Imagine this: Your company just rolled out a new compliance training on data privacy, and employees must complete a quiz at the end to certify their understanding. But after reviewing the results, you notice a problem—many employees failed the assessment. Did they not understand the material, or is the test itself flawed? This is where item analysis come in. By evaluating test questions for clarity, difficulty, and effectiveness, item analysis ensures that assessments truly measure what they’re supposed to and support real learning.

What is Item Analysis?

Item analysis is basically a quality check for assessments. It looks at test questions to see if they’re actually measuring what they’re supposed to. Through data, we can identify whether a question is too easy, too hard, or just plain confusing.

And it’s not just useful for teachers or trainers. Well-designed assessments help learners too—by making sure they’re tested on what actually matters, rather than just memorizing random facts. In workplace training, especially compliance training, this means ensuring employees truly understand policies and how to apply them.

For adult learning, item analysis also helps identify weak spots in training. If a lot of employees struggle with certain questions, it might mean the training itself needs improvement. By analyzing test results, we can fine-tune both the training and the assessments to make learning more effective.

Why Compliance Assessments Need a Quality Check

Compliance training isn’t just a box to check, nor is it a one-and-done task. It ensures that employees apply policies and regulations correctly in their work. This is why, apart from continuously improving the topics covered in compliance training, assessments must also be evaluated and refined as needed.

Poorly designed assessments may lead to either false positives or false negatives:

• False positives occur when employees pass but do not retain or apply the information.
• False negatives happen when employees fail due to a confusing test design, not a lack of knowledge.

How to Spot Flawed Compliance Questions Using Item Analysis

1. Are too many learners getting this question right or wrong?
   • If everyone gets it right, it might be too easy or not assessing real decision-making.
     • Example: “Is it important to protect customer data?” (Too obvious; does not assess the understanding of how to do it.)
   • If almost no one gets it right, it could be poorly worded or irrelevant.
     • Example: “What year was the Data Privacy Act enacted in the Philippines?” (Memorization-based; not useful for real-world application.)
2. Are top performers and struggling learners answering it the same way?
   • If both groups perform similarly, the question is not effective in distinguishing knowledge levels.
     • Example: A question asking for a definition rather than testing if employees can recognize a compliance risk in their daily work.
   • Fix: Instead of a multiple-choice question, use a scenario-based one where employees must choose the right action in a real-world compliance situation.
3. Are employees ignoring certain answer choices?
   • If no one selects certain options, the distractors are not effective.
     • Example: If a data privacy question gives “Ignore the request” as an option, most employees won’t pick it—making it a useless distractor.
   • Fix: Use common real-world mistakes as distractors, such as selecting the wrong way to store sensitive files or mishandling employees’ personal information.

Applying Item Analysis to Improve Compliance Training

• Use LMS data to see which questions learners struggle with.
• Compare quiz results with real-world compliance incidents (e.g., security breaches or policy violations) to check if assessments predict actual risks.
• Pilot the compliance test with a sample group and refine questions based on their responses.

Final Thoughts: Item Analysis = Better Assessments = Better Learning

When designing assessments for any type of training, it’s important to remember that they aren’t just about getting a passing score. They must ensure that employees understand and apply the skills covered in the training correctly.

As learning and development professionals, we must continuously audit our assessments to determine whether they measure real understanding or merely reinforce memorization. The reliability and validity of an assessment depend on how well it has been quality-checked and aligned with learning objectives.

By applying item analysis and refining assessments, we can improve learning outcomes and create more effective training programs. In our succeeding blog posts, we’ll take a deeper dive into how item analysis can be done to improve assessments and explore the valuable insights it can provide.