The Case For Creating A Learning Culture At Work, Remote Or Not

As more organisations experiment with partial or fully remote workforces, many companies are struggling with engagement of the workforce and trying to create a culture of learning at work.

Research from the World Economic Forum has shown that half of today’s most in-demand skills were not on the list three years ago. As a result, there is now a need for intellectual curiosity and the desire and ability to quickly grow and adapt one’s skill set. How can you create a learning culture within your own team or in your organisation?

It is known that companies with highly engaged workforces outperform their peers by a whopping 147 percent in earnings per share. While some organisations may be waiting for the pandemic to be over until training can kickstart, that is not a winning strategy as creating a learning culture is possible, remote or not.

We do not mean compulsory Zoom presentations in which employees multitask on the side. What we would suggest is flexible, passion-driven learning where employees learn what they want, when they want, and on their own terms.

In a new book by Shelly Osborne, the VP of Learning at Udemy, The Upskilling Imperative: 5 Ways to Make Learning Core to the Way We Work, she offers an overhaul to corporate training in her book. Osborne challenges traditional, one-size-fits-all approaches to training that are no longer relevant to modern workers, working remotely or not. Here are some takeaways that we have summarised:

#1 Find proof in how learning can drive business success

As businesses continue to operate with limited staff or reduced capacity, it is important for employees to stretch their skill sets further and fill tasks and roles they wouldn’t normally. Individuals are more likely to learn and seek out learning when they understand the role it plays in overall business success.

“Leaders can signal the value of learning throughout the organisation by setting aside their own time for it and sharing with their teams and the broader organisation what they’re learning,” says Osborne. “This makes it clear to employees that learning at work is not only accepted, it’s encouraged.”

#2 The case for flexibility

There’s more to learning via a training module or sending people for workshops. Employees require more flexibility today than ever before, and that is especially true when it comes to learning based on findings during the pandemic.

A new report from the London School of Economics shows that training rate in the first half of 2020 fell significantly, with the researchers highlighting the sharp fall in discretionary spending among firms and the focus instead on survival.

There is also a noticeable absence of training in the kind of transferrable skills that employers find so valuable, especially during an era in which the power of technology is rising and our ability to work effectively alongside it is increasingly defining our workplace experience.

Building a sustainable learning culture means giving employees time and space to learn where and when they want. Doing so will encourage them to seek out new learning opportunities independently and allow for psychological safety and the ability to learn.

#3 Putting employees in-charge

All in-person trainings are often passive. The best trainers often this model on its head, coaching learners to take ownership of mastering a skill or material.

You can apply this type of approach easily with your learners. For example, you may ask employees to pair up and record a video demonstrating a particular skill. Or have them research a new skill and develop a slideshow demonstrating it to their co-workers. They could also create a contest on applying principles they have recently learned. The key is to have learners take the reins.

#4 Dismiss the top-down approach to engagement

It is important to create an ecosystem of learning and teaching that includes everyone.  People get a tremendous amount of satisfaction from sharing their know-how. There’s a lot of important institutional knowledge you could also retain if you gave all your employees the power to easily create and share courses.

With Skillshare, Udemy and LinkedIn, it is possible for anyone to create shareable content. Traditional approaches to training (such as an overhead projector and chalkboards) were built for a world we don’t live in anymore. What’s more, they aren’t engaging for today’s workers, who are accustomed to consuming digital content on their own terms. This was true before the pandemic and it’s undeniable now.

#5 Hire curious people

Lastly, hiring curious people and finding the right fit is important to continue the learning culture journey. Good selection makes training and development much more effective because it is easier to augment potential than to go against someone’s nature.

If you hire people who are naturally curious, and maximise the fit between their interests and the role they are in, you will not have to worry so much about their willingness to learn or be on their case to unlock their curiosity.

In summary, if you want to nurture curiosity and learning in your employees, there’s no need to rely on your organisation’s formal learning and development programmes.

Beyond modernising the learning experience at work, companies need to transform at every level into learning-driven organisations, where working and learning are closely linked.

As companies continue to navigate this new environment, we are optimistic that the fundamental shift toward flexible, accessible online learning is here to stay.

We have been instrumental with a number of growth clients, to help them unearth senior candidates who have transformed the face of the business. If you are looking to expand your team, get in touch with us at The Edge.