No function, department, or organization can successfully implement change or achieve excellence unless its long-term purpose is clearly defined. This mission should be the foundation upon which all strategic decisions are made and must precede the structure of the learning function.
I have been in many companies where the reason for a learning function was not clear. And this is why so many learning departments suffer layoffs, lack budget and get little respect. Having a clear outcome in mind is a prerequisite to success. The second requirement is that the outcome be perceived as valuable.
Most learning functions focus on individual skill development and on managing the process of career development. This may also include assisting in developing a performance management system and working through the career development activities and aggressive education strategies to help retention. While this is a noble effort, it does not produce much in the way of perceived value which, in most organizations, means revenue. Nor does it do anything for the short term. And, let’s face it, corporations are focused on today and are looking for ways to improve shorter term performance. To expect an organization to invest considerable resources and talent in vague and unclear general development is foolish.
Much of the general employee education and career development can be outsourced and employees can be expected to guide their own development when provided with tools and resources.
I am a firm believer that formal corporate education needs to focus on helping the organization achieve its immediate and mid-term business goals. It can do so by taking on a primary strategic focus such as I describe here.
1. Initiative-Driven
This type of learning function drives a corporate-wide initiative or business plan or project. This is often an initiative that the CEO is passionate about and which is being cascaded throughout the company.
This is an appropriate and excellent model when there are ‘great things afoot’. Motorola University very successfully drove the quality initiative throughout Motorola. At the same time, Motorola U was also involved in strategic planning and in helping the company cope with expansion into China and other parts of the world. It pioneered bringing focus to one or two issues and putting a structure in place to facilitate delivering the content, coaching the implementation and building understanding and acceptance of the issues with management and the employees.
Examples of initiatives where a learning function might play a role include such things as globalization, productivity, process improvement, and empowerment.
This focus on driving an initiative turns out to be one of the most important of the emerging definitions of a successful learning function.
2. Change-Management Focused
Another form concentrates its efforts on driving change or on facilitating a complete transformation process for a company. This is often a transitory role as a company embarks on a new strategy or is in the process of merger or acquisition.
By helping managers and employees understand and deal with vast change, internally or in the marketplace or both, revenues and productivity grow and resistance, misunderstanding and anger lessen.
3. Leadership Development
Many learning functions are chartered to build the leadership of the organization. Stellar examples of this include General Electric’s Management Development Institute at Crotonville, New York and IBM’s decades long investment in new techniques and technology.
Leadership development is at the cusp of radical change. It has been rapidly evolving as organizations face both a shortage of leadership and a leadership team unprepared for competition in a global, fast-paced and far more collaborative world than they emerged from. In fact, the challenge of leadership development is how to create flexible and nimble leaders who are also focused enough to stay on target in achieving the organization’s strategic business goals.
Teams and project work are taking on more of a role and hierarchal leadership is much less important than collaborative and team leadership.
There is experimentation with simulations, informal learning networks, and collaborative learning between customers, suppliers and academics. Learning experts can facilitate and improve how this takes place.
4. Business Development
Another charter for a learning function is to drive Business Development. They do this by providing background information, skills development and academic knowledge to those who are developing a new service or product. Ideally, the learning function could connect managers with key academic researchers in those areas and also bring in experts to impart their skills and knowledge to the development team.
Some companies make this the function of the marketing department, but by putting it into a learning function that also does other things (e.g. leadership development); they get a more synergistic result.
Of course, this requires people staffing the university who are very different from the ones we find now working as trainers.
5. Customer/Supplier Relationship Management Orientation
Another strategic orientation focuses on educating and managing the customer and supplier relationship. Learning functions engaged in this activity educate employees in negotiating skills and in relationship management. They may offer skills training to suppliers and even set or educate to industry standards. This is a practice common among manufacturing companies such as Ford or Motorola.
By having a clearly stated, short to mid-term strategy and by developing an understanding of what a CEO perceives as value will go a long way to making a learning function successful.
