If you’re reading up on how to promote a learning culture in an organisation, we want to start this article by giving you a mental high five. This is the way to respond to a challenging few years!
Instead of hiding your head in the sand, throwing your toys or sulking in the corner, you put on your most stylish thinking cap, crack your knuckles, and get down to the business of reinvention.
After all, if it works for Cher and Lady Gaga, Angeline Jolie and Kim Kardashian, who are we to balk at the notion of development and metamorphosis? Even Arnold Schwarzenegger did it – the man went from professional bodybuilder, to major Hollywood actor, to governor of California for Pete’s sake!
However, even if you are not looking to reinvent your entire business from the ground up, there are still many benefits associated with fostering a healthy culture of continuous learning and employee development within your enterprise.
When you create a learning culture within your business, you are essentially planting seeds of awesomeness that could blossom within your employees in the form of increased efficiency and productivity, supercharged workplace satisfaction and improved talent retention, a more positive outlook and sense of ownership and accountability, as well as resilience in the face of change and challenges.
That’s a whole lot of bang for your training and development buck, don’t you think?
Now that we’ve covered the why, let’s focus on the how.
Here are 3 ways to promote a learning culture in an organisation:
1. Keep ongoing learning top of mind by discussing it regularly
The first step to creating a learning environment is to keep the notion of continued education top of mind by weaving it into regular performance conversations between managers and employees – in fact, it should be built-in as an agenda item to ensure that it’s not overlooked.
Use these discussions to figure out how training could be used to alleviate the workload, address performance issues, and bolster personal development.
It’s best to lead with open-ended questions that encourage employees to discuss their experience with any existing development plans that are in place, how they feel they’ve progressed, whether they are facing any challenges, and what managers can do to assist.
TOP TIP: Team members who commit to learning and succeed by gaining new skills and/or qualifications should be recognised and rewarded for doing so in a public way that inspires their co-workers to do the same.
Employees should also be encouraged to highlight any interesting courses and/or training platforms they come across in their personal capacity that may suit the needs of your team.
2. Make time for learning and development
To ensure that employees are open to the idea of embracing a culture of learning, you need to make it clear that they will be given time and space to invest in their development. If it’s seen as something they would need to do in their limited spare time, it’s bound to create friction from the word go.
As such, learning and development should form a part of your organisation’s vision and mission statement, signalling that your business is committed to the process and will work with the team to create space and time to pursue continued learning.
Ideally, each employee should be able to sit with their direct manager to determine a timeline for a given course and find pockets of time in which they’d be able to pursue it, supported by company resources like internet connectivity and any other tech that may be required.
Here’s some good news…
Ongoing learning does not have to happen at the hand of lengthy, time-consuming courses that cost a lot of money. Sure, there are certain skills that will require formalised courseware and the enrolment of employees in workshops, etc., but there are also other ways to keep the prized tools in your shed nice and sharp.
bountiXP offers functionality that empowers employees to become lifelong learners. This cloud-hosted course management system supports rich content, interactive functionality and certificated courses that are bolstered with real-time tracking and progress reports to improve training efficiency. Best of all – employees can tap into all the learning goodness from their mobile phones!
READ MORE: How to make microlearning fun and effective for your employees
3. Establish clear links between training and business goals
When employees can draw a clear line between the need for continued learning and supporting their organisation’s success, creating alignment between business goals and development becomes rather effortless.
A study conducted by Brandon Hall Group and Halogen Software, determined that the best way to pave the way for this type of synergy is to use cascading goals to connect business and learning objectives.
Next up, everyone needs to be on board with ongoing monitoring and evaluating in this regard so that accountability is built into the plan straight off the bat. Goals should be SMART – specific, measurable, actionable, relevant, and time-bound, and suitable for setting, managing, and reassessing individual goals and development progress.
There you have it – a quick guide that explains how to promote a learning culture in an organisation. Start small and plant the seeds for ongoing employee development – the rewards are beyond epic and will benefit your business for many years to come.