Reflecting upon and reviewing your own experience attending a training programme, the time line technique enables you to understand all the stages in the design and delivery of a learning intervention and places you back in the seat of a learner. In reviewing the three phases of learning transfer (before, during, and after the learning intervention), you will be able to isolate the significant contributions that enable you to be fully effective and efficient in transferring your learning.

Research in learning transfer has accelerated over the last 10 years as business, healthcare, and education have been questioning whether their investment in learning and development is bearing fruit. Learning transfer is not something that happens only at the end of a learning process; the ability to transfer is vested in every stage and requires an understanding of not only what we learn but how we learn.

Among the many factors that influence learning transfer, 16 make up the Learning Transfer System Inventory as established by Professor Ed Holton and his research team. These factors are categorised under three headings: capability, motivation, and work environment. This module describes these factors (and the corresponding categorizations) and how they affect the likelihood of success of a learning intervention.