At Advantage Business, one of the most common areas we work in with our clients is to help them build learning pathways for their valued members of staff and management. This has significant benefits for the day to day operations of a business, but is also a foundation for establishing an effective succession strategy. This article is the first in a series of three on building learning journeys for staff in small and medium-sized businesses in New Zealand. In the first edition, I talk about assessing organisational needs, defining learning objectives and designing the learning journey.
Building learning journeys for your staff involves creating a structured pathway that guides them through the various stages of learning and development. Clear pathways help ensure that staff acquire the necessary skills and knowledge to perform their roles effectively and advance their careers.
The first stages are focused on assessment, defining and designing the learning needs, the objectives for learning and training implementation:
1. Assess Your Organizational Needs
The first step in building effective learning journeys for your staff is to clearly identify the learning goals for your business. Determine what your business aims to achieve through staff development. These could include goals such as improving productivity, enhancing your levels of customer service, driving innovation and many more.
An important part of this process should also be to analyze the skill gaps in your business. Conduct a skills gap analysis to understand the current competencies of the staff and identify areas for improvement.
2. Define Your Learning Objectives
After assessing your organizational needs, the next step is to set clear goals for the learning pathways that your staff will undertake. Be sure to establish specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART) objectives for the learning journey.
It is always an advantage to align your staff learning journeys with the career pathways available both in your industry and in your business. As you define your objectives, ensure they align with the potential career progression opportunities within your business. This will encourage more commitment from your staff and enable better staff succession.
3. Design the Learning Journey
After assessing your learning needs and defining your objectives, the next step is to design the structure of your staff learning processes. The starting point should be to segment the learning stages. Break down the training journey into stages such as onboarding, core skills training, advanced skills development, and leadership training. Each industry has specific and often contrasting learning needs, so you need to pay careful attention to the detail at each training stage.
As you design the delivery methods, try to blend a range of learning methods. Use a mix of formal (classroom training, e-learning), informal (mentoring, coaching), and experiential learning (on-the-job training, simulations). Again, these will be specific for different industry sectors. Also, take account of individual as well as group training needs. Individual pathways can be focused on roles, departments, or career aspirations.
Once you have assessed, defined and designed the learning pathways for your staff, you will be confident in knowing what you want and where more effective learning opportunities for your staff can take your business.
In the next edition of this series, I will discuss developing effective learning content, implementing training programs and monitoring their effectiveness. In the third and final edition, I will cover how to adapt and improve your staff learning programs over time, tools and techniques, and examples of learning journeys.
For hands on advice around developing staff learning journeys in your business contact your nearest Advantage Business Advisor.