78% of organisations polled by The Ken Blanchard Companies in their latest annual Corporate Issues Survey say they will be spending the same or more on L&D initiatives in the next financial year.

This is a marked improvement from 2009, when almost half of the companies polled said they intended to reduce their training budgets. The study shows that companies are continuing to recognise the importance of training to help them weather the recession, and maintaining their training budgets despite 60% saying they were facing economic challenges.

Businesses’ priorities for training were clearly influenced by economic challenges, with the most popular areas for learning investment being change management and improving employee engagement.