ISSN: 2222-6990
Open access
This paper presents the evaluation on the face and content validity of a Soft Skills Transfer of Training Instrument. This is a newly developed instrument with an aim to assess the influencing factors of soft skills application back into the workplace after training amongst clerical employees in a Malaysian context. The instrument comprises of 85 items with twelve constructs: personal efficacy; intention; motivation; expectations; training contents; delivery; awareness; interventions; superior’s support; trainer’s quality; workplace; and climate. The constructs were derived from Baldwin and Ford’s Transfer of Training Model (1988), Burke & Hutchins’ Model of Transfer (2008), and Holton’s HRD Evaluation Research and Measurement Model (1996). The evaluation was based on the opinions of five experts from academia and training industry background. Each item was evaluated to ensure its relevance to the study and rated based on a dichotomous rating of agree or disagree. The ratings were used to calculate the extent of agreement between raters using Kappa Index (Kappa) and Content Validity Index (CVI). As this study involved multiple raters, Fleiss’ Kappa Index (FKI) was applied. The calculation yielded that the inter-rater agreement was 0.76 (FKI) while the proportion agreement was 0.96 (CVI). Items with at least a CVI of 0.80 were included in the final instrument. This evaluation confirmed and supported that the face and content validity of the items on the instrument could be used to assess the influencing factors of soft skills training transfer and ready for a pilot study.
Anthony, J. V., & Joanne, M. G. (2005). Understanding interobserver agreement: the kappa statistic. Family Medicine Research Series, 37(5), 360-363.
Azwani, M., Nor’ain, M. T., & Noor Shah, S. (2016). Evaluating the face and content validity of a teaching and learning guiding principles instrument (TLGPI): a perspective study of Malaysia teacher educators. Malaysian Journal of Society and Space, 12(3), 11-21.
Baldwin, T., & Ford, J. K. (1988). Transfer of training: a review and directions for future research. Personnel Psychology, 41, 63-105.
Bhanot, S. (2009). Importance of soft skills for an employee and for the organization. SIES Journal of Management, 6(1), 18-22.
Bhatti, M. A., & Kaur, S. (2010). The role of individual and training design factors on training transfer. Journal of European Industrial Training, 34(7), 656-672.
Blume, B., Ford, J., Baldwin, T., & Huang, J. (2010). Transfer of training: a meta-analytic review. Journal of Management, 36(4), 1065-1105.
Bonekamp, L., & Sue, M. (2015). Consequences of Industry 4.0 on human labour and work organisation. Journal of Business and Media Psychology, 6(1), 33-40.
Bowles, J. (2018). The computerisation of European jobs. Retrieved from http://www.bruegel.org/nc/blog/detail/article/1394-the-computerisation-of-europeanjobs/
Burke, L. A., & Hutchins, H. M. (2008). A study of best practices in training transfer and proposed model of transfer. Human Resource Development Quarterly, 19(2), 107-128.
Burke, L. A., Hutchins, H. M., & Saks, A. M, (2013). Best practices in training transfer. In: Paulidi, Psychology for Business Success, (Vol 1, pp. 115-132). Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger.
Chiwaridzo, M., Chikasha, T. N., Naidoo, N., Dambi, J. M., Tadyanemhandu, C., Munambah, N., & Chizanga, P. T. (2017). Content validity and test-retest reliability of a low back pain questionnaire in Zimbabwean adolescents. Archives of Physiotherapy, 7(3), 1-12.
Feng, Y., & Richards, L. (2018). A review of digital curation professional competencies: theory and current practices. Records Management Journal, 28(1), 62-78.
Field, A. P. (2005). Discovering statistics using SPSS, 2nd Ed. London: Sage Publications Inc.
Fleiss, J. L., Levin B., & Paik, M. C. (2003). Assessing significance in a fourfold table. Statistical Methods for Rates and Proportions, 3rd Ed. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Franke, F., & Felfe, J. (2012). Transfer of leadership skills. Journal of Personnel Psychology, 11(3), 138-147.
Hamed, T. (2016). Validity and reliability of the research instrument; how to test the validation of a questionnaire/survey in a research. International Journal of Academic Research in Management (IJARM), 5(3), 28-36.
Hernández-Garbanzo, Y. M. (2011). Measuring the impact of youth EFNEP: questionnaire development and validation (Doctoral dissertation). Date of access: 12/09/2019. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses database, (UMI No: 3469533).
Holton, E. F. (2005). Holton’s evaluation model: new evidence and construct elaboration. Advances in Developing Human Resources, 7(1), 37-54.
Ibrahim, R., Boerhannoeddin, A., & Bakare, K. K. (2017). The effect of soft skills and training methodology on employee performance. European Journal of Training and Development, 41(4), 1-19.
Kilem, L. G. (2008). Computing inter-rater reliability and its variance in the presence of high agreement. British Journal of Mathematical and Statistical Psychology, 61, 29–48.
Lam, K. W., Hassan, A., Sulaiman, T., & Kamarudin, N. (2018). Evaluating the face and content validity of an instructional technology competency instrument for university lecturers in Malaysia. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 8(5), 367–385.
Lazarus, A. (2013). Soften up: the importance of soft skills for job success. Physician Executive, 39(50), 40-45.
McHugh, M. L. (2012). Interrater reliability: the kappa statistic. Biochem Med (Zagreb), 22(3), 276-282.
Moeller, S., Robinson, M., Wilkowski, B., & Hanson, D. (2012). The big chill: interpersonal coldness and emotion-labeling skills. Journal of Personality, 80(3), 703-724.
Morris, E., & Burkett, K. (2011). Mixed methodologies: a new research paradigm or enhanced quantitative paradigm. Online Journal of Cultural Competence in Nursing and Healthcare, 1(1), 27?36.
Noe, R. (2010). Employee training and development. 5th Ed. New York: McGraw Hill Irwin.
Noe, R. A., & Kodwani, A. D. (2018). Employee training and development. 7th Ed. Chennai: McGraw-Hill Education India Private Limited.
Nurjannah, I. & Sri Marga, S. (2017). Guidelines for analysis on measuring interrater reliability of nursing outcome classification. International Journal of Research in Medical Sciences, 5(4), 1169-1175.
Oluwatayo, J. A. (2012). Validity and reliability issues in educational research. Journal of Educational and Social Research, 2(2), 391-400.
Polit, D. F., Beck, C. T., & Owen, S. V. (2007). Is the CVI an acceptable indicator of content validity? Appraisal and recommendations. Research in Nursing and Health, 30(4), 459-67.
Putta, H. (2014). Impact of recession on training. Journal of Business and Management, 16(9), 42-44.
Robles, M. (2012). Executive perceptions of the top 10 soft skills needed in today’s workplace. Business Communications Quarterly, 75(4), 453-465.
Ryan-Nicholls, K., & Will, C. (2009). Rigour in qualitative research: Mechanisms for control. Nurse Researcher, 16, 70-82.
Sangoseni, O., Hellman, M., & Hill, C. (2013). Development and validation of a questionnaire to assess the effect of online learning on behaviors, attitudes, and clinical practices of physical therapists in the United States regarding evidence-based clinical practice. The Internet Journal of Allied Health Sciences and Practice, 11(2), 1-13.
Sikorskii, A., & Noble, P. C, (2013). Statistical considerations in the psychometric validation of outcome measures. Clinical Orthopaedics and Related Research, 471, 3489–3495.
Strickland, J., Strickland, A., Wang, P., Zimmerly, L., & Moulton, S. (2013). Online course development using the ADDIE instruction design model: the need to establish validity. In J. Sanchez & K. Zhang (Eds.). Proceedings of world conference on e-learning in corporate, government, healthcare, and higher education 2010, (pp. 2046-2054). Chesapeake, VA: AACE.
Thatcher, R. (2010). Validity and reliability of quantitative electroencephalography. Journal of Neurotherapy, 14, 122-152.
Thomason, D. L. (2008). Physical education activities scale: the development of an instrument to measure adolescent perceptions of school physical education activities. (Doctoral dissertation). Date of access: 12/09/2019. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses database, (UMI No: 3328453).
Tonhauser, C., & Buker, L. (2016). Determinants of transfer of training: a comprehensive literature review. International Journal for Research in Vocational Education and Training, 3(2), 127-165.
Truitt, D. (2011). The effect of training and development on employee attitude as it relates to training and work proficiency,” Sage Open, 1(3), 1-13. DOI: 10.1177/2158244011433338
Umar, I. N., & Su-Lyn, Y. (2011). Instructional design practitioners in Malaysia: skills and issues. International Journal of Social, Behavioral, Educational, Economic, Business and Industrial Engineering, 5(11), 1704-1708.
Wats, M., & Wats, R. K. (2009). Developing soft skills in students. International Journal of Learning, 15(12), 1-10.
World Economic Forum. (2018). The future of jobs. Retrieved from http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Future_of_Jobs_2018.
Wong, K. L., Ong, S. F., & Kuek, T. Y. (2012). Constructing a survey questionnaire to collect data on service quality of business academics. European Journal of Social Sciences, 29, 209-221.
Yassir, Y. A., McIntyre, G. T., & Bearn, D. R. (2016). Three questionnaires to assess the perception of fixed orthodontic therapy before, during and after treatment: validity and reliability. European Journal of Orthodontics, 39(4), 402–410.
Zamanzadeh, V., Ghahramanian, A., Rassouli, M., Abbaszadeh, A., Alavi-Majd, H., & Nikanfar, A-R. (2015). Design and implementation content validity study: development of an instrument for measuring patient-centered communication. Journal of Caring Sciences, 4(2), 165-178.
In-Text Citation: (Shafie et al., 2020)
To Cite this Article: Shafie, S., Majid, F. A., Damio, S. M., & Hoon, T. S. (2020). Evaluation on The Face and Content Validity of a Soft Skills Transfer of Training Instrument. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 10(10), 1054–1065.
Copyright: © 2020 The Author(s)
Published by HRMARS (www.hrmars.com)
This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) license. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this license may be seen at: http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode