“We are living in a unique moment in history, and there’s no going back from the effects that the past year has had on us,” said Annee Bayeux, Chief Learning Strategist, EdCast speaking to a live audience at the People Matters L&D SEA Conference.
The world has had to adapt to our digital world – including industries, companies and individuals. “But not all transformations have been successful,” she noted.
Companies are still adjusting to new business realities. And McKinsey’s research shows that the dedication to learn about digital technologies and “to share tests and learn from findings across the organization” is only going to accelerate in the new world of work.
Now, more than ever, it’s a mandate to be bold – and to build digital from the ground up.
“In this context CLO’s are asking: How can they support the acceleration of digital? How to future-proof the learning tech stack? What can they do to ensure we have the right learning culture? And if we build technology, will employees adapt?” Bayeux noted.
The Jardine Matheson Experience
“Getting a learning platform is not going to suddenly drive up learning” Sanghita Bhakta, Head – Digital Learning, Jardine Matheson said as she reflected on the experience of the company to accelerate learning.
The company had a two-pronged approach to building capability.
- Structured, company-led learning opportunities – To build capabilities in leadership, management, soft skills and specific functional or technical areas.
- On-demand, employee-led self-motivated learning opportunities – at a point of need – to embed the habit of lifelong learning.
To support the mandate, the company came up with a marketing approach to take learning to the learners: A B2C + B2B strategy.
A B2C approach is simply a way to engage users from a top-down model with two outcomes in mind – To build a brand connected to “Create, share and learn” and to “make users self-sufficient” that ultimately helped build a culture of continuous learning. And within this strategy, the company focused on five steps:
- Identify and engage champions (Jardine Enthusiasts) – These were active users or subject matter experts (SMEs) or leaders, who the L&D team engaged with on a regular basis. The SMEs or Jardine enthusiasts were identified across the group to share their expertise. By participating in the exercise, it helped employees leave a legacy. And since this was a new exercise, there was an internal and external search (on platforms outside the company learning tools) to identify active employees who could be a part of this initiative. What really drove the success of Jardine enthusiasts was giving employees a framework to curate, validate and create content – mainly focused on podcasts and videos.
- Drive activation and engagement campaigns: Campaigns are critical to build a learning culture. On a quarterly basis, the L&D team focused on creating template-campaigns to drive employee connect and message. For example: One quarter was focused on the learning app, which promoted ‘learning-on-the-go’. The company also leveraged Ed Campaigns – to help regulate regular learning nudges.
- Build the users: In order to empower learners and help them answer each other’s questions, the company focused on creating DIY (Do it yourself) guides – from assessments, certification and showcasing their learning badges which could be posted on to LinkedIn.
- Content: There was a four pronged approach to content – The first of which was to buy the content, the second was to build learning communities, the third approach was curated learning – that’s focused on learning of the month. The fourth was focused on learner centred content including DIY content.
- Reward and Recognition – The focus is on creating, sharing and celebrating success stories. A data centred approach helps narrow down your reward and recognition program.