Our learning designs focus on reinforcing and promoting the personal characteristics, job skills and business knowledge required within applicable job functions. Most importantly, designs offer a guided learning experience to identify and illustrate the behaviors that will demonstrate practical application in the job role. This is the critical leverage point for learning. In our experience, companies come to understand the personalities and skills that are needed to be successful in their culture. Where they can excel is in teaching the actual “behaviors” that top performers exhibit in the job role. Ultimately, a Success Factors Study often is an essential exercise to establish instructional criteria for the learning design and for linking a learning initiative to broader human resource systems.

Linking to Human Resource Systems

Linking learning designs is viewed as an essential strategy for supporting an overall organizational learning initiative. We consider human resources as a broad system that involves activities throughout an employees life cycle. The learning design applied for our clients can extend to all human resources areas with specific recommendations for each activity to drive, support and measure desired performance behaviors.

For example, the performance planning activity can be enhanced with Individual Development Plan (IDP) processes to track success factor learning and improvement, training courses, and on-going coaching assessments. The performance review component can be updated to include new skills and knowledge targets. Finally, coaching methods for promoting and guiding organizational learning can accompany the overall learning design. In total, the goal of any comprehensive learning design is to positively impact and influence all arenas of organizational development - recruitment, on-boarding, and performance management.

Skill-building Workshops and Train-the-Trainer Programs

Our goal is to go beyond “skills training” by focusing on “building behaviors for job success.” Our organizational learning design work integrates the best practices for adult learning in order to generate outcomes aimed at enhancing individual and group capabilities, behaviors and performance. For all learning experiences, we focus attention on the creation of an active learning environment. There are multiple techniques employed in the active learning environment – all of which provide value for the organizational learner. When sequenced and offered in a thoughtful and engaging manner, we have found success in the ability to stimulate accelerated learning. Our goal is to generate a learning experience that moves from simple knowledge transfer to a dynamic learning experience so that concepts are not left to interpretation, rather, are understood through practiced application. When the learning design calls for direct skills training, our team generates workshops that present practical simulations and discussions of organizational relationships and interactions. Activities offer a chance to step outside of defined roles and participate according to natural character. Upon completion of an activity, participants dialogue about their experience and work together to modify behaviors, adjust expectations, and determine appropriate performance goals. The final step, as guided by trained facilitators, applies learning - desired behavior; rules for engagement; roles and expectations; corporate values - back to actual business scenarios. In doing this, participants become the mechanism for promoting positive behavioral change. It is a dynamic training method - one that allows individuals to become personally invested in driving purposeful work activities.

All Skill-building learning designs feature a companion train-the-trainer program to transfer facilitation responsibility to internal resources. Programs include customized, comprehensive facilitation manuals and direct training on learning technique to ensure successful delivery of intended design.