Tips for Developing Employee Skills for Competitive Advantage

Only 40% of companies say their learning strategy is aligned with business goals. Meaning 3 of 5 companies have learning strategies with little of no connection to business objectives. Here are some L&D tips: 1. Align with Business Strategy: 🔶 Shape learning strategies based on the business and talent strategies. 🔶 Strategy should support professional development and build capabilities. 🔶 This should be done company-wide and in a cost-effective way. 🔶 Use Learning strategy to enhance culture and reinforce values. 2. Co-ownership Between Business Units and HR: 🔶 Be agile and ready to adapt to business processes and practices. 🔶 Enhance HR partnerships with business leaders. 🔶 Leadership from both groups must share responsibility. 🔶 Define, prioritize and design capability-building programs together. 3. Assess Capability Gaps and Estimated Value: 🔶 Verify that employees can deliver on business priorities. 🔶 Continuously assess employee capabilities... deliberately and systematically. 🔶 Identify essential capabilities for various functions or job descriptions. 🔶 Measure how employees rate in each of these areas. 🔶 Proactively seek to close capability gaps. 4. Design Learning Journeys 🔶 Combine digital-learning and in-person sessions. 🔶 Be aware that leaders have very busy schedules. 🔶 Create a space where people can learn in a safe environment. 🔶 Reinforce that failures won't affect anyone's career path. 🔶 Move away from stand-alone programs by designing learning journeys. 5. Scale-up: 🔶 Establish an agenda of strategic initiatives that support capability building. 🔶 Help leaders develop high-performing teams. 🔶 Maintain an ongoing discussion with business leaders about initiatives. 🔶 Keep initiatives realistic given the limitations of funding and budget. 🔶 Scale if possible - program cost per person decline with scale. 6. Measure the Impact on Business Performance: 🔶 How closely aligned are L&D initiatives with business priorities. 🔶 Are learning interventions changing people’s behavior and performance. 🔶 How well are investments and resources in L&D being used. 🔶 Focus on outcomes-based metrics. 7. Integrate of L&D Interventions into HR Processes: 🔶 Corporate-learning activities need to be aligned with HR strategy. 🔶 L&D affects every other aspect of HR from recruiting to succession planning. 🔶 Understand HR strategy and processes and work closely with HR leaders. 🔶 Help managers build skills to provide development feedback in real time. 8. Enable of the 70:20:10 Learning Framework: 🔶 70% of learning takes place on the job. 🔶 20%of learning happens through interaction and collaboration. 🔶 10% of learning through formal-learning interventions like classroom training. 🔶 These stats are general guidelines and vary by industry and organization. Great read: McKinsey & Company The Essential Components of a Successful L&D Strategy

𝗦𝗲𝗲𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗙𝗲𝗲𝗱𝗯𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗧𝗼 𝗔𝗰𝗰𝗲𝗹𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗔𝗻𝗱 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄𝘁𝗵: The most sustainable long-term competitive advantage an employee can have is learning more quickly than their peers. Receiving feedback is essential to establishing this advantage but receiving accurate and honest feedback can be an elusive goal. The following research from OfficeVibe highlights why feedback is vital for employees. • 62% of employees wish they received more feedback from their colleagues. • 83% of employees appreciate receiving feedback, regardless of if it is positive or negative.  • 96% of employees said that receiving ongoing feedback is a good thing. • 4 out of 10 workers are actively disengaged when they get little or no feedback.   We all understand that giving and receiving feedback is hard. Research shows that people feel equally anxious about offering feedback as they do when receiving feedback, which helps to explain why so few people provide others with needed constructive feedback. 𝟰 𝗣𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗲𝘀 𝗧𝗼 𝗠𝗶𝗻𝗶𝗺𝗶𝘇𝗲 𝗧𝗵𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝘀 𝗙𝗼𝗿 𝗢𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗧𝗼 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝘃𝗶𝗱𝗲 𝗬𝗼𝘂 𝗙𝗲𝗲𝗱𝗯𝗮𝗰𝗸:   𝟭) 𝗕𝗲 𝗦𝗽𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗳𝗶𝗰 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗙𝗲𝗲𝗱𝗯𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗥𝗲𝗾𝘂𝗲𝘀𝘁𝘀  If you ask general questions like "What can I do better?" others don't understand what type of feedback is "okay" to provide. A specific feedback request would be, "I am working on improving how I lead our team meetings. What am I doing that is getting in the way of our meetings being more collaborative?". 𝟮) 𝗔𝘀𝗸 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗙𝗲𝗲𝗱𝗯𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗢𝗳𝘁𝗲𝗻 As this becomes part of an employee's routine, people start to feel safe about providing upward feedback. 𝟯) 𝗔𝘃𝗼𝗶𝗱 𝗗𝗲𝗳𝗲𝗻𝘀𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 If an employee is perceived as defensive, they are making a statement to others that it isn't safe to give them constructive feedback, and they do not value feedback. 𝟰) 𝗦𝗮𝘆 “𝗧𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗸 𝗬𝗼𝘂” Even if you disagree or feel like the feedback is unfair, be appreciative of receiving the information. A person’s feedback is not the ultimate truth, but their perceptions are what they use to make decisions. Having that knowledge is powerful.   Do you agree? Share your COMMENTS below.   𝗛𝗶𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲   𝗼𝗻 𝗺𝘆 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗳𝗶𝗹𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗯𝗲 𝗻𝗼𝘁𝗶𝗳𝗶𝗲𝗱 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝗜 𝗽𝗼𝘀𝘁 | Tony Gambill   Subscribe to my   𝐂𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐕𝐢𝐞𝐰 𝐋𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩  , LinkedIn newsletter to join 34,998 others who receive biweekly practical tips for Self-Leadership and Leading Others: https://lnkd.in/dYRwgY96   #leadership #careers #humanresources #management

#Training’s purpose in the workplace is to improve performance, because jobs done well=higher revenue. Now there are many things that impact performance, some controllable, some unpredictable. So when we are creating training, it’s important to do so while carefully considering what we can control. One of those things is to understand the behaviors necessary to perform tasks that support the achievement of business goals and objectives, and use that understanding to reduce information and training that is not necessary for employees to adopt the specific behavior we are targeting. What are some key moments that can help achieve this? 1. Working with practicing SMEs to understand the workflows we are supporting during needs analysis 2. During content generation, keeping everyone focused around questions like: “How will this information help learners do X to the best of their ability?” “Would they still be able to do the behavior within the target range without exposure to this information?” “Will including this have high, medium, or low impact to their ability to perform the target behavior” 3. Keeping focus around the fact that there is A LOT of content competing for our audiences’ attention, all with varying levels of importance. Constantly circle back to WHY should they be paying attention to this, and HOW can we make sure we aren’t muddying the waters further by only delivering what is critical? And these are just a few! What are some other key moments/tips/tricks #LearningAndDevelopment folks use to keep the focus on supporting the business through improving #performance? Would love to get a good #crowdsourced reference list in the comments!