Is learning and development headed for the scrap heap?

Things are changing fast in the world of Learning and Development (L&D), but sometimes it seems we’re oblivious to the fact. It’s almost as if we’re ostriches – our response to an oncoming threat is to bury our heads in the sand rather than face it.

Soon that won’t be an option.

Once L&D’s work was simple and predictable. Training was a schedule of events, part of the calendar. Following an initial period of intensive induction training, employees received regular training measured in days or even in weeks per year. Today, this isn’t an option. Given how fast information flows and changes, the business demands faster ways of keeping employees up-to-speed.

The worrying news for L&D: increasingly the business is not turning to L&D for skill and knowledge support, but doing it alone, using social media and other tools.

The result is a challenging environment for L&D. CERPOINT Systems’ new white paper highlights three key ways that L&D can respond to these challenges and thrive.

What are the three ways in which L&D must change?

First, the speed of change of information means it is not possible for the L&D department to be subject matter experts in all areas that it trains in. Perhaps it can only be expert in a minority. Instead, it must develop methods of working with subject matter experts in the business and developing content in conjunction with them.

Second, L&D must support the wide-ranging learning activities already taking place in the workplace – whether they are explicit or more informal learning taking place using social networks. Such workplace activities are usually timely, focused on business need and backed by management.

The third change that L&D teams must make is internal. Personnel must specialize. It is no longer credible to be a jack-of-all learning trades. And L&D staff must follow structured career paths and explicit training and development plans. They must also find the tools to take away the routine administrative tasks that add little value to the departmental role.

These three things have always been core activities for the Learning and Development function, but today’s greater speed of technological change, combined with the increased importance of learning to the modern, organization means that these three facets of the modern L&D department are now crucial to its success.

L&D is changing dramatically. Without being seen by the business as an essential part of daily life, there’s a risk that it will soon be regarded as a relic of a bygone age – a nice-to-have luxury like subsidized staff canteens with no place in the modern age.

The department has to accept that its expertise no longer lies in training, but in how people learn. Work with the rest of the organisation while growing our own professionalism, and there’s every chance that we’ll be an essential part of our enterprises’ future. Carry on in the old ways, and one thing is certain: the L&D function will be abandoned.

This is an extract from the CERTPOINT Systems white paper [Three Major Challenges Facing Learning & Developments Today]. Click to download the full white paper for free.

Thanks,
CERTPOINT Team