Perceived usefulness of training and development activities among women managers

Abstract

This research examines the participation of women managers in Sri Lanka in various training and development activities during their career and how they perceive the usefulness of such training and development activities. Objectives of this research are: to identify most common training and development activities that women managers in Sri Lankan have participated; to identify most useful training and development activities according to women managers in Sri Lankan; and to see the nature of correlation between the number of training and development activities participated by women managers in Sri Lankan and their perceived usefulness. The two measures originally developed by Greenhaus et al. (1990) was used by Burke et al. (1998) to measure the number of training and development activities participated by Filipino managerial women and their perceived usefulness (Burke et al. 1998). The two measures are participation and usefulness (Burke et al. 1998). Respondents were asked to indicate their participation on 13 different training and development activities and a five point scale ranging from extremely useless = 1 to extremely useful = 5 was used to measure the perceived usefulness of such activities (Burke et al. 1998). A questionnaire was developed using the above training and development activities and usefulness scale. The sample selected for this study includes 100 women managers in Sri Lanka who are employed in the private sector and residing in the western province of Sri Lanka. The sample of 100 Sri Lankan women managers consists of 50 women managers from the financial services sector and 50 women managers from the manufacturing sector. A similar study carried out in Canada have found that a positive correlation exists between the number of activities participated and their mean perceived usefulness Burke et al. (1998). Based on this the following hypothesis was developed: a positive correlation exists between the number of activities participated by women managers in Sri Lankan and their mean perceived usefulness. The study carried out among Filipino managerial women found that a negative correlation exists between two variables and this finding deviated from the Canadian experience where there was a positive correlation between the variables (Burke et al 1998). The research study found that a positive correlation exists among the women managers in Sri Lanka.