Employee_Learning_&_Development_Excellence_July_2022

JULY 2022 • Vol.9 • No.07 (ISSN 2564-2014)

MINDSET MATTERS: AN AGILE APPROACH TO EMPLOYEE DEVELOPMENT IN A HYBRID WORKPLACE - Katy Conway, Chief People Officer and Ellen Ourednik, Director, L&D, RGP

The State of Learner Engagement, Solutions and Platforms 2022 Drive business success via better L&D Page 21 - 48 Sponsored by

INDEX

Employee Learning & Development Excellence JULY 2022

Vol.09

No.07

(ISSN 2564-2014)

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Mindset Matters: An Agile Approach To Employee Development In A Hybrid Workplace Inorder to capitalize on the possibilities of a hybrid workplace, organizations must rethink their approach to learning and development

On the Cover

- Katy Conway, Chief People Officer and Ellen Ourednik, Director, L&D, RGP

Articles 10 Building Gen Z Loyalty With Effective Career Mapping Providing opportunities for employees to train on the job and upskill - Emily Zini, Senior Director, Operations, The Escape Game

49 Retain Your Employees By Giving Them Wings How can companies turn problems into opportunities - David Novak,

Former Chairman and CEO, Yum! Brands, and Jason Goldsmith, President and Co-Founder, Mustard

69 Here’s How Improving SOPs Can Help You Grow Your Business Develop a culture of knowledge sharing and continuous improvement - Ken Babcock, CEO and Co-founder, Tango

14 Potential Over Credentials: 58 Upskilling HR To Meet The Future Of Work A Call To Action For HR HR technology should be Departments flexible to meet the needs of Apprenticeship is the new employees and companies pipeline - Cathy Koslowski, - Ximena Hartsock, Co-Founder, BuildWithin

Equus Software’s VP, Solutions Consulting

The State of Learner Engagement, Solutions and Platforms 2022 Drive business success via better L&D Page 21 - 48

Top Picks

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INDEX

The Case For Purpose In Career Development

For many people, finding their purpose or “why” leads them to their long-term career pathway - Misty Frost, CEO, Penn Foster/Carrus

18

7 Ways Instructor-Led Online Training Will Change In The Future ILT will see some drastic changes in years to come. That is the nature of the L&D industry.

- Christopher Pappas,

53

Founder, The eLearning Industry’s Network

The Coaching Insights You Didn't Know You Needed How to optimize your coaching investment?

- Jonathan Passmore, Senior Vice President, Coaching, CoachHub

61

Professional Development Is Key To Retaining Talent

Highlights from a recent survey by The Conference Board - Rebecca Ray, Executive Vice President and Jennifer Burnett, Principal, The Conference Board

EDITOR’S NOTE

Editorial Purpose Our mission is to promote personal and

Deepa Damodaran

Debbie Mcgrath

professional development based on

Editor, Employee Learning & Development Excellence

Publisher, HR.com

constructive values, sound ethics, and timeless principles.

Employee Development in a Hybrid Workplace Excellence Publications Debbie McGrath

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Babitha Balakrishnan and Deepa Damodaran

S

kills are fast becoming redundant.

According to The World Economic Forum, 50% of currently employed workers will need reskilling by 2025!

Globally, organizations spent over $332 billion on corporate learning and development (L&D) in 2019, and they are projected to spend over $487 billion by 2030, a compound growth rate of 8%.

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Although employers are spending billions of dollars on corporate L&D, too often, they get little in return!

It has now become imperative that employers develop an agile learning approach to employee development that caters to their future needs. A hybrid workplace offers employers an opportunity to reimagine how they support and connect with employees.

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In Mindset Matters: An Agile Approach To Employee Development In A Hybrid Workplace, by RGP Chief People Officer Katy Conway and RGP Senior Director of Learning & Development Ellen Ourednik, learn how employers can capitalize on the various possibilities that a hybrid workplace offer in developing their employees.

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Employee Learning & Development Excellence (ISSN 2564-2014)

Careers, like people, are not made in exactly one way. We all know people who knew precisely what they wanted in their career right from the get-go, but they tend to be the exception to the rule.

In fact, studies show helping employees align purpose with work is essential

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to increase engagement and create a culture of learning at work.

Read The Case For Purpose In Career Development by Penn Foster/Carrus CEO Misty Frost to understand how companies can help employees find their next career path.

The eLearning Industry’s Network Founder Christopher Pappas, in his article, lists down the 7 Ways Instructor-Led Online Training Will Change In The Future.

Also, featured in this edition is the findings from ‘The State of Learner Engagement, Solutions and Platforms 2022’ research. Read it to understand the perceptions of the overall quality of employee L&D, key aspects of a learning culture, factors driving the increasing need for corporate L&D, and barriers and pain points to more effective training initiatives, among others.

That is not all! We bring you a handful of other insightful articles in this edition of Employee Learning & Development Excellence, and hope you find answers to your queries around employee learning and development that help you achieve excellence in our L&D initiatives.

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COVER ARTICLE

Mindset Matters: An Agile Approach To Employee Development In A Hybrid Workplace Inorder to capitalize on the possibilities of a hybrid workplace, organizations must rethink their approach to learning and development

By Katy Conway and Ellen Ourednik, RGP

T

he rise of the everywhere workplace and hybrid work arrangements offer unprecedented flexibility and work-life integration opportunities. A mix of on-premises and remote work gives us greater ability to shape when, where and how we contribute to our employers of choice. And in turn, employers have a real opportunity to reimagine how we support and connect with our employees.

One place we see this is in an evolved approach to employee learning and development – anchored in an increasingly agile, learning culture that intentionally mixes synchronous and asynchronous learning.

To capitalize on the possibilities of a hybrid workplace, organizations must rethink their approach to learning and development. Having the right mindset is everything.

Adopt a Learning Culture

Learning should not be viewed as a separate function but rather woven into any change initiative. Learning requires listening and a hybrid environment allows learning and development professionals to deepen their business partnerships, move beyond regular stakeholder conversations and participate in virtual meetings where the work is being done.

The hybrid workplace has made learning and development initiatives easier to deploy and removed barriers created by the narrower construct of traditional in-person learning. For example, some of the best-in-class onboarding programs are now virtual experiences that bring new joiners together nationally—or even globally—in ways that are more connected, consistent and scalable. Employees can access asynchronous self-study learnings anytime, anywhere, on a multitude of devices.

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Mindset Matters: An Agile Approach To Employee Development In A Hybrid Workplace

Shared learning experiences are opportunities to not only learn together, but also to learn about one another. In a learning culture, learning experiences intentionally incorporate time for meaningful connection through small group breakouts, reflection and discussion questions, and team-based activities.

By stating a collective “growth mindset,” organizations can reinforce learning as a cultural expectation and empower employees to value learning, upskilling and reskilling. This encourages employees to seek and share learnings with one another and to understand that valuable teaching can be gained via traditional learning, on-the-job practical applications, and the successes and failures that are inherent to running and transforming a business.

With a learning culture established, learning is valued and celebrated, which creates a pathway to foster community and connection among a hybrid workforce.

Cultivate a More Purposeful Learning Environment

As we develop the real estate model that supports the everywhere workplace, we will likely see companies prioritize learning spaces such as training rooms and learning labs. Dedicated learning spaces that foster collaboration subtly support focus and engagement. There is a growing demand for physical environments that balance individual and group work, such as small, drop-in conference rooms, open floor plans, and areas for social gatherings. These types of collaboration spaces reinforce the consistent seek and share mentality among employees. Off-site spaces that are not the “workplace” (i.e., not home, nor office) can also bolster engagement when holding specific learning forums in person.

When learning is delivered in a virtual or hybrid format, it is vital to have integrated connection points for all participants. This can be a mix of live polls and surveys, facilitated chat interaction, guided exercises and shared input.

Offer a Mix of In-person and Virtual Connections

flexible approach to learning and development.

Organizations that can meet people where they are to deliver learning opportunities have stronger adoption rates. This requires a mix of in-person and virtual offerings, a balance of synchronous learning together and asynchronous self-paced courses, compelling digital and interactive content and an overall agile approach to learning.

By leveraging a mix of synchronous and asynchronous learning, organizations can accelerate ramp time for new joiners or employees new to a role.

This enables a strong blend of necessary formalized training with important on-the-job experiential learning, and it allows leaders to spend time on the items that are most critical to an employee’s success.

When asynchronous learning is broken into small sessions of 30 minutes or less, it creates a microburst learning effect that is more consumable and fast tracks integration with work rather than being a distraction.

It is also important to take an empathetic and relatable approach to scheduling synchronous training. For example, rotating meeting times to accommodate a variety of time zones can create awareness and connection among participants.

Organizations may also consider offering the same live learning sessions two or three times to give employees choices, along with on-demand content.

Maintain an Agile Approach

It is important to go where the energy is to enable truly organic employee and peer-led interaction.

Rather than developing traditional and more static learning pathways, hybrid is best supported by an agile approach to content and delivery. Organizations should regularly solicit business leader sentiment and organizational key performance indicators to guide content. Utilization metrics derived from a learning management system and company performance metrics offer essential insights into learning effectiveness and engagement. These insights help organizations quickly develop compelling learning content that can be iterated and delivered in an agile way.

Hybrid environments demand a multi-faceted and

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Mindset Matters: An Agile Approach To Employee Development In A Hybrid Workplace

In a hybrid world where work and life are so thinly separated, an agile learning approach that supports the “whole person” can also be very meaningful for employees and their leaders. Curated, holistic content that spans professional development, personal wellness and leadership development gives employees a sense of balance while helping leaders navigate an ever-changing environment.

Hybrid work arrangements are here to stay and this can be great for an evolved approach to learning and professional development. One unchanging constant is that learning is only as effective as our ability to engage the learners. In today’s ever-changing hybrid landscape, it is imperative to have an agile learning practice that enables engagement across a variety of modalities, encourages vulnerable learnings and is informed by consistent feedback.

Ellen Ourednik is Senior Director of Learning & Development at RGP.

Katy Conway is Chief People Officer at RGP.

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• What employee engagement is and the importance • How to create and implement an employee engagement strategy • The main drivers of employee engagement

10 Strategies for Creating an Effective Employee Growth & Development Plan

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Building Gen Z Loyalty With Effective Career Mapping Providing opportunities for employees to train on the job and upskill

By Emily Zini, The Escape Game

F

or any organization, selecting, recruiting, training, and retaining high-quality team members is central to a cohesive strategy and supports strong growth.

However, today’s workforce is changing dramatically due to post-pandemic shifts, as well as Gen Z becoming a greater percentage of the workforce – an astounding 27% by 2025.

Organizations have to prioritize nurturing their teams as professional development and on-the-job learning are essential to retaining Gen Z for the long-term.

more than 40% of our guest feedback in online reviews specifically mentions our staff positively. One of the reasons for this consistency is our formal in-house leadership development program called ASCEND. We started this program in 2015 with a few leaders on a Google Meet video call and a copy of ‘Setting the Table’ by Danny Meyer. We read through a few chapters at a time and had an open discussion about what we were learning.

While it was not elaborate or structured, that single book helped shape so much of our

guest experience and training philosophy.

Later on, we wrote and developed our own materials and additional resources, such as homework and structured mentorship breakout groups. ASCEND became an opportunity to develop leaders and reinforce our training. Our ASCEND members meet once per month for an hour as a group to learn from our COO and co-founder, James Murrell. We believe having our COO lead this program signals to our team that their development is a top priority for us.

The goal for any organization should be to create homegrown leaders by investing in leadership development and providing opportunities for employees to train on the job and upskill.

Building a Professional Development Program At The Escape Game (TEG),

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Building Gen Z Loyalty With Effective Career Mapping

There are a number of free resources that can be used as a starting point for an organizational leadership development program. We initially focused on books and podcasts from hero companies like the Disney Institute and Union Square Hospitality Group, and great leaders like John Maxwell, Craig Groeschel, and Lee Cockerell, to name a few. These served as the foundation for us to create an astounding program where we build leaders.

Cultivating a Leadership Pipeline

At TEG, we have the benefit of offering a fulfilling and fun career to people who are hungry to grow but aren’t quite sure where to begin their career. We make it clear that those who align with our mission, vision, and values can grow here – regardless of their prior experience level. Often they just need someone to point out their potential and show them a path to growth.

Because we are constantly opening new retail locations, we have the opportunity to match people to their dream cities.

Being paid to move to Hawaii to launch a new location is a reality for employees at TEG. We’ve found that casting a compelling, yet realistic, vision for growth is key for developing our leadership pipeline with immensely talented employees.

We also created a “Manager in Training” program to constantly refill our leadership pipeline.

Those who are Managers in Training have expressed strong interest in growing into a leadership role, are open to moving for TEG, and are fully committed to our culture and values. This program allows them to have exposure to our management roles – shadowing and studying skills such as interviewing, coaching, tracking KPIs, etc. It also helps prepare them to seamlessly transition into assistant or general manager positions as they come available at our company. When they become general managers, they are already ambassadors of our culture and have the necessary baseline of skills and experience to succeed.

Prioritizing Upskilling Employees

We have found that upskilling team members is an investment that pays off not only in performance, but also retention.

This creates a win-win for TEG and the team member, in that when a team member’s career is enhanced, the company’s objectives are more likely to be accomplished.

All of the components of upskilling don’t necessarily have to cost much; we’ve created some initiatives that are a great value add and are especially effective.

As one might expect, we love games at TEG. As such, we’ve creatively “gamified” upskilling with badges and pins. Our team members receive custom TEG-designed pins each time they are signed off on a new position

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or skill. They proudly display pins such as “Hospitality Hero” or “Master Game Guide” on their nametag lanyard at the company.

We also try to use team-member downtime effectively for training and development time. This could be a manager just taking a few minutes to ask a team member about their dream TEG store to work in, or training on a new skill or position.

Upskilling, paired with leaders who actively build a culture with their employees, creates a very motivated and loyal team that is hungry for growth. Gen Z can rest assured that they will find organizations that easily align to their values and will give them the opportunity to thrive doing something they love to do.

Emily Zini is Senior Director of Operations at The Escape Game.

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TOP PICK

The Case For Purpose In Career Development For many people, finding their purpose or “why” leads them to their long-term career pathway

By Misty Frost, Penn Foster/Carrus

C

areers, like people, are not made in exactly one way. We all know people who knew precisely what they wanted in their career right from the get-go, but they tend to be the exception to the rule. In fact, studies show helping employees align purpose with work is essential to increase engagement and create a culture of learning at work.

For many people, finding their purpose or “why” leads them to their long-term career pathway.

Then, it is up to each individual to learn and up to engaging workplaces to offer training that promotes

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the continued acquisition of skills throughout each person’s career. The work takes time, but when it aligns with purpose, it becomes energizing instead of taxing.

This certainly resonates, and Simon Sinek’s best-selling book “Start With Why” certainly proves this point. But, figuring out a personal ‘why,’ let alone finding a company or industry whose purpose aligns well with that purpose, can seem daunting. There are a few questions to ask in order to identify a personal career purpose.

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The Case For Purpose In Career Development

are, it becomes easier to chart a career path and determine how training can get employees from being in a rut to being engaged.

For employers, it’s important to identify the skills needed to achieve business goals, and then invest in people to help build and strengthen those skills.

At the same time, since most jobs don’t happen in a vacuum, people, and therefore trust, play an important role in professional development.

There are common elements for a company that establishes trust from its leaders and throughout the organization: The team has fun, performs better, and brings forward some new approaches to solving problems for customers. Not everything works, but the initiatives that do work generate revenue and help organizations become wildly successful market leaders. ● What are your intrinsic strengths? ● What interests would you like to explore? ● What can you contribute to the world and how does this align with personal fulfillment?

Annual Gallup polls show that many people are not especially engaged in their work. In fact, the most recent statistic showed only 36% of employees are engaged at work. One reason for this could be that their purpose is unrelated to their current position—and it could even be something they never considered doing.

Understanding common career myths and taking an introspective look at career ruts can help employees identify purpose and then engage in training to build skills needed to get to the career they want. Some common myths about purpose include:

With the great resignation continuing, as people look for their next roles, or if they are in an interview setting, asking leaders how they build trust and invest in training can be very telling and help identify an engaging work environment. This information, combined with a clear understanding of personal purpose, can lead to a powerful career path that promotes continuous learning, skills development, and engagement for the long term.

Recommended Resources Gartner: Employees Seek Personal Value and Purpose at Work. Be Prepared to Deliver.; McKinsey: Help your employees find purpose--or watch them leave | McKinsey

Misty Frost is CEO of Penn Foster/ Carrus

● Purpose is unchanging ● Purpose must always be altruistic ● One’s career purpose is their identity

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These myths, and many others, can stump a person who is trying to figure out what skills to develop and how to develop their career. Throughout careers, the specifics of career purpose can change over time, while some key overall goals tend to remain steadfast. Once myths are recognized for what they

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Potential Over Credentials: A Call To Action For HR Departments Apprenticeship is the new pipeline

By Ximena Hartsock, BuildWithin

W

ith technology startups announcing layoffs and hiring freezes, now might seem like odd timing to discuss the shortage of digital talent. I beg

to differ. As HR professionals know, finding and retaining tech workers in the United States will be difficult whether we go into an economic contraction or not. The

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main pipelines for tech talent— universities, immigration, and to some extent, coding camps—do not even come close to meeting domestic demand.

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Potential Over Credentials: A Call To Action For HR Departments

Unless our country develops more pipelines for digital talent, there will be consequences. The organizational consulting firm Korn Ferry estimates that the global technology sector will suffer $449.7 billion in unrealized output by 2030 due to a shortage of 4.3 million workers. The U.S. alone will account for $162.2 billion—36% of that total—if business continues as usual.

An overhaul of our university system and immigration policies seems extremely unlikely. That is why I believe apprenticeship programs are coming to your HR department. The emerging roles and skills needed in this country, changing cultural attitudes towards college, and the scale of untapped potential make it almost inevitable. Employers are ready to put potential over credentials.

The Eight-year Window

Part of the problem for digital employers—and the solution—is that too many Americans are stuck in jobs without a future.

According to consulting firm McKinsey, which analyzed 800 professions in eight major economies, 1 in 10 Americans will need to change jobs by 2030 because their role will no longer exist. About half will need more advanced skills to make this transition.

The World Economic Forum (WEF) Future of Jobs 2020 report argues that the most in-demand emerging roles in America are digital. The WEF identified AI and

machine learning specialists, data analysts and scientists, and big data specialists as the three most in-demand jobs. Data entry clerks, accounting/booking/payroll clerks, and secretaries were seen as the most “redundant.”

The top three “emerging skills” are quite broad: analytical thinking and innovation, active learning and learning strategies, and complex problem-solving.

These strike me as skills that do not cater to university instruction.

Learning “innovation” in a classroom would be like reading a cookbook but never preparing any meals. To learn how to cook, you must cook. Likewise, to learn innovation, you must innovate something. The same applies to complex problem-solving.

Although college courses can contrive scenarios in which students innovate or solve complex problems, simulations will not compare favorably to the on-job experience. Plus, why pay a college $10,000 or more per year to practice something that employers would pay you to do?

Employers are beginning to ask that same question.

Discounting College

Whether university training is relevant to a job or not, most tech roles still require at least a bachelor’s degree. Perhaps not for long. Research from the nonprofit Burning Glass Institute suggests that employers require more credentials when they have leverage in the job market (e.g., just after the Great Recession)

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but drop requirements when they are short on talent.

For example, as talent demand intensified leading up to Covid-19, “skill-based hiring” gained momentum. According to Burning Glass, “Some 46% of middle-skill and 31% of high-skill occupations experienced material degree resets between 2017 and 2019.” The researchers call this a “structural reset,” meaning that it is likely permanent. Differently, they believe Covid-19 caused a “cyclical reset” that temporarily lowered requirements for certain roles (notably in healthcare).

The WEF Future of Jobs report is describing structural changes in employment from roles that require manual work and repetition to jobs that favor human guidance of automated systems. That change poses a long-term reset in requirements and at a scale perhaps not seen since the first Industrial Revolution.

Accenture and IBM seem to be ahead of the curve in recognizing this structural reset. According to Burning Glass’s analysis, Accenture requires a degree for only 26% of its quality assurance (QA) engineering roles, and IBM for just 29%. By comparison, 84% of QA roles at Google require a degree, as do 90% at Apple, 94% at Intel, and 100% at Oracle. Even Facebook, founded by a college dropout, demands a degree for most IT roles.

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Potential Over Credentials: A Call To Action For HR Departments

Degree requirements are supposed to select top candidates, but in practice, they exclude more than 81 million workers without bachelor’s degrees, or about 56% of the civilian workforce over the age of 25. Black, Hispanic, and Native American workers are overrepresented among non-degree holders, posing a diversity and inclusion issue on top of a limiting talent strategy.

Apprenticeships Are the New Pipeline

In my prior role as CEO and co-founder of Phone2Action (now Capitol Canary), a digital advocacy platform, I ran apprenticeship programs for over eight years and found them essential to our talent strategy. Rather than compete with Silicon Valley for the same degree holders, visa applicants, and coding camp graduates, we developed our own talent pool.

Well-known tech companies, including Google, Accenture, Pinterest, ServiceNow, and Uber have done the same with “registered” apprenticeships.

Different from an internship in which companies can do whatever they want, apprenticeships registered with the Department of Labor (DOL) have to meet standards for on-the-job training, classroom instruction, and wages. That way, after the apprenticeship period, the apprentice is equipped to work professionally in the field.

In 2020, there were over 275,000 apprentices in programs

registered with the DOL, but just 2,951 of them worked in “Information,” a broad category that includes information technology, media, and more.

Meanwhile, 188,452 apprenticed in skilled trades related to construction (good news for the housing shortage). The same characteristics that make a construction apprenticeship so effective—hands-on learning under the supervision of a professional—suit digital roles.

The barrier for tech companies, I believe, is designing and administering these apprenticeship programs.

Whereas the construction trades have always depended on apprenticeships, the tech industry does not have this tradition. The process of turning someone into a skilled digital worker is not well understood within corporations and is even less understood in higher education.

Thus, DOL-approved intermediaries are increasingly behind these tech apprenticeships, redesigning what preparation for a technology career looks like in this century.

The effort to develop a winning formula for tech apprenticeships is likely to have beneficial ripple effects. Perhaps it will lead to a healthier distinction between education and career preparation, which are too often conflated.

shortage in tech, the discounting of college, and the need for more talent pipelines, apprenticeship programs are probably coming to your HR department.

Soon enough, we will see HR departments hiring a Director of Apprenticeships. Competing on the open market for tech talent will be seen as inefficient.

Perhaps the tech companies that move early on apprenticeships will not become a Korn Ferry statistic about unrealized output.

Amidst economic uncertainty, apprenticeships tap a new talent pool that is eager to learn.

Whether an employer’s aim is to reduce recruiting costs, increase diversity and inclusion, or simply find the talent they need to exist, the outcome is that millions of Americans may have an opportunity to advance out of stagnant work and join the digital economy. This is the time to value potential over credentials.

Ximena Hartsock is Co-Founder of BuildWithin.

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Director of Apprenticeships

There is room for a massive expansion of technology apprenticeships. Given the talent

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7 Ways Instructor-Led Online Training Will Change In The Future ILT will see some drastic changes in years to come.

That is the nature of the L&D industry.

By Christopher Pappas, The eLearning Industry’s Network

The Evolution of ILT

Everything must evolve to survive. From wild beasts to training methodologies. But old is not synonymous with antiquated. There is still a case to be made for ILT, especially if you are willing to integrate learning technologies.

Employee Learning & Development Excellence presented by HR.com

JULY 2022

Tried and tested instructor-led training paired with an LMS can transform your L&D initiatives. But you must be ready and willing to adapt to modern employees’ needs and expectations to achieve the best outcome.

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7 Ways Instructor-Led Online Training Will Change In The Future

Below are 7 ways that instructor-led online training will change in years to come, and tips to keep up with tech tides.

1. Less Travel, More Live Events When your accounting department thinks of ILT, piles of money usually spring to mind. All those travel expenses, accommodations, site rental fees, and payroll hours. This is why the future of instructor-led online training involves much less travel and more live events. An LMS becomes their all-in-one collaboration platform. They are able to schedule webinars and one-on-one meetings, as well as record events and upload them to an online training library.

2. Instructors Utilize LMS Metrics to Diagnose Performance Pitfalls Another clue that LMS is not intended to replace instructors but make their lives easier is built-in reporting. Instructors can use LMS metrics to diagnose performance gaps before it is too late. This applies to on-the-job and ILT performance. Reports reveal personal sticking points that employees must address.

But they also help instructors zero in on aspects of their curriculum or strategy that need some work.

Maybe their sessions are too long or do not provide any real-world examples for employees to follow.

Employee Learning & Development Excellence presented by HR.com

JULY 2022

3. Follow-up Support Via an LMS Library Instructors already carry a lot of weight on their learned shoulders. They must prepare for each event, gather a list of recommended study materials, and gather feedback. In years to come, they wll use an LMS library to offer follow-up support remotely.

Employees can access the JIT repository when they have a question or need to refresh their memory.

They can always turn to an instructor for more complex issues.

However, an LMS library gives them greater autonomy so they can troubleshoot challenges on their own, at their own pace, and not have to worry about asking a manager or a co-worker (and losing face).

4. Smaller Groups (and Social Learning) to Provide Niche Knowledge The longer the attendance roll-call, the less time for each trainee. Many organizations take the mass training approach. They host one event every year and pack a room with every employee they can spare, putting a skeleton crew on the sales floor. In the future, ILT will involve smaller groups that provide niche knowledge and give instructors more time to mingle and work one-on-one with employees to broaden their skills.

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7 Ways Instructor-Led Online Training Will Change In The Future

There will also be more social learning thrown into the mix to facilitate collaboration and team building.

For example, group collaboration projects or online forums that foster a sense of training community.

5. Embedded Peer-based Support Support should not fall squarely on the shoulders of instructors and facilitators. Not when there is so much in-house knowledge to spread around. Instructor-led online training will incorporate peer coaching and mentoring to enrich experiences and reduce costs. Employees can start blogs or post questions on social media pages.

They can hold each other accountable and use live chat features to offer real-time advice. Instructors are still on-hand to provide guidance, but they also have more time to focus on other tasks, such as developing a new curriculum or evaluating LMS reports.

Who knows, they may even have a little room in their schedules for much-needed R&R.

It is not about whether an employee can pass a multiple-choice exam, but if they can use the compliance info to stay safe on the job. Instructors can use LMS data to identify areas for improvement, such as realworld performance results, or see how an employee reacts under pressure and if they are able to solve problems on the spot. Then, they can customize their ILT strategy based on common sticking points.

Conclusion ILT will see some drastic changes in years to come.

That is the nature of the L&D industry. We are always looking for new (and more cost-effective) ways to impart the essentials and fine-tune in-house talent.

Blending instructor-led training with an LMS gives you the opportunity to tap into big data, reduce ILT costs, and embed peer-based support. You can also focus more on real-world applications instead of relying solely on assessment scores to gauge proficiency.

This article first appeared here.

6. More Opportunities for Hands-on Experience Talking to employees and telling them what/what not to do is one thing. However, it will not help them apply what they have learned in the workplace. ILT and LMS facilitate real-world experience and application. Employees have the power to test out new skills and learn from mistakes, instead of making them on the job and losing valued customers or racking up compliance penalties.

Christopher Pappas is the Founder of The eLearning Industry’s Network.

Christopher, who holds an MBA, and an MEd (Learning Design) from BGSU, is an eLearning blogger, EduTechpreneur, eLearning analyst, speaker and social media addict.

The future of ILT holds simulations, scenarios, and serious games, which are all training tools that impart practical knowledge whilst reducing seat time.

You can also expect to see more virtual apprenticeships that cultivate experience for remote workers.

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7. Less Focus on Assessment Scores and Quantitative Know-how Assessment results used to be the only gauge of success. If a high percentage of employees passed the final exam, instructors did their part. In the nottoo-distant future, online ILT will involve more quantitative analysis. Assessment scores will still play a role in the overall evaluation. However, the quality, breadth, and applicability of knowledge will take center stage.

Employee Learning & Development Excellence presented by HR.com

JULY 2022

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Special Research Supplement July 2022

The State of Learner Engagement, Solutions and Platforms 2022

Drive business success via better L&D

INTERACTIVE

JULY 2022

Sponsored by:

INDEX RESEARCH REPORT SUMMARY 23

The State of Learner Engagement, Solutions and Platforms 2022 Drive business success via better L&D Survey conducted by:

Sponsored by:

ARTICLE

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Top 6 Employee Training Challenges And Solutions: Expert Outlook

37

By Andrea Turner, Senior Vice President

By Kristy McCann Flynn, CEO & Founder,

of Services, Infopro Learning

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The Age of Power Skills: How Experiential Learning Bridges the Skills Gap

Soft Skills: A Competitive Edge and an Employee Retention Imperative GoCoach.

42

Train More, Train Smart and Lose Less!

By Jigsaw

By Zach Gottlieb,

Senior Director, Sales, Mursion

The HR Research Institute, powered by HR.com, the world’s largest social network for Human Resources professionals, is a key part of our mandate to inform and educate today’s HR professionals. Over the past three years, the HR Research Institute has produced more than 85 exclusive primary research and state of the industry reports, along with corresponding infographics in many cases, based on the surveys of thousands of HR professionals. Each research report highlights current HR trends, benchmarks, and industry best practices. HR Research Institute Reports and Infographics are available online, and always free, at www.hr.com/ featuredresearch

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STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

The State of Learner Engagement, Solutions and Platforms 2022 Drive business success via better L&D Sponsored by:

Conducted by:

Exclusive HR.com Research

E

mployers are spending billions of dollars on corporate learning and development (L&D).

However, too often, they get little in return.

We believe that, collectively, L&D professionals can and should do better.

Globally, organizations spent over $332 billion on corporate learning and development in 2019, and they are projected to spend over $487 billion by 2030, a compound growth rate of 8%.

HR.com's HR Research Institute, in its latest research, ‘The State of Learning Engagement, Solutions and Platforms, 2022’, explores perceptions of the overall quality of employee L&D, key aspects of a learning culture, factors driving the increasing need for corporate L&D, and barriers and pain points to more effective training initiatives, among others.

Following are some major findings from the study:

Finding 1: New Skill Development and Career Development Are Top Drivers of L&D Today Forty nine percent of the respondents, when asked to identify three factors that are most important in driving learning in their organizations, chose ‘new skills development’.

This helps support the findings of various other studies. The World Economic Forum, for example, estimates that 50% of currently employed workers will need reskilling by 2025.

The second most widely cited driver is the related topic of career development, cited by 39%. A previous HR.com Research Institute Report showed that three-quarters of HR professionals agree that employees are looking for more career development opportunities. The bad news is that only a minority of organizations provide strategies and methods for helping employees reach career development goals, a significant disconnect.

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STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Survey Question: What three factors are most important in driving learning in your organization? (select up to three) New skills development

49%

Career development

39%

Employee retention and/or turnover

38%

Regulatory compliance

One-quarter consider changing business needs an L&D driver

36%

Staying competitive

25%

Changing business needs

25%

Skills maintenance

25%

Return on investment

15%

Ease of use

14%

Greater agility

7%

Mergers or acquisitions

3% 0

20

30

40

50

Finding 2: Fewer than a Third Say that the Overall Quality of Their Organization’s L&D Is Excellent

being perfect), only 29% percent of respondents

When asked to rate the current overall quality

The majority rated the quality mediocre at best,

of learning in their organization on a ten-point scale (a “1” being terrible/non-existent and a “10”

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10

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assigned it an 8, 9 or 10.

and almost a quarter of respondents rated the quality of L&D as poor (that is, a 1, 2, 3 or 4).

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Finding 3: Only a Quarter Feel Learners in Their Organizations Are Deeply Engaged with the Learning Content They Provide

How about experience? About a third (34%) say

About 42% of respondents said that their

that their employees have excellent learning

organizations have specific learning goals to a high or very high degree. They were least likely to say that learners in their organization are deeply

engaged with learning to a high or very high degree (just 25%).

experiences to a high or very high degree. Only a few more (36%) say that learners in their organization “learn successfully.”

Survey Question: To what degree are the following statements about learners in your organization true?

42%

They have specific learning goals (e.g., re-skilling)

Only 36% feel their employees learn successfully to a high or very high degree

30% 25% 36%

They learn successfully

45% 13% 34%

They have an excellent learner experience

39% 23% 30%

They have ways to measure their learning

24% 43% 28%

They have the means to train for the role/career that they want

40% 31% 25%

They are deeply engaged with learning

44% 28% 0

High or very high degree

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10

Moderate degree

20

30

40

50

Low or very low degree

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Finding 4: The Most Widely Cited Pain Point Is a Lack of Time to Attend Training

To learn more about The State of Learner Engagement, Solutions

Fifty-eight percent of respondents selected “no

and Platforms 2022 survey and to get

time to attend training,” as the top pain point to

strategic outcomes and 7 key takeaways from

learner effectiveness in their organizations.

this exclusive HR.com Research Institute

No doubt the pandemic coupled with acute job

research, please read the complete report

shortages have run up against the amount of time that an organization can devote to training. On the other hand, failing to find the time to train puts the organization at risk now and in the future.

here:

The State of Learner Engagement, Solutions and Platforms 2022

This research points to two other significant top pain points: a lack of a culture that supports learning (40%) and low learner motivation (38%).

Various HR Research Institute studies show that culture plays an enormous role in learning success. As for low learner motivation, we suspect that this is less due to intrinsic motivation and more due to other factors, such as poor learning

Read the Research Report

cultures and processes.

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STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Top 6 Employee Training Challenges And Solutions: Expert Outlook

By Andrea Turner, Infopro Learning

“Development is about transforming the lives of

include a time-strapped and sometimes scattered

people, not just transforming economies.”

workforce, cost-cutting while enhancing

- Joseph E. Stiglitz‑

engagement, and catering to various learning styles, to name a few.

Regardless of the type or size of your organization, supporting your staff with impeccable training

Let us highlight the most frequent training

opportunities is something you cannot afford to

challenges and strategies to improve your

overlook. Most companies prioritize increasing the

training’s effectiveness:

effectiveness of training programs when investing in training expenses. There is no one-size-fitsall employee training solution because each organization is different in approach, environment, and other factors.

When employees’ energy is drained due to their work life, household chores, and a slew of other commitments, there is a possibility that training

There is a need to build a comprehensive training and development program that appropriately handles the myriad employee training challenges that your company and its employees confront.

Many businesses discover that their training is inadequate (or partially effective) in meeting their objectives despite cautious resource allocation.

This is frequently due to a few common training and development concerns. These constraints

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#1. Chaotic Employee Schedule

ARTICLE

may only add to their stress. Worse, intruding on employees’ personal time with training sessions is a tried-and-true strategy for making them dread training.

Solution: ●● Consider implementing a microlearning strategy to give meaningful and relevant knowledge in small portions. Simple microlearning forms include short films, checklists, and infographics, making training more consumable.

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

●● According to LinkedIn 2020 Workplace Learning Report, 54% of employees would spend more time studying if given specific course recommendations to assist them in achieving their professional objectives. Since employees have a hectic schedule, please support them with course recommendations that are appropriate for them. ●● Use innovative images to communicate multiple topics at once. Learners can save time and take a break from reading text. ●● Wherever possible, make brief, uncomplicated assessments a priority. ●● Make your training more mobile-friendly.

Learners should be able to access the learning management system (LMS) and training materials from any location.

distributed workforce can be tricky: uncertainties are frequent, and cultural differences can lead to irregularities in training.

Solution: ●● Consider your target learning audience and create materials that are not only bilingual but also multicultural. ●● Use simple and effective platforms like video conferences, webinars, and online forums to unite your dispersed employees.

#3 Different Generations in the Same Workplace It is unavoidable that you will have workers from diverse generations in your organization.

Unsurprisingly, the millennial generation is

#2. Scattered Workforce The emergence of remote work and a dispersed workforce has posed new training and

comfortable with online learning and development.

Different generations might have distinct learning styles.

development challenges. Training a geographically

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STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Solution: ●● You can build multiple delivery methods for your curriculum, considering the convenience of older employees. ●● Millennials are excellent advocates who can effectively communicate what they’ve learned to their colleagues. ●● Make it simple for all learners to ask questions and receive material and technical advice using resources like discussion forums.

#4 Keep Learners Engaged Simply talking to learners for hours does not serve the purpose. Passive learning can make the learner bored and distracted during the training process – and it is also inadequate for retaining information once the course is over. Furthermore, not having hands-on practice and lack of interactivity impact knowledge retention and engagement.

Solution: ●● Include practical learning activities in your training.

●● Include post-session digital assets that they can refer to.

#5 Budget Training is expensive due to facilitation, equipment, venue rental, and the cost of employees’ time. Training budgets are typically limited, even though training demands are constantly high. According to a report by People Matters, learning & development (L&D) budgets have increased since the pandemic outbreak for 57% of organizations, and 15% of companies are spending over $5k on training and development for each employee.

Solution: ●● Switch to an online platform for your training – it is frequently less expensive to plan because it does not require booking a place, meals, or transportation. ●● Use a low-cost, high-performance LMS. When you are educating many employees, it will make a significant difference.

●● Keep modules brief and to the point. ●● Provide discussion forums for learners to engage emotionally with other learners informally.

A People Matters report states that 32% of employees believe updating training content more

●● Create breakout sessions for interactivity – create polls, and conduct quizzes and exercises.

frequently is essential. It is critical to receive such

●● Involve a session moderator who can effectively manage the environment and troubleshoot issues.

have a better chance of keeping trainees engaged

●● Add a short video to the learning module to generate excitement among learners.

insight into what went well and what did not in

●● Engage in pre-work through digital learning to prepare participants for the training session.

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#6 Gathering Feedback

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course feedback and, more importantly, to be seen acting on what you have been informed. You will if you do it this way. As a result, they will feel more invested in their personal growth, and you will gain your eLearning program. You may then incorporate this information into your course creation cycle, ensuring that your content is always current and relevant.

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Solution:

These figures demonstrate the necessity of

●● Incorporate the feedback/response towards the end of the course. The training will be marked complete only when the employee has participated in the response.

a comprehensive training and development program. We have highlighted the most common organizational training difficulties, but as you can see, they are all solvable. Consistency, logic, and flexibility are essential, as is the capacity to view

Wrapping Up with Some Astounding Statistics: ●● A recent survey from Better Buys found that employees who get professional development opportunities are 15% more engaged and have 34% higher retention than those who do not. ●● A report from Deloitte states organizations with a strong learning culture are 92% more likely to develop novel products and processes, 52% more productive, 56% more likely to be the first to market with their products and services, and 17% more profitable than their peers. Their engagement and retention rates are also 30–50% higher. ●● According to a report published in PR Newswire the ExecuSearch Group revealed that 86% of professionals said they would change jobs if a new company offered them more opportunities for professional development.

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the Learning and Development process as a whole and incorporate your employees in the process.

Leverage an LMS that is simple to use has all the functionalities you require and has a helpful support team to provide an exceptional learning experience for your learners. Following these steps can significantly increase the effectiveness of your training in no time!

Andrea Turner is Senior Vice President of Services with Infopro Learning Known as “Chief Problem-Solver” with a passion for excellence, Andrea comes with 20 years of experience in positions of leadership and progressive growth and is always focused on finding innovative solutions.

Would you like to comment?

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

The Age of Power Skills: How Experiential Learning Bridges the Skills Gap

The Great Attrition is Real

The cost of losing an employee is significant –

Over the past year and a half, employers have

Gallup Workplace estimates it at one-half to

experienced a growing trend of employees seeking outside roles, with 40% of them at least somewhat likely to leave in the next 3-6 months (McKinsey, “Great Attrition or Great Attraction”). Interestingly, among the employees in McKinsey’s survey, 36% who had quit in the past six months did so without having a new job in hand.

two times the employee’s annual salary, which doesn’t necessarily include the negative impact departures have on remaining employees’ morale and productivity.

According to McKinsey, the cause is a gap between employers’ and employees’ perception of what matters for retention. In its work, McKinsey identified that employees assigned more comparative value to “relational elements” – like feeling valued by their manager, a sense of belonging at work, and having caring and trusting teammates – than employers, who believe they place more importance on pay or work-life balance.

From Attrition to Attraction Human capital thought leaders like Josh Bersin have worked to compile the elements of firms that retain employees with human-centered practices, or what he calls the “Irresistible Organization.” Many of the underlying principles of these Irresistible orgs. directly focus on the same relational aspects of work,

like appreciation, psychological safety, inclusivity, and supportive coworkers.

In order to establish these higherlevel principles, adults working in large organizations need relational aptitude – comprising behaviors which Bersin has identified collectively as “Power Skills” (vs. the more traditional and potentially devaluing label, “Soft Skills”).

73

%

of respondents in a study conducted by Future Workplace and Mursion estimated that it takes years of real-life experiences to develop power skills.

Building an Ideal Environment for Power Skill Learning But how can adults acquire and sustain new behavioral skills? A growing body of neuroscientific research – along with decades of study around how adults learn – supports the idea that experiential learning, in which learners play an active role by practicing over time, leads to sustainable skill development.

Due to the sensitive nature of relational skill development – which requires the practice (and frequent failure to succeed) of sensitive conversations – an effective practice environment should be designed with the following principles in mind: Safe & anonymized: “It’s OK if I make a mistake; my coworkers are not the ones observing my behavioral practice experience” Improvisational: “My conversation changes based on emergent information and context”

In IBM surveys of executives as early as 2016, researchers like Bersin noted

Immersive: “I am actively participating

executives’ growing consensus that

in a live conversation; my counterpart can

“behavioral skills” are actually the most

communicate responsively to my actions”

critical for workers today, vs. more technical skill sets.

Stressful (constructively): “The perceived stakes are high; I feel the same stress response

Mursion’s own work with large-scale

of a difficult conversation and my behaviors are

organizational clients reveals a similar

being evaluated by a live counterpart in real-time”

demand for skills training in these same Power Skills, with “Empathy,” “Humility,”

In seeking to build its own ideal environment for

“Cultural Intelligence,” and “Conflict

Power Skill development, Mursion looked to visionary

Management” as some of the most

researchers in the VR space like Stanford’s Jeremy

frequently requested by Learning &

Bailenson, who found that individuals communicate

Development and Talent Management

more when engaging with virtual avatars that are

leader clients.

controlled in real-time by a human actor.

Mursion’s Approach to Impactful Learning Mursion’s model takes these principles, above, and scaffolds them on the

• A “Host Avatar” appears to help learners become accustomed to speaking with a human-in-the-loop avatar • The Host Avatar introduces the scenario

technological platform of a “human-in-the-

and helps the learner understand their

loop” simulation, in which a live “Simulation

role and strategies to deploy during the

Specialist” controls one or more avatars in

interaction

real-time in a video conference with client learners.

• Learners then enter the “Simulation” portion of the experience, where they will

Controlled studies and research over tens of thousands of Mursion sessions delivered a shows that skills like “Active Listening”

interact with one or more avatars as outlined in the scenario structure • The Host Avatar returns to conduct a

could be sustainably increased after multiple

feedback discussion with the learner to help

simulated conversations and generate

them reflect on specific prompts related to

the same stress response as live role-play

the scenario

scenarios (i.e. Standardized Medical Patient Mursion has incorporated the most in-

training).

demand Skills and Strategies to design a set of To ensure an impactful learning experience,

Simulation scenarios that apply to Leadership,

Mursion structures each 30-minute session as

Inclusive Leadership (DEI&B), Sales and

follows:

Customer Service contexts.

• Learner signs into browser-based video conference at a pre scheduled time

Visit Mursion.com for more information and to schedule a demo

About the Author: Zach Gottlieb Zach has spent the past 11 years helping adult learners adopt new behaviors and acquire new skills as employees in F1000 organizations. He has helped develop Custom Executive Education programs, led consultative sales of digital skill-building programs, and addressed workplace burnout with digital tools and live instructional experiences.

He now leads a team at Mursion, bringing a unique blend of humans, AI and VR to increase emotional intelligence for learners.

Would you like to comment?

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Soft Skills: A Competitive Edge and an Employee Retention Imperative L&D today needs to drive the development of 13 soft skills

By Kristy McCann Flynn, GoCoach

P

eople are still quitting their jobs in record

data programming, budgets, or software skills.

numbers, and it is obviously draining

While hard skills like these are important, soft

organizations of critical skills. Not only

skills are equally important for any employee’s

traditional hard skills — the job-specific abilities

growth, for a better employee experience, and for

and knowledge needed to get work done — but

improving your organization’s culture. Soft skills

also soft skills.

can absolutely give any organization a competitive edge.

It is a talent drain that is hamstringing company performance and disrupting company culture.

Stanford Research Center, Harvard University, and

How do you address all of this? Learning and

the Carnegie Foundation found that 85% of job

development, of course.

success comes from excellent soft skills. Before you can add soft skills to your L&D plan, however, it

●● The 2022 LinkedIn Global Talent Trends Report says professional development is thought to be the number one way to improve company culture.

is important to identify exactly what we are talking

●● A report by The Execu|Search Group found that 86% of professionals would change jobs if a new company offered them more opportunities for professional development.

employee success.

The problem is, too many L&D leaders are wearing blinders — and old blinders at that. They are still concentrating on developing hard skills like

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about.

We believe 13 necessary soft skills are critical to

13 Must-have Soft Skills Soft skills can be taught and improved with practice and awareness. These 13 soft skills added to your L&D program will help you keep your competitive edge and drive employee retention.

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

1. Problem-solving

4. Empathy

Without clear, practical problem-solving skills,

Empathy is non-judgmentally imagining the world

obstacles become blockers and prevent people,

from someone else’s point of view. It allows you

teams, and entire organizations from reaching

to understand how your actions and decisions

goals and desired outcomes. As a skill, problem-

will affect others, and it helps build teams of

solving drives innovation and growth for the

people who are more likely to work well together.

individual and the organization.

Empathy can be developed and practiced through coursework and active listening techniques.

Problem-solving can be developed by modeling best practices and facilitating creative efforts.

5. Collaboration Collaboration allows for multiple points of view

2. Agility

and new ways of problem-solving. Knowing

Agility is the ability to learn and pivot when

the keys to collaboration is crucial for forging

necessary and not become complacent. And

cooperation, being flexible to take leadership (or to

agility — especially learning agility — is completely

step aside for someone else to lead), and building

teachable. You can create a workplace ecosystem

the entire organization up.

that relies on innovation and flexibility by giving employees tools, such as accessible materials,

Collaboration can be modeled, taught, and

chances to collaborate with coworkers, and the

practiced through leadership and team-building

space to have their ideas heard. This way, they can

exercises.

learn quickly and adapt to new ideas with ease.

6. Change management 3. Attentive listening

Leaders and managers need change

Focusing on what others are saying and being

management skills to keep teams on board even

able to repeat back to them not only what they

when employees feel overwhelmed. Change

said, but also what they meant is a hallmark of

management is the ability to authentically and

attentive listening. Why is this important? It is

clearly communicate change to team members

important because collaboration and workplace

so they welcome initiatives. Change management

harmony depend extensively on the ability of

skills also foster collaboration across

employees to not only understand what they are

organizational boundaries. Change management

being asked to do or respond to, but also to be able

courses and group exercises — such as crossing

to comprehend the underlying thought behind the

your arms the other way and changing chairs to

request, complaint, or problem.

change perspective — help develop this necessary skill.

Attentive listening can be developed through training and modeling from the top down.

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STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

7. Curiosity

on awareness and strong communication. Team

Curious employees better understand the

members also need to be sufficiently aware to

workplace environment (and will also lean more easily into collaboration and change management). Curiosity drives people to want to learn more and apply their learning to problem-

see opportunities for change. While some people are naturally aware, awareness can be taught and practiced until it is finely honed.

solving. You can help your employees develop

9. Vulnerability

curiosity by creating an environment that

Being vulnerable creates a space to let others into

encourages questions and problem-solving.

your head, and for you to see yourself as others do. It also offers opportunities for problem-solving

8. Awareness

and makes employees more likely to be creative,

A combination of perception, alertness,

take risks, and be more open to making mistakes.

and appreciation of those around us, of the organization, and of society as a whole is what defines awareness. Good leadership depends

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Vulnerability can be facilitated by example. It offers team members insights into why things are happening a certain way and why change happens.

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

10. Authenticity

13. Resilience

When the actions of a person or organization

During times of adversity, rapid change, and

reflect their core values, and when those core

ambiguity, resilience helps employees bounce

values align with their greater purpose, they are

back and respond to challenges and problems

acting with authenticity. Authentic leadership

in healthy, supportive ways. It is more about the

cultivates a leader’s unique life story and

ability to adapt and be agile than the ability to

personality to serve multiple stakeholders —

toughen up and “just do it.” An organization made

customers, employees, investors, and society in

up of resilient team members is better prepared for

general. Authenticity in team members leads to

the ever-changing work world. Resilience can be

organization-wide values in action, driving purpose

coached and strengthened to help organizations

and meaning. Authenticity can be developed,

deal with uncertain times.

practiced, and modeled through learning and development courses.

In a world where workers are willing and able to go where they feel they can learn more, it’s important

11. Integrity

to focus on learning and development. Soft skills

Integrity is core to dependability. It catalyzes team members to exemplify independence, pride in their work, approachability, and honesty.

Integrity is the basis for teamwork, problem-

should be an important part of any L&D plan. Once you know the 13 most important soft skills, you can build a more rounded development plan and not only retain employees, but attract them as well.

solving, and collaboration — all of which in turn drive productivity and innovation. Integrity should be discussed openly, modeled by leaders, and encouraged in team members.

12. Communication Good communication enables others to understand the information we are offering more quickly and accurately with less frequent misunderstandings and fewer frustrations. Good communication at the organizational level leads to better strategic understanding. At the leadership level, it leads to greater cooperation. Among team

Kristy McCann Flynn has 15 years of experience as a Strategic Human Resource Leader, Change Manager and Organizational Development Expert. She has served in senior leadership positions throughout her career – most notably with Pearson Education and Constant Contact.

Kristy brings a big picture perspective and a hands-on, tactical approach to her leadership that she is now bringing to life with GoCoach (where she is the CEO & Founder). Kristy’s goal is to help and educate companies to meet their ultimate goals by empowering their employees to take ownership of their career.

members, good communication leads to clearer reasoning and collaboration. Communication skills can be enhanced through training, practice, and

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open conversations.

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STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Soft Skills Offer a Competitive Edge. Are Your Organization’s Soft Skills Being Drained or Developed?

The Great Resignation isn’t slowing down any time soon, draining organizations of soft skills.

86% of professionals would change jobs for better development opportunities.

Stanford Research Center, Harvard University, and the Carnegie Foundation found that 85% of job success comes from excellent soft skills.

Learning and development has become one of the most important ways to drive retention and culture. And soft skills are more important than ever to add to your plan.

Knowing the 13 most important soft skills and incorporating them into your L&D plan will help you retain, hire, and grow top talent.

Contact GoCoach to learn more.

Train More, Train Smart and Lose Less!

The cost of training vs. the cost of staff turnover Jigsaw

T

here have been significant and accelerated

the current labor market, with 48% saying that

overhauls of what we have considered

candidates lack the skills needed to fill open jobs.”

the norm in business, many of which were

prompted because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Regardless of virtual or in-office employees,

We have seen the change from mostly in-person

training is an investment in the individuals on

work to most of our employees working remotely.

your team. Training is the most valuable thing to

We are seeing a record number of Americans

an employee even more valuable than a pay raise.

quitting their jobs for new opportunities. Some

According to LinkedIn’s 2019 Workforce Learning

of this comes from a lack of training and growth

Report, the percentage of employees that say

opportunities, the employer wanting them back in

they would stay with a company if they invested

the office and the lack of a flexible work schedule.

in their employees’ learning was 94 percent, with

Training is incredibly important for the company

younger employees expressing the most interest.

and the employee. Employees want the

This trend has been consistent in the American

opportunity to advance and grow. To grow with

workforce for several years.

their current company means they need to be involved in professional development programs designed around promotion opportunities.

Unfortunately, many employees must seek this growth outside of their current company. At a time when there is a severe skills gap for American workers, employee retention is critical. According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, CEO and President, Suzanne Clark, “The demand for skilled workers is greater than ever, but availability is in short supply. Our study finds that 74% of hiring managers agree that there is a skills gap in

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STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

The pandemic has led many workers to reevaluate

One of the most cited reasons is a lack of growth

the work they are doing and consider other

opportunities from a career and professional

employment opportunities. Some of the main

development standpoint. NerdWallet states, “If an

reasons are the ability to work virtually, the

employee has been doing the same job for years

opportunity for growth, a more flexible work

without any opportunity for growth and change,

environment and professional development/

they’re going to seek that growth and change at

training.

another organization.”

It’s being classified as the Great Resignation,

Investing in employee training and professional

with over 4 million people leaving their jobs in

development is vital to retaining valuable

January of 2022, a staggering 44% of employees

employees. It is far more cost-effective to cultivate

are “job seekers”, the majority in search of better

your current employee base, and strengthen

pay or better working conditions. According to

their knowledge and commitment through new

ShifteLearning “70% of employees report that they

opportunities within the company than it is to

don’t have mastery of the skills needed to do their

lose them and face hiring someone who does not

jobs.” This trend is supported by a 2018 Gartner

have the same level of knowledge, experience and

report, which identifies that 40% of departing

loyalty.

employees cite a lack of future development as a factor in their decision.

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STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Companies who choose to not invest in training

fact that these programs rarely meet their goals

and professional development will lose the

because there was no way to measure outcomes,

opportunity to develop some great employees,

the switch to virtual training makes sense for most

who have a solid history with the company,

companies.

experience in their position, and who have an immense amount of knowledge. By losing this

The Cost of Staff Turnover

critical workforce, they will face replacing them

There are numerous costs to consider when

with someone who will need even more training, will not have the same corporate commitment and may even leave within a few weeks of joining the company.

replacing a team member. These costs include recruiting fees, advertising, interviewing, screening, and onboarding. Then add the soft costs of the

As reported by CNBC, “…according to LinkedIn’s 2019 Workforce Learning Report, 94 percent of employees say that they would stay at a company longer if it simply invested in helping them learn.”

Meanwhile, employers have been complaining about a skill gap in the workforce. In 2016, according to Adecco, 44% of 500 United States senior executives said that the American workforce lacks soft skills, such as communication, creativity, critical thinking, and collaboration. Another key takeaway from this survey is that: “89% of respondents think that corporate apprenticeship or training programs could help alleviate the skills gap.”

Among some of the things the pandemic has done is the solidification that companies need to look at virtual training to become the norm.

Between the high costs of bringing everyone together, the difficulty of scheduling, downtime for the participants as they travel to training, and the

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looking at staff turnover. First is the cost of

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hiring team’s time, reference checking plus the company resources’ time to onboard.

Onboarding means new employee training, time spent with the management team and other employees to learn about the company, policies, and procedures plus the skills training for the position itself.

It takes time for an employee to get up to speed and become proficient enough to replace a previous employee. This task is especially challenging when you lose an employee, who has been a strong team member. According to the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), “the average replacement cost of a salaried employee is six to nine months’ salary. For an employee earning $60,000 per year, that totals approximately $30,000 to $45,000.”

That cost is in addition to the new employee’s compensation package, the cost of recruiting and the cost of training.

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Hiring a new employee does not come without

When evaluating the cost of training, adding

risks. How long will they stay, how productive and

things like the cost of the human resources (HR)

engaged will they be, how quickly can they get up

or learning and development (L&D) teams as

to speed and what level of company loyalty will

they plan the training programs along the time

they have?

needed from others to assist in training. So, time is another cost to consider, plus the loss of

BambooHR reported that, according to over 1,000

productivity by those who are assisting. This cost

employees surveyed, “31% of people left a job

is defined by the decrease in revenue.

within the first six months, with 68% of those departing within the first three months. For many

According to the 2021 Workplace Learning Trends

new employees, it seems the first three months at

Report from Udemy, the main obstacle cited by

an organization are the most precarious.” The first

respondents was a lack of time (61%).

three months are where employees learn what it is like to work for the company. They experience the

The trend in the corporate training world is that

culture and see the efforts spent on training and

the majority, if not all, training will be virtual for

customer care. For companies that do not have

the foreseeable future. It makes more sense from

good onboarding and ongoing training programs,

a timing and cost perspective. Virtual training,

these new hires will most likely leave quickly. Then

if using the right virtual training technology,

the process and costs start again.

increases participation, offers small group project activities, offers in-class assessments

Another cost of staff turnover is the loss of

for evaluating learning real-time, and provides

knowledge, productivity, and engagement.

measurable outcomes. The cost of the technology

Along with these additional costs is the loss of

is a fraction of the cost of bringing the team

relationships between the departing employee and

together in a live environment.

customers. Building client relationships takes time and losing a critical employee can result in losing

With virtual corporate training, there is an

customers.

opportunity for companies to increase and improve

The Cost of Training In 2018, across all industries, organizations with 100-999 employees spent about $1,096 per employee, organizations with 1,000-9,999 employees spent about $941 per employee, and companies with 10,000 employees or more spent

their training programs by offering more frequent training opportunities to their employees. Looking at the cost of $45,000+ to replace an employee and the “average cost to train - $1,046, there’s no question that increasing your investment in professional development and training programs would have exponential value to the company.

$1,046 per employee on training.

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ARTICLE

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Even if you increased your training cost to $5,000

Using the right technology is critical. Web

per employee, based on the cost of losing that

conferencing systems are not built for training and

employee, it is significantly less than losing

learning. Using a virtual solution that’s designed

valuable team members.

specifically for learning makes a difference in the level of engagement and outcomes of training.

Using a virtual training solution, you can train more in a very cost-effective manner so while training

Train more, train smart and lose less!

budgets need to be increased, you eliminate the travel and out-of-office expenses. The cost of virtual is significantly less, so your training budget can be used for training, not travel.

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For more information: 1.877.472.6648 sales@hr.com www.HR.com/epubs

The HR Research Institute tracks human resources trends and best practices.

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Retain Your Employees

By Giving Them Wings How can companies turn problems into opportunities

By David Novak, David Novak Leadership, and Jason Goldsmith, Mustard

C

ompanies keep hearing from employees wanting more career opportunities, more direction, more engagement in the big picture and purpose. Those calls have only increased with the isolation of the pandemic. Working remotely may have lots of advantages, but it has made people feel all the more cut off.

The obvious solution is to encourage managers to step up their guidance of employees, but it can prove to be difficult. Whether for lack of will, ability, or time, managers aren’t working with their team members as much as the situation requires.

What’s needed is greater coaching. Many companies offer leadership development programs, but usually reserve them for a few “high-potentials” –which leaves the rest of the employees out. Yet it’s financially impractical for most companies or employees to contract with outside coaches.

That leaves most people adrift. No wonder with the pandemic fading, we’re seeing the Great Resignation.

People don’t see the opportunity to make a difference in their organization, so they’re trying somewhere else. But companies can turn this problem into an opportunity, by promoting self-coaching.

Self-Coaching from HR

Rather than address the problem directly, companies can get unstuck by shifting it back to employees. The best path forward is for people to take ownership and accountability for their own development.

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That’s a scary thought for many HR departments.

Aren’t you basically telling people they’re on their own? Won’t that make them even more likely to leave, at a time when we need all the talent we can get? Why would we do that?

You do that because most of these employees will actually become more engaged with the organization, not less. And the status quo – essentially doing nothing -- is worse. It’s just too easy now for talented people to find positions elsewhere. Barriers to moving have fallen steadily over the decades, and with remote work, the options are even greater. People already think they’re pretty much on their own. If you guide them in self-coaching, you’re at least showing them that you care.

After all, companies gave up on lifetime employment a while ago. With downsizing or even rightsizing, they sent a message to people not to rely on the organization forever. Most young people have no expectation of staying more than several years anyway. The spell of the “organization man” broke in the 1990s.

But people still care about corporate life. All the New Economy talk about “the brand called you” never gained traction. Most employees are willing to work hard for a company, as long as it builds their capabilities for success, or the next job.

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Retain Your Employees By Giving Them Wings

True, people may see a self-coaching program as just another HR-required series of trainings or workshops.

So companies need to frame it differently. Start by connecting to employees’ latent unease about corporate life, and cast the program as an opportunity to explore possibilities—all possibilities.

That means giving people an alternative to looking elsewhere, if they choose

themselves. They’re secure enough in what they offer to encourage employees to seek what will most satisfy them. They believe their company can deliver those opportunities, so they work on making people aware of the possibilities. Deep down, they actually want what’s best for employees even if it takes them elsewhere. They’d rather have employees fulfilled than frustrated.

Just make sure the program has structure – don’t just give employees a running-and-development budget for outside resources they have to select.

Even recommended software apps need some kind of monitoring, to see if people are really following through.

Personal Highlight Reel

Self-coaching is therefore no radical break for HR. It merely recognizes the reality of corporate life, and gives employees one more capability for career success.

Too many people live a constant battle between what they hear from the outside world and their own diminishing self-confidence. After all, our brains recall each negative thought three times more than a positive one, so it’s easy for the negative thoughts to compound.

From our perspective, enlightened HR functions and CEOs will want their people to take charge of

Employee Learning & Development Excellence presented by HR.com

Companies can draw on plenty of self-coaching guides and frameworks, including this valuable recent HBR article. The program’s content matters less than the overall message: employees need to take charge of their own careers. Doing so often requires an extra dose of encouragement.

JULY 2022

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Retain Your Employees By Giving Them Wings

Even companies that make an effort to balance criticism with praise may find themselves with timid or even demoralized, yet still talented, employees.

One of the best ways we’ve found to inspire self-coaching action is with a “personal highlight reel.” We tell people to visualize the marks of success they’ve already achieved: not just corporate, but in building their family and other relationships, any sports trophies, and even simple milestones such as a birthday party in good health.

To reinforce their confidence, they might surround themselves with pictures and mementos from those achievements. They’ve overcome challenges in the past, and they can do so again.

Go Gradually

If HR is worried about hurting retention, it doesn’t need to embrace full self-coaching at once.

Companies can start by simply broadening employees’ imagination about career paths within the organization. HubSpot, a Boston-based software company, encourages employees to tap into their innermost desires and move around — not just up — the chain of command. Katie Burke, HubSpot’s chief people officer, adds, “If you’re trying to think about how to prevent people from finding their passion, you’re fundamentally doing it the wrong way.”

to volunteer for new initiatives, and to pay more attention to company news.

Even what might seem a major drawback to self-coaching programs, looking for opportunities outside the organization, can actually become an asset. Corporate boundaries are more fluid than ever as companies rely more on ecosystems of suppliers and distributors. Effective leaders benefit from a broad perspective and network. And those employees who do leave will likely still feel connected to your organization, a tie that will pay off in future collaboration.

Yes, the best self-coaching guidance won’t keep everyone. You’ll still lose some talented people, and you’ll wonder if you somehow abetted their flight. But meanwhile, you’ll keep far more people engaged and open to leadership. You’ll give them valuable skills that keep them staying for more. And maybe you’ll attract some new people too.

This new outlook looks to become the next round of corporate culture, centered on empowering people to lead – in whatever arena suits them best. Engaged employees will always pay off in the long run, no matter where they end up.

The move to self-coaching doesn’t have to be a dramatic shift. Since most employees are getting little coaching now, anyway, adding some talks or digital modules can only be a net positive. Just make sure the materials focus on personal growth and professional development.

David Novak runs David Novak Leadership, a digital leadership development platform, and is the former Chairman and CEO of Yum! Brands.

Jason Goldsmith is a performance coach for athletes and is the President and Co-Founder of Mustard, a computer vision enabled social platform that is revolutionizing performance coaching by creating proprietary CV/AI technology.

The Next Round of Culture

Companies are always talking about their need for more leaders. They want more people to see the big picture, take responsibility and act confidently. But those traits don’t appear naturally in most people, especially not in large organizations that pressure people to only stay in their own lane.

They are co-authors of Take Charge of You: How Self-Coaching Can Transform Your Life and Your Career (Ideapress, March 2022).

Self-coaching is an ideal source for future leaders.

It raises employees’ perspectives beyond their tasks and gets them working on larger issues. It prompts them to network beyond their immediate group,

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Top Pick

The Coaching Insights You Didn't Know You Needed How to optimize your coaching investment?

By Jonathan Passmore, CoachHub

D

o you know your workforce?

Like, really know how your employees perceive their strengths and weaknesses?

These insights form the backbone of an effective talent management strategy, but they can be hard to garner.

While many in the learning and development field know the transformational results of digital coaching — things like deeper employee engagement, improved interpersonal skills and increased productivity — few know about its potential to deliver data-driven insights on your workforce’s strengths, weaknesses and development opportunities.

Here’s how it typically works: Before matching coachees with their ideal coaches, digital coaching solutions provide a selfassessment that helps learners identify their strengths, areas for development and, ultimately, coaching goals. The platform aggregates this data, populating

HR dashboards with completely confidential but highly insightful information on your workforce.

Of course, not all digital coaching solutions provide these data-driven insights or, even more critically, handle personal information with the privacy it deserves. In fact, many platforms do not even meet EU standards on General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), let alone System and Organization Controls (SOC2). Some digital providers even secretly record calls.

And this discrepancy in data usage and privacy will likely increase as the digital coaching industry continues to expand and new, potentially less trustworthy, coaching vendors enter the market.

To find a vendor that can optimize your coaching investment, examine these variables:

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1. Data-driven HR dashboards Quality digital coaching solutions tailor their programs to meet each learner and organization’s unique needs. And the key to personalizing learning journeys at scale is data. Responses to comprehensive self-assessment questions help coaching solutions identify ideal matches between coaches and coachees.

This data serves another purpose for the best coaching solutions on the market — it provides high-level workforce insights.

Tech-forward coaching solutions aggregate and anonymize data to help HR teams see the overall workforce’s strengths, weaknesses and goals.

Through the dashboard you can learn things like, have you established a caring culture where wellbeing is at the forefront? Do your employees need leadership development? Do you need to build organizational resilience?

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The Coaching Insights You Didn't Know You Needed

Some analytics dashboards also measure how coaches are working on these focus areas and progressing toward their established goals. In other words, graphics show how coaching programs are impacting the organization as a whole. And they measure the employee experience, continuously updating metrics on user feedback and platform usage.

By checking the dashboard, you know if your employees are changing perspectives, activating existing strengths and finding new, productive solutions. And you understand how satisfied they are with their coaches and their own personal and professional development.

Again, not all coaching platforms provide such robust HR dashboards. To figure out how (or if) coaching solutions use workforce data, you can ask these five questions: 1. Does your coaching solution provide a dashboard purpose-built for HR teams?

2. What kind of insights can data uncover about my workforce?

3. Do your metrics include employee satisfaction data?

4. Do your metrics include usage data?

5. Are the metrics available in multiple languages?

2. Data confidentiality At a minimum, digital coaching solutions should create psychologically safe spaces, meaning coaching conversations should

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remain confidential. This confidentiality cultivates the trust, openness and honesty required for productive one-on-one sessions. It is also businesscritical to protect commercially sensitive information. In fact, only under potentially dangerous circumstances or illegality should coaches ever disclose the contents of their conversations.

When delivered through digital means, coaching demands even more stringent confidentiality.

Not only must conversations remain private, but coaching vendors must also keep all digital information secure, following basic standards like ISO27001 and meeting the industry SOC2 standard.

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The Coaching Insights You Didn't Know You Needed

Most enterprises agree that increased data calls for increased data security, but these practices still vary widely in the digital coaching industry. Consequently, you should look for a coaching vendor that provides information on team development and robust evidence of impact, but never reveals details about specific individuals. The coaching platform should also guarantee full data protection.

You can investigate a vendor’s data security by asking these five questions: 1. Do you record coaching conversations?

2. Do you manage information security using ISO27001 standards?

3. Are you SOC2-compliant?

4. How are your data centers certified?

5. Does your platform use best security practices like multifactor authentication and password managers?

3. Coach Community Of course, while data can uncover indispensable learning and development insights, coaches themselves are at the heart of all digital coaching solutions.

And a provider’s bench of coaches warrants a thorough examination — especially in the highly unregulated coaching industry. Partner with providers that overcorrect for a lack of regulations, setting a high bar for their coaches. You can’t go wrong with a provider that employs individuals with diverse industry

knowledge and credentials from the world’s most renowned coaching bodies, EMCC Global or the International Coaching Federation (ICF).

The learning and development of coaches should not stop at qualifications though. Just like learners, coaches can and should receive personal and professional support, through coaching supervision. An investment in the coaches themselves continually improves their services and means they likely follow the latest coaching standards and guidelines.

Along with coaching standards, examine potential vendors’ coaching models. Confirm they take a proven, scientific approach to their curriculums and that coaches are capable of supporting those frameworks.

You can ask these five questions to determine the overall quality of a vendor’s coaching services: 1. How do you support your coaches’ well-being?

2. What arrangements do you have for coaching supervision?

3. What wider training and development do you provide for your coaches?

4. Do you have an evidencedbased coaching framework that your coaches use?

5. How have you trained your coaches in this coaching model?

development programs, HR teams must maximize their corporate coaching investments. These 15 audit questions can help.

To deliver on the tremendous promise of digital coaching, HR teams should select a solution that provides — and protects — robust data-driven insights while equipping every employee with personalized coaching that’s rooted in scientific research and delivered by supported, competent coaches.

Jonathan Passmore is Senior Vice President of Coaching at CoachHub, a professor at Henley Business School, as well as a global thought leader in behavioral change, listed in the Thinkers 50 and Global Gurus lists. He is a chartered psychologist, holds five degrees including an MBA and doctorate in psychology.

He is an accredited coach with the ICF and EMCC, as well as holding qualifications in team coach and coach supervision. He is probably the most widely published coaching researcher-writer contributing over 30 books and nearly 200 scientific papers and book chapters to the field.

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Upskilling HR To Meet The Future Of Work HR technology should be flexible to meet the needs of employees and companies

By Cathy Koslowski, Equus Software

T

he Great Resignation is set to continue well into next year, with PwC estimating that one in five employees will switch employers. Around 35% are looking to ask for a raise with pressure higher in the tech industry. Higher pay, more job fulfillment, and wanting to be themselves are a few reasons pushing workers to change jobs.

However, those workers participating in the Great Resignation are not sitting on the sidelines. More than half switched their field of work rather than

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leaving the workforce entirely. And many times, this goes beyond a paycheck. MIT Sloan Management Review found that 34 million workers left because of company culture or decision-making. Oliver Wyman found that a tenth completed training for a new job. The reasons for this are complex and up to the individual. Still, in the same PwC survey, 30% said they were concerned about technology replacing their position, and 39% said they are not getting sufficient digital tools and technology training from their employer.

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Upskilling HR To Meet The Future Of Work

This shows that the Great Resignation is not just about a paycheck. While money is still the top factor in a decision, job fulfillment and being one’s true self rank just behind. Employees are looking to work somewhere that provides a sense of meaning in their work, provides them with the skills to meet future demands, and offers a work-life balance that fits their needs. HR staff and company leaders will need to upskill to meet the future of recruitment and retention.

Create an Individualized Experience

To meet employees’ expectations, HR professionals need to start with the onboarding process.

Employees are considering everything from pay to work structures to environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) commitments and they will have questions and requirements beyond the traditional scope of the role and compensation. They will want answers immediately and personalized to them. If a company cannot or will not meet their requests, workers are more willing to walk away and will find a company that does.

One way to address this is through individualized experience packages. They want to know they will have support throughout their journey with the company. For many, this might only pertain to salary and career growth. For others, this might mean more flexibility for caregiving, allowances for daycare, or better dependent coverage. Employees might be willing to give in one area to gain in another as long as it aligns with their priorities. With a diverse workforce that has multiple needs, traditional one-size-fits-all benefits packages are no longer applicable.

More Than Benefits & Salary

Most of the Great Resignation has revolved around traditional individual needs: salary, work-life balance, work culture, benefits, and training.

However, a company’s stance on ESG is increasingly becoming an issue for employees, especially younger employees. More than half of employees say that ESG issues are important in terms of a company’s transparency with 23% of employees saying a company’s commitment to environmental impact factors into their day-to-day work. These are

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increasingly important factors for employees, and HR professionals need to be able to address these concerns, especially through demonstrated actions by the company.

To help employees contribute on an individual level, HR departments need to appoint a senior leader outside of HR to help govern these programs.

Employee resource groups (ERGs) are important ways to get employee feedback and get a sampling of what matters to the organization in a variety of areas.

Companies can also provide donation matching where they will match dollar amounts to a certain amount. This allows a company to be vested in the causes its employees care about.

HR leaders need to leverage ERGs appropriately. They cannot be seen as an afterschool club or a symbol in the organization. They are also more than networking events or reminders about healthcare enrollment.

They need to empower ERGs to set goals with company leaders and organize these groups with a layer of reporting and accountability. Sponsoring ERGs and ensuring accountability is an added skill for HR. As ERGs become more prevalent in companies, this will be a very desired skill to have.

Flexibility is the New Standard

Conversations between employees and HR departments are moving from the office or at home to flexible schedules and locations that meet an employee’s needs. The pandemic has shown how the need for caregiving has changed the employee landscape. Even for employees who want to be in the office full time, a health event with a family member might require the need to work from a different location for an extended period of time. Employees want this flexibility and to work for companies that provide it.

Flexible or remote work arrangements bring a myriad of compliance, payroll, and tax issues for HR departments to manage, especially for HR professionals who previously only had to deal with in-state or bordering state requirements. If the requests are global or crossing foreign borders,

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HR departments will need to dedicate global mobility teams to address these issues and manage them as they occur. They will be responsible for making sure travel arrangements can be made, collaboration and socialization tools are in place, and that payroll structures are aligned for local jurisdictions.

Balancing Quantitative and Qualitative Data

Armed with more data about employees’ goals, work habits, and values, and with company ESG goals, HR departments can better improve their operations.

The team can gather data on who is using what services or who is being dispatched to what assignments and identify any gaps against goals for both environmental and social sustainability. The company can use this information to course correct and improve its opportunities for employees.

Capturing, using, and interpreting this data will require upskilling the current HR team or bringing someone in with a data analytics background to keep a pulse on the data. As technology becomes a bigger touchpoint for employees, more data will be collected and analyzed. It can provide valuable insights into employee collaboration and engagement. It can also reduce time spent on low-value tasks through automation and self-serve applications.

should be flexible to meet the needs of employees and companies. The pandemic has shown that the unexpected can happen. Being prepared with the right technology—one that is flexible and adaptable to employees—will future-proof your business and keep HR departments motivated and able to handle adversity.

Changing work habits and requirements will only accelerate. This will include hybrid and flexible work as well as ESG issues. HR departments need to continually upskill their team members. As workers become and think more global, companies that might not have had an international presence will need to evaluate everything from taxes to labor laws to governance around sustainability issues.

HR professionals are becoming the face of an organization in ways beyond traditional benefits and payroll. They are leading the digital transformation of a company, and companies need to equip them with the right skills and technologies to meet constant changes in employee and employment trends and offerings.

Cathy Koslowski is an experienced global mobility professional who has worked in all aspects of global mobility. She currently serves as Equus Software’s VP of Solutions Consulting.

Prior to joining Equus, Cathy spent 15 years at a Big 4 in the US, UK, and Belgium in client service, mobility technology, and as a chief of staff working on strategic projects. She’s managed transformative programs in both the technology and engineering industries. Cathy is recognized in the market as an industry speaker and a strategic problem solver working across all organizational levels, cultures, countries, and service lines to gain consensus on effective and efficient practices.

However, do not overly rely on technology to provide collaboration and human interaction. Global mobility teams can use this for directional indicators about their employees or to provide easier ways to work. But it is important to balance this with actual interactions between global mobility and HR departments. Providing ways to connect in an inclusive way—many times in ways that technology cannot—is valuable for employees looking for more proactive ways to approach performance management, career development, and balance.

Younger works are more in tune and inclined to this way of behaving.

Flexible Work, Flexible Technology

Technology should be in the service of human interaction, not a barrier to it. HR technology

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Top Pick

Professional Development Is Key To Retaining Talent Highlights from a recent survey

by The Conference Board

By Rebecca Ray and Jennifer Burnett, The Conference Board

A

s talent shortages persist, a new survey reveals that professional development opportunities are one tool for retaining employees. Indeed, 58 percent say they are likely to leave their company without professional development—or continuing education and career training to help develop new skills, stay up to date on current trends, and drive career advancement. This likelihood to leave holds especially true among women, people of color, and Millennials.

But for people of color, there may be a gap in access to these opportunities. Conducted by The Conference Board, the survey reveals that more people of color report a lack of opportunities and resources for professional development than do their White counterparts.

The latest workforce survey from The Conference Board captured the thoughts of more than 1,200 individuals—predominantly professional/office workers—from May 16-31. Respondents weighed in on the importance, access, reasons, and barriers to professional development.

Key findings include: 1. Development Opportunities Are Key to Retaining Employees, Especially Women, People of Color, and Millennials When asked how likely are employees to leave a company for another if they do not receive the development opportunities they believe they need:

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● Women, people of color, and Millennials are more likely to leave their organizations if they don’t receive development opportunities. ● Gender:

Women: 61 percent would leave

Men: 55 percent ● Race:

Black: 68 percent

Hispanic and Latino: 70 percent

Asian: 80 percent

White: 53 percent ● Generation:

Millennials: 66 percent

Gen X: 63 percent

Baby Boomers: 47 percent ● The disparities are even more striking among women of color:

Black women: 71 percent

Hispanic women: 70 percent

Asian women: 70 percent

White women: 56 percent ● Overall, 58 percent of workers are likely to leave their company if they don’t receive professional development opportunities.

These survey results reveal that, in the midst of a talent shortage, providing and promoting opportunities for career and skills development can be a critical way to attract candidates. In order to retain and grow the diversity of thought and

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experience within your organization, it is critical to ensure that all employees have access to rich professional development opportunities.

2. Most Employees Highly Value the Opportunity to Develop Work-related Skills When asked how important is it to employees to continuously develop their work-related skills: ● 96 percent of respondents say it is important or very important for them to continuously develop their work-related skills. ● More people of color say continuously developing skills is very important: ● Black: 87 percent ● Hispanic and Latino: 86 percent ● Asian: 78 percent ● White: 73 percent ● More women say it is very important than men: ● Women: 80 percent ● Men: 70 percent

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3. Despite the High Value Placed on Professional Development Opportunities, People of Color Report a Greater Lack of Access to these Opportunities and Resources When asked what barriers/challenges do employees experience in developing their skills: ● More people of color report a lack of opportunities and resources for professional development than do their White counterparts. ● Lack of resources:

Black: 38 percent

Hispanic and Latino: 35 percent

Asian: 40 percent

White: 28 percent ● Lack of opportunities:

Black: 37 percent

Hispanic and Latino: 37 percent

Asian: 36 percent

White: 27 percent

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4. A Lack of Time Is the Greatest Barrier to Developing Skills Overall When asked what barriers/challenges do employees experience in developing their skills: ● Nearly 80 percent said the biggest barrier to developing skills is a lack of time. ● 31 percent said a lack of resources and 29 percent said a lack of opportunities were their greatest barriers. ● Time off for training and development (54 percent) and improved access to career development opportunities (54 percent) were the top two ways that employees feel their employers can support their development. ● Less than a quarter (22 percent) thought that an internal career center/job board for job openings and opportunities would be helpful.

5 Are there Enough Opportunities for Development?

The C-suite and Individual Contributors Disagree When asked what barriers/challenges do employees experience in developing their skills: ● Only 10 percent of CEOs and the C-suite consider a lack of opportunities a barrier, compared to 40 percent of individual contributors.

6. One in Ten Worry Their Skills Won’t Keep Up When asked how confident are employees that they have the skills they need to perform well in their job now, for the next 1-2 years:

● More than one in ten (13 percent) are not confident they have the skills to continue to perform well in their current role for the next 1-2 years. ● 97 percent of survey respondents are confident that they have the skills needed to perform well in their current jobs, but fewer (87 percent) are confident they have the skills to perform well in the next 1-2 years. ● Baby Boomers are more confident in their skills than younger generations: ● Millennials: 72 percent are very/quite confident they have the needed skills ● Gen X: 76 percent ● Baby Boomers: 85 percent 7. Personal Growth Is the Top Driver of Developing Work-related Skills When asked what are the top reasons why employees want to develop their work-related skills: ● 70 percent of the respondents said they want to develop their work-related skills to expand their personal growth and development, and to perform at a higher level in their current role (60 percent). ● Only 31 percent wanted to do so to get a promotion.

8. Many Employees Take Their Learning and Development into their Own Hands When asked how do employees communicate their need to develop skills and capabilities with their current employer: ● 58 percent of the respondents said they share their development needs with their manager, while 57 percent of employees design their own learning and development plans. ● Only 20 percent update an online employee profile and development plan.

9. Employees Are Learning from Free Online Resources When asked, what resources do employees use most often to develop work-related knowledge and skills, and which are most effective:

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● 65 percent of the respondents said that free external resources (TED Talks, YouTube, LinkedIn Learning) are used most often, but only 44 percent of respondents find them effective. ● 58 percent use employer-provided training resources (courses, simulations, materials), but only 46 percent find them effective. ● Less than a quarter (23 percent) use employerprovided experiential development (gigs, projects, rotations), but 35 percent find them effective.

10. Senior-level Staff Are Less Likely to Use Employer-provided Resources, and Less Likely to Find Them Effective When asked, what resources do employees use most often to develop work-related knowledge and skills, and which are most effective, they said: ● The higher you are in an organization, the less likely you are to use employer-provided resources. ● Individual contributors: 66 percent use employer-provided resources ● CEOs: 30 percent ● The perceived effectiveness of employer-provided resources decreases dramatically as you move up in the organization: ● Individual contributors: 56 percent find employer-provided resources effective ● CEOs: 17 percent

11. Employees Think Leadership, Critical Thinking, and Adaptability Will Be the Most Important Skills for the Future When asked, which of the following non-technical, personal skills will be important for their future job opportunities and career success? ● Top three skills overall:

Leadership: 40 percent

Critical thinking: 36 percent

Adaptability and agility: 35 percent ● Bottom 3 skills overall:

Empathy: 11 percent

Resilience: 12 percent

Global and cultural awareness:

15 percent ● Women think adaptability and agility will be more important (39 percent) than do men (30 percent).

Employees have made clear their desire to keep learning and growing both within and beyond their current roles. It is in the best interest of employers to provide all employees across their business with learning and development opportunities related to business priorities and overall personal growth, whether it’s ensuring there are appropriate resources for front-line workers or highlighting the importance of empathy for managers in a hybrid world of work.

Creating a culture of learning will not only help your employees flourish but will help your company stay ahead of the rapidly changing business environment.”

Jennifer Burnett is Principal of Human Capital at The Conference Board.

Rebecca Ray is Executive Vice President of Human Capital at The Conference Board.

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n 2 2 o i 0 at r 2

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u C P l e oria

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L&D Trends and Challenges for 2023

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Future of HR Skills and Education

Nov 2022

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Sep 2022

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Aug 2022

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Employee Development in a Hybrid Work Arrangement

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Here’s How Improving SOPs Can Help You Grow Your Business Develop a culture of knowledge sharing and continuous improvement

By Ken Babcock, Tango

B

usinesses have standard operating procedures (SOPs) to educate uniform tasks to ensure quality and consistency. They also assist in onboarding new talent, upskilling current team members, and promoting a culture of knowledge sharing. In addition, these procedures can boost productivity, promote appropriate resource allocation, and improve existing processes by creating a central repository of information. During my time at Uber, I saw how important it is to have a practical knowledge management system in place with SOPs, so I set out to tackle this problem in a way that can help businesses of all sizes have the power to scale internally.

Creating and Upkeeping SOPs

The number of businesses reporting a comprehensive SOP library is slim. Only 1.5 percent of businesses report having documented every procedure within their company. Even though 25 percent of businesses report documenting some of their procedures, they fail to keep their SOPs updated as practices change and their business grows.

Why don’t companies take the time to create and implement SOPs? Creating them is a chore that most find to be time-consuming and secondary to

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other tasks. If that isn’t enough, they quickly become obsolete within just weeks, as processes and projects continue to evolve.

How can businesses address the need for SOPs while reducing the time spent creating them? Flexible workflow documentation tools allow companies to streamline the creation of SOPs by enabling team members to capture workflows in real-time as they work. Equally important is the ability to easily and quickly edit SOPs as they change without having to reinvent the wheel. The right workflow documentation system makes SOPs the byproduct of how teams work and can be updated to match the needs of a growing business.

Improving Overall Productivity

On an average, employees spend 19 percent of their workweek searching for information to do their job, which creates frustration and translates to hours of lost time. In addition to affecting an organization’s overall productivity and bottom line, it also directly impacts the quality and consistency of output as people may be performing the same task differently.

A knowledge management system with a repository of SOPs ensures that everyone on the team has access

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standardize training efforts, shorten the learning curve, and improve the employee experience.

Great employee onboarding can improve employee retention by 82 percent by ensuring access to knowledge and SOPs new hires can get up to speed quickly and painlessly.

This is also a good time to audit and update SOPs . New hires using the SOPs can flag unclear or out-of-date steps, helping businesses find inefficiencies in their process documentation.

to the same information when needed and empowers employees to be their best at work.

In addition to creating standardized practice, organizations should strive to develop a culture of knowledge sharing and continuous improvement.

For example, by capturing the best practices from top performers and sharing them across teams, you can celebrate great work and improve the team’s efficiency and outcomes. In addition, when employees call out sick– like the 7.8 million that called out sick in January of 2022– SOPs allow ill employees to transfer their work to other team members during an absence, reducing the likelihood of a project or task stalling or slipping through the cracks.

Knowledge management supports retention and engagement by increasing employee satisfaction.

Giving employees the tools and resources they need to do great work translates to a better sense of belonging and fulfillment. Companies that have happy employees are proven to outperform competitors by 20 percent .

Why Businesses Need to Improve Their SOPs

Neglecting SOPs can cause many consequences, including inconsistencies across the company, poor customer experiences, and a less engaged workforce.

On the other hand, knowledge management leads to better workflows, improved customer experiences, and ultimately, prepares you to scale and grow.

Ken Babcock is the CEO and Co-founder of Tango, the leading workflow intelligence platform that streamlines the creation of process documentation. Babcock is highly committed to helping teams be their best at work by transforming process documentation from a chore into an opportunity for continuous improvement. Babcock’s business insights have been featured in publications such as TechCrunch and Fortune.

Onboarding New Hires and Retaining Employees

SOPs remove the complexity of miscommunications and poorly communicated instructions. Nearly 70% of managers aren’t comfortable communicating with their employees, and more than 57% of employees report not receiving clear instructions from their managers. SOPs can bridge the gap in communicating how work gets done by making processes understandable and easier to implement.

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