Does training managers pay off?

Does investment in training lead to improved results? Most research in this area defends this idea. However, the empirical evidence does not always support it. According to the literature, this is due, in part, to methodological problems of empirical research in this issue. This paper tries to solve one of them – the lack of homogeneity in the samples most of previous studies used – because it focuses on managers. Using data from a survey of 316 Spanish firms, the paper analyzes the effects of training managers in performance. Our findings show that firms that train their managers obtain better effectiveness results than those that do not, and that the intensity of the training also affects financial performance.