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When you think about the people who seem to have the CEO’s ear, I bet you’re thinking about the leaders in departments like product development, sales and finance. In most of the organizations where I worked, that was certainly the case. It’s probably rare for the CEO to have the CLO or Talent Development leaders on speed dial.
But the environment we’re living in is creating an opportunity for the executives in talent development to take on a bigger role and seize their seat at the strategy table. That’s right, learning and development is increasingly becoming critical to an organization’s long-term strategy and success. Why?
CEOs are concerned about skills
According to a study conducted by PwC, 63% of CEOs are concerned about their talent having the right skills. It’s one of the top things that keeps them up at night. They know that rapid changes to the workplace and global trends are creating a skills gap that could impact productivity and competitive advantage.
Today’s workforce values learning
People want to learn – especially the people who are likely to make up most of your workforce in the coming years. According to Docebo, 36% of workers and nearly half of Millennials would consider quitting a job that didn’t provide learning opportunities. When considering what job to accept, opportunities for learning are considered alongside what we traditionally think of as the deciding factors – things like compensation and health benefits.
Learning has moved to the front seat
At most companies, learning was not something you thought about every day. Each year, you’d decide what professional development you’d pursue (or your boss would decide for you), and you’d go to the workshop to tick the box for training for that year. With the speed of change increasing and the digitization of many job functions and processes, binary learning is no longer relevant. Today, each employee needs to be learning something new every day. I call it treadmill learning because learning needs to be like moving on a treadmill. To remain upright and relevant you need to keep moving forward. If you stop learning, you don’t stand still, you fall off the back and get left behind.
So what does it mean for hardworking talent development professionals?
It’s your time to shine!
In many organizations, the Sales and Finance teams are the drivers. They have the most powerful seats at the strategy table, but the items I discussed above create a unique opportunity for you to increase your influence and become indispensable inside your organization and sit alongside your other colleagues when planning the future of the business. Here’s how.
Connect with your colleagues
Partner with the leaders of the various job functions in your company – specifically marketing, IT, and Onboarding, learning to get really clear about what’s on the horizon and what your internal clients need to keep their talent relevant and engaged. That means partnering with the marketing department to build programs that turn your people into digital brand ambassadors and working with IT to understand how data analytics will impact all functions in the organization. Dive deeply into what your colleagues see as skill gaps so you can build the most relevant learning experiences. You’ll build the personal brand attribute of collaborative and become more influential throughout the organization.
Become a “new learning” expert
In The Expertise Economy, Kelly Palmer says, “The one-size-fits-all mentality of corporate education is no longer relevant. Learning needs to be customized for each individual based on their skill and knowledge gaps, personal and professional goals, and specific interests.” That means you need to make learning accessible and relevant to this new paradigm. Palmer adds, “One of the main goals of personalized learning is ultimately to combine the best of what the ecosystem has to offer. It’s not an either/or proposition, but rather aims to unite the best features of learner motivation, technology, and online learning supported by teacher and peer expertise.”
Build a culture of learning
Many of my corporate clients use the StrengthsFinder assessment with their people to help them get a handle on their superpowers. When you complete the assessment, it reveals for you your top 5 strengths among 34 different ones that are used in the workplace. One of my clients really stands out because so many of their people have “learner” among their top 5 strengths. Learners are described by Gallup as people who “have a great desire to learn and want to continuously improve. The process of learning, rather than the outcome, excites them. You love to learn.” This client also happens to have learning integrated into every part of the employee lifecycle. Even the recruiters focus on the learning opportunities inside the organization when talking to new hires – even more than talking about salary and benefits and cool things like their commitment to fitness or the ping pong table in the break room.
Be a learner yourself
There’s a lot of truth to the old adage about the cobbler’s children having no shoes. Learning professionals are working so hard to develop others, they usually spend less time learning – and often when they are, they’re wearing the “would this be good for our company’s learners?” hat rather than adopting the “how can I use this to learn and grow and advance?” mentality. I see it in the workshops I deliver. There are rarely learning professionals participating – if they’re in the room at all, they’re sitting at the back, focusing on the delivery of the program. It’s time for them to take a seat at the front of the classroom – as well as in the board room, and beyond.
William Arruda is the cofounder of CareerBlast and creator of the complete LinkedIn quiz that helps you evaluate your LinkedIn profile and networking strategy.
