Employee Perceptions of the Effectiveness of E-training to Meet Performance Evaluation Requirements

Abstract

Saudi universities have moved to e-training programmes, including ‘Ithrai’ and other platforms, due to their potential effectiveness and cost-efficiency. However, limited efforts have been made to evaluate the effectiveness of e-training programmes in the context of university workplaces in Saudi Arabia using Job Performance Evaluation Charter JPEC. The purpose of this study is to address this gap in the literature by examining the effect of e-training on meeting JPEC requirements for employees in the public university context in Saudi Arabia. This study highlights that e-training approaches are important to ensure that employees have acquired essential competencies and skills using JPEC as the foundation for their evaluation. In addition, it is important to take into account the different levels of knowledge among employees and encourage cooperation in order to overcome the various knowledge gaps among them as a result of their different abilities in dealing with technology. Participants highly agreed on the impact of e-training in terms of meeting the requirements for evaluating job performance in the area of employee professional development with a mean of (4.19). This research, however, is subject to several limitations. First, the study occurred at one Saudi university and is geographically limited. It also relied on a small sample size and it may not be possible to generalise the reported perceptions to the whole institution or Saudi Arabia as a whole. Other researchers could replicate the study by including different institutions in different geographical regions. Second, all the data were self-reported and may suffer from social desirability bias. Thus, readers should interpret the findings with caution.