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The future of organisational landscape looks LIT! The latest generation entering the workforce in the near future is about to reinvent leadership and work styles, alike. With values as their guiding star, Gen-Zers are here to revolutionise everything we know about the corporate world. As the first digital native generation, using technology to influence the world around is child’s play to them.

Continue reading “How To Effectively Lead Gen Z Employees”

A recent meta-analysis survey on the effectiveness of diversity training programs smashed the prevalent perception that diversity training does not work. It shows that with adequate target awareness and skill development, such programs can bring about effective and long term behavioural changes within an organisation.

Continue reading “How to Make Your Diversity Training Effective?”

I learnt things the hard way and this blog is an attempt to reflect on the mistakes I made while collecting feedback for online game-based learning courses and gamified content. In my experience this holds true regardless of the type of content – gamified, storified, serious games, elearning, microlearning or nanolearning.  If you are an online learning designer or just someone who is learning using online courses, I hope you add to my points and further help me and other learning designers become better.

Continue reading “How To Effectively Collect Feedback For Digital Learning Courses?”

We are living in extraordinary times, and it comes with equally extraordinary share of challenges. The organizations and the L&D ecosystems are witnessing an unprecedented shift in how we used to operate. The organizations that are still thriving are the ones who could quickly navigate their way through these times. They were ale to re-organise their business processes, customer interactions, and adopted technology in a huge way. When going through such massive changes, the obvious pressure and onus of navigating these changes falls in the lap of the leaders and the L&D team of the organisation. And these changes bring a host of new trends and leadership practices for leaders to adapt to, and cope up with.

Continue reading “6 Leadership Development Trends To Watch Out In 2021”

At FocusU, we are a fan of impromptu check-ins about pretty much everything. We do this using a digital app. What makes this highly engaging is the variety of questions we get. From ‘What are your grateful for today?’ to ‘What is a small habit that makes your truly happy? – the questions truly are wholesome and interesting. One of the recent questions that we were asked was the following –

Continue reading “Using the ‘State Of Flow’ to Curate Better Learning & Development Modules”

The only thing worse than training employees and having them leave is not training them and having them stay
– Henry Ford

There is no doubt that learning and development for employees is an integral part of an organisation’s growth. If you speak to managers or employees, though, not all of them will express complete satisfaction about the corporate learning and development structure in their respective organizations. Managers often feel that the employees are not displaying the behaviors or skills that their training should inculcate in them. It is also common to hear employees speak of training as a chore that needs completion.

This 2019 article by the Harvard Business Review quoted a survey in which three out of every four managers expressed dissatisfaction with their organization’s learning and development process. The same article quotes a Mckinsey survey in which just one in four employees felt that their training brought about visible and measurable improvements in performance.

The FocusU experience

For a decade and more, we at FocusU have been crafting and delivering experiential learning programs that have had impactful learning outcomes. All these years, most of our offerings were instructor-led and face-to-face. Last year we changed our approach completely, and pivoted to a bouquet of virtual learning.

This gave us a good view of what was working and what was not, both for in-person and for virtual delivery of our sessions. Here is our take on where we are going wrong with corporate learning and development in the workplace, and what we can do about it.

1. The wrong metrics

Most organisations still rely on an annual learning calendar for employees. The employee must go through all the recommended modules before the close of the year. In this social age, employees are also encouraged to post their certifications on social media. This drives a culture of showing off the courses completed. Neither business leaders nor employees seem too concerned about how much of the learning gets implemented at the workplace. The focus seems to be on how many rather than how well.

What to do about it

The L&D team must discuss the annual calendar with individual managers at the start of the year. For every employee under a particular manager, they need to agree on the expected changes in aptitude and attitude. If that is too difficult, then they can do the same for that manager’s team at least. Every manager must provide feedback at reasonable intervals about how many of those goals each employee has met.

2. The wrong modules

This happens when an organization creates a one-size-fits-all training calendar for all employees. For instance, every employee might not need to become an expert in business correspondence. Negotiation skills is another example of a skill that only selected employees would need to use within the next one year. Yet these are two of the dozen or so training modules that almost every employee trudges through in many organizations. This, in spite of no opportunity for them to use those skills. This is why measuring the effectiveness of such programs becomes difficult.

What to do about it

In continuation of the previous point, at least a part of the training plans for every employee need to be tailor-made either to impart skills she might need for a future role she is being considered for, or skills she is not proficient at presently. If the coaching skills for a particular skill is not available in house, the organisation should outsource a learning and development specialist to run that particular module.

3. The wrong length

The pandemic has brought to a grinding halt the days of employees spending an entire day in an indoor venue closeted with the learning and development trainer. People do not have that kind of attention spans anymore. Organizations need to rightsize their training modules as well.

What to do about it

More and more companies are using microlearning modules to coach employees about specific skills they need. Employees can access these modules at their own pace and time on their smartphones with the help of a mobile application. There are several examples of companies like Walmart, Uber, and others using microlearning to get more impactful results.

4. The wrong sources

This has more to do with a learning and enablement culture in the organization than the instructional design of a corporate learning and development plan. Leaders and line managers need to realize that learning does not need to happen during a designated training program only. When you have a question to ask, you usually end up searching for the answer on the internet instead of waiting for the next training program. You might also ask your colleagues or your manager, but whether this would happen would depend on the learning culture in the organisation.

What to do about it

Leaders of any organization must be willing to devote time to coaching their employees while on the job. People learn faster and retain better when they see someone doing it, rather than by someone telling them how to do it. The leader of a sales team taking along a junior employee during a sales call can be a huge learning experience.

Leaders setting an example can motivate others in their team to come forward to help their colleagues or juniors. This is not to say that an organization can do away with the formal learning and development process entirely. But the annual learning calendar can become more effective if coaching and training becomes an ongoing activity at the workplace.

Time to set things right

Learning and development is too important for organisations to ignore. The price they would need to pay is too high. But an even bigger mistake would be to do  multiple training programs that fail to produce the optimal results and the proper engagement from participants. Managers need to stop looking at learning as something that happens in separate sessions outside the workplace. Employees need to stop thinking of a training session as a well-deserved break from actual work.

Even two years back, more than $1300 was the annual spend per employee on corporate learning and development worldwide. It is incumbent on all stakeholders to make every such dollar count. If you are looking for help, we would be glad to help you design a customised program, as per your team’s needs.

A Mckinsey Global Institute report in 2017 attempted to forecast what kinds of jobs would lose relevance, and what new job roles would emerge. In less than three years, a deadly virus hit the world with unexpected ferocity. The last two years have changed lives worldwide in a way no other single event has. Families got hit by untimely deaths, companies have closed down, national economies have taken a beating.

Continue reading “How To Help Your Team Up-Skill Post Pandemic”

Till 2019, working from home was a need-based option provided to some employees by some organisations. But, Covid turned everything around. Organisations were forced to ask employees to work from home for the foreseeable future. And, with the second year of working from home arrangements in progression, both leaders and teams alike have adapted to this new working model. In fact, there have been several distinct advantages in ensuring employee engagement too.

Continue reading “Organisation’s Guide On Efficiently Implementing A Hybrid Working Model”

Anyone can lead when the plan is working. The best lead when the plan falls apart.
– Robin Sharma

On any given day, organisations can run on autopilot. Of course, this doesn’t refer to a flat organisational structure where everyone is equal. Leaders at different levels will still need to lead their respective teams. But, a leader’s true mettle is tested best during times of crisis. A leaders only gets to join the ‘above and beyond’ club after battling a few unforeseen crises and challenges.

This blog is not about leadership development. It is not even about leadership. Rather, the limited scope of this blog is to discuss what a leader must do when an unexpected storm hits the team. The pandemic is on everyone’s lips now, but it is not the first or the first, or the only, crisis that leaders across organisations have faced. And nor, will it be the last.

The three quick pointers explained in this short blog will certainly be useful this year. And, they can also be part of a playbook later for any of the leadership challenges that you are bound to face even after the pandemic is over.

1. See, and Be Seen

The worst thing that can happen to a team during a crisis is the leader doing a disappearing act. Some leaders feel that employees might feel burdened with people looking over their shoulders while dealing with a workplace crisis. And, they would be right. But a leader needs to keep a close watch, nonetheless. This can help you identify the team members who might need your intervention. Also, it is important that you communicate your round the clock availability to your team. They should feel comfortable enough to reach out whenever they need you.

To further understand the art of communicating with your team effectively, here’s an insightful article by the Harvard Business Review. Another critical aspect of the leader ‘being seen’ is the leader’s public communication. When done effectively, this not only reassures the world at large, but also gives a boost of confidence to the employees as well.

2. Being compassionate doesn’t hurt

”Compassion is empathy in action”

A common behavioural trait expected of leadership development folks is zero tolerance for mistakes. And it might even prove useful in normal times. But, often times, during a crisis, it can do more harm than good. Think of a cab driver who misjudges an angle and brushes his car against an electric pole –

If this happens during a regular trip, all that he needs to do is correct his steering wheel and straighten the course of the car.

Now imagine this happening in a crowded city street on a day when you have given him twenty minutes to get you to the airport. In a corporate environment, this would be a crisis, right? Both his and your nerves would be fraught with tension.

As soon as he hears the sound of metal on metal, and your cry of warning, he gives a violent jerk on his steering wheel. The car careens towards the other side of the road and almost hits an oncoming vehicle, and you yell again in fear. To avoid a collision, he gives another sharp turn of the wheel.. you get the picture, right? One thing will lead to another do nothing for his self-confidence.

A much better strategy would be to assure him that mistakes happen only when someone is trying. Tell him you are okay with him committing an error, and he should do the job right the next time. Encourage him to learn from this error and move on.

3. Delegate and network effectively

Most organisations have a command and control structure with clear circles of influence. Everyone knows their place in the hierarchy and owns up their responsibilities, accordingly. This works fine when things are going in a routine manner. But this becomes a serious leadership challenge when the organisation is facing an adverse situation. Mckinsey and Co. published a blog in 2020 about leadership challenges during the pandemic. Any leader could replicate the recommendations of the article at other times as well.

The article explained that a top-down approach for decision making, based on a bottom-up approach for information gathering can be highly effective. But during a crisis, the volume and velocity of changes to the ground situation are too high for a regular hierarchy to handle. Thus, the senior leadership should not even consider taking all the pressure on themselves. Instead, it is better to place a different structure in place. Let us try to understand this alternate leadership development process, a little better.

The article suggest that aside from the senior executive team, two more teams should be set up. The first is the response leadership team that acts as the control centre for coordinating the different teams on the ground. This team would also act as a bridge to the senior executive team. The second team would consist of smaller decentralized sub-teams. They would be responsible for handling smaller bits of the crisis, like external and internal communications, technology, supply chain, company assets, employee support, outreach, and others.

Apart from a more efficient response, deploying such a decentralised network could also help the organisation efficiently employ its leadership development plan. The younger team members entrusted with handling some of these ad hoc teams would effectively be ready to take on greater responsibilities down the line.

Final thoughts

An organisation’s leadership development skills are truly tested during difficult times. You may continue with your routine leadership development strategies during the course of a regular year but the pandemic calls for a more proactive and decentralised approach. You can explore more such opinion pieces on leadership in the blogs section of our website for a wealth of literature on the subject. We hope our strategies will come in handy in helping you sail smoothly through these troubled waters.

For more leadership strategies that you can implement during the pandemic, speak to our team for a custom program.