Maximizing opportunities for training transfer through workplace design: An EB perspective

The study investigated worker perceptions about the relative impact of workplace design on training transfer as compared with other organizational factors identified as impacting transfer in transfer research. While Human Resource Development research now recognizes the importance Of organizational context in influencing worker ability and opportunity to transfer the physical environment has been overlooked as a potential contributor. The study applied Environment and Behavior (EB) research to human resource development needs in its examination of workplace design. Utilizing an ethnographic approach, cumulative frequencies for elicited responses about organizational factors were highest for workplace design perceived to impede transfer and second highest for workplace design perceived to facilitate transfer. Further of the individual items and attributes elicited per organizational factor, workplace design features that did not support privacy needs were elicited most often as impeding transfer across all organizational factors.