate the cost of the SWAT program in his head. He
knows the printing costs of the four-color training materials and the prices of the computers,
LCD projector, and network components included in the innovative Training in a Box pack-
age. He’s on top of the numbers and can offer a total estimated cost of the program in less than
a minute. Also ironic is that for a program that doesn’t have to prove its worth to execs with
presentations and forms, the ROI is outstanding.

The metrics
Codianni’s directive was simple. As Toshiba acquired dealerships selling competing office hard-
ware, software, and services, salespeople needed to get up-to-speed on the company’s products
and culture. That process formerly took a year, and the salespeople would still be selling as much

48 TDJanuary 2005
as 50 percent of the old inventory nine
months after acquisition. With the SWAT
program, salespeople from once-competing
dealerships are trained in 60 days, and, by
six months after acquisition, they’re selling
80 percent Toshiba products. After nine
months, 100 percent of their sales are
Toshiba merchandise.
In addition, Codianni and his team
found that the training resulted in in-
creased retention. Before SWAT, about 60
percent of the original salesforce remained
at the acquired dealerships by the end of
nine months. That was a problem because Toshiba acquires new dealerships specifically for Anthony Codianni and his team
staff know-how. Now, post-SWAT training, 92 percent of sales staff remain after nine months. developed Training in a Box—
Why? Codianni says the salespeople stay because they’re trained—each and every one of a well-traveled learning solution.
them. In the past, a dealership would only send some of its staff for classroom training, not
wanting to take all of the salespeople out of the field. But with the new program, a blended
approach that combines self-study, synchronous e-learning, and classroom training, every
salesperson gets trained—and he or she only spends four days out of the field.
It’s obvious that although Toshiba management may not talk much about ROI in training,
they know it when they see it. “It’s not that we’re not fiscally responsible,” Codianni says. “We
certainly are. But if we need to do something and it’s a priority, we’ll do it and we’ll find the
money.” After his calculations, Codianni estimates the cost of the program at about
US$200,000 to $250,000, but he calls it “priceless.”

The details
SWAT was developed in less than 90 days. In December 2002, Toshiba’s senior executive vice
president handed down the directive. The program launched at the beginning of April 2003.
Codianni attributes the speedy development of SWAT, which didn’t repurpose training mate-
rials but created them all from scratch, to “creative ideas” and “a great team.”
The program pared down a six-module training curriculum into three modules: Product
Knowledge, Advanced Selling, and Color. Studying just those three components over 60 days
trains all of the sales reps at a dealership in every product Toshiba American Business Solutions
offers. The blended curriculum breaks down as follows:
● Product Knowledge: four self-study sessions and one online test
● Advanced Selling: four self-study sessions, one live e-learning session, one two-day class-
room seminar, and three online tests
● Color: three self-study sessions, three live e-learning sessions, one two-day classroom semi-
nar, and two online tests.
Self-study. Much of the SWAT content is product information, and Codianni and his team
don’t believe in “wasting human resources” to teach that. Thus, a large portion of the blended
program consists of self-study through workbooks and Toshiba’s FYI portal.

TDJanuary 2005 49
R O I o f S WAT
FYI is a learning manage-
ment system offering such train-
At Toshiba,
ing resources as online tutorials,
short pre-recorded Webinars,
all e-learning
and product knowledge tests
24/7. It’s also where learners reg-
is live and
ister for the live e-learning ses-
sions that make up the second
interactive
blended component. In addi-
tion, the FYI portal acts as an in-
with an online
tranet for all Toshiba dealers, trainer.
providing a plethora of product
information, including sales
guides, quick tips sheets, fast
start user guides, product posters, and prospect pre-
sentations. It’s Toshiba’s philosophy to make sure that
all information on a product is available to salespeople
the minute the product is released, Codianni says.
Live e-learning. Although Toshiba offers asynchronous
online tutorials and pre-recorded Webinars in its self-
study component, Codianni says the company doesn’t
consider those elements e-learning. E-learning is “live
with a trainer. It’s interactive.” That’s what SWAT
offers in its second component, in which training staff
is brought in to teach skill.
Two trainers conduct the live e-learning. One is
responsible for Advanced Selling and one for Color.
The second trainer acts as backup when not leading
the online session, troubleshooting any problems
with the technology.
The salespeople can participate from the road
using laptops that Toshiba gives each one when the
dealership is acquired.
The training staff increased the amount of live e-
learning after they first launched the program be-
cause of the number of questions that arose during
the self-study portion. The team wanted to ensure
those questions were answered before the classroom
training sessions so that everyone had a base knowl-
edge level and in-person time wasn’t wasted.
Classroom training . With the self-study and e-
learning modules, classroom training time was re-
duced to just four days in 60. Those two two-day ses-
sions help salespeople learn more about the products
through hands-on practice. The same trainers who
conduct the live e-learning sessions conduct the in-
person training.
Codianni and his team decided that the most effi-
cient approach was to bring the training to the dealer-
50 TDJanuary 2005
ship rather than the dealership to
the training. Thus, they devel-
oped Training in a Box, which
packages 20 laptop computers,
an LCD projector, a wireless
network, participant materials
(workbooks, sales rep guides,
and introductory CDs), and
manager materials (manager’s
guide and introductory CD).
This kit travels from dealer-
ship to dealership with the train-
ing team, and it ensures that
each location has the necessary
equipment for the learners to complete the classroom
component of the blended program. Toshiba was
uniquely suited to come up with this idea, not only
because the company sells much of the equipment
contained in the package, but also because of the com-
pany vision. “We thrive on mobility, we thrive on flex-
ibility,” Codianni says. “We believe that you no longer
have an office; your office is your computer.”
The Training in a Box idea was so popular at the
Learn from the BEST professional development day
(when ASTD BEST Award winners participated in
roundtable discussions and networking with atten-
dees), that Toshiba is considering selling the package
to other organizations.
The return
When Toshiba began acquiring competing dealer-
ships as part of its growth strategy, the process of
assimilating the sales staff into the company was
much more difficult. Now, with SWAT, salespeople
who previously never sold Toshiba products can do
so confidently in only 60 days. While getting their
people up-to-speed once cost dealerships about
$200,000, SWAT is offered to them free, largely
because it is cost-effective for Toshiba to produce.
And while Toshiba American Business Solutions
doesn’t make the training function prove ROI, the
accounting department did at one point consider
cutting the training budget. That is, until the senior
vice president said, “Absolutely not,” largely because
of the success of SWAT. If that’s not ROI, it’s hard to
say what is.
Eva Kaplan-Leiserson is news editor for T+D;
ekaplan@astd.org.