An Evaluation of the Senior Management Course

This paper assesses the effectiveness of the senior management course offered at the Kenya school of Government (KSG) to middle level management staff as perceived by the participants of the program. The program was developed in the 1960s and has since undergone various reviews with the current revision having been launched in 2008. The aim of the paper is to highlight the reactions of employees, who have gone through the program, on its effectiveness in preparing them for their roles at senior management levels. The research was based on a survey of participant evaluations using the Kirkpatrick framework of training evaluation, at reaction level. The reaction level measures the participants ’ interest, motivation, and attention levels (Kirkpatrick & Kirkpatrick, 2005). This level is important for the future of the program because the motivation to learn, and changes in behaviour, is greatly influenced by the participants’ positive reactions. The key finding was that the perceptions of participants about the relevance, delivery and application of the Senior Management Course vary significantly and correlate negatively with age, job group, years in service and years served in their current job group. The main contribution of this paper lies in highlighting how to improve the effectiveness of management development programmes as well as informing both policy and practice in the public sector