Morgan Massie, award-winning leadership consultant, ICF-certified coach, and founder/CEO of Leadership and Training Concierge.
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After over two decades in the talent development industry, I understand the frustration firsthand. Imagine this: Your dedicated training team spends months developing an exciting new program for your organization's employees. Learners love the training and provide positive feedback on how fun the training was. Yet somehow, the training misses the mark in aligning with company strategy, and now you're getting pushback from leaders about the ROI of your program. It feels like all that hard work was a waste.
Let's discuss your training programs. Are they genuinely fostering employee growth while also aligning with your organization's strategic business objectives? Or do they fall just shy of hitting the target?
The conventional one-and-done approach to training is losing its allure. This is why talent development experts and business leaders are seeking a more effective solution—a more outcome-based approach that ensures training is directly tied to the organization's objectives.
Enter PROOF, a practical framework I've developed through leading and coaching talent teams that combines the alignment of training needs with a focus on creating an impactful and engaging learning experience. PROOF stands for purposeful, results-oriented, optimized learning, ongoing reinforcement and feedback-driven. Let's explore how you can implement this framework and ensure that your training initiatives hit the bullseye when it comes to your company's grand plans.
Purposeful: Assess Your Current Initiatives
An article published in Training Industry in April 2021 discusses the need for employee learning and development (L&D) to focus on improving business performance. The article highlights the importance of defining the objectives of L&D to align with the organization's strategic goals and business metrics. And it emphasizes the need for L&D leaders to focus on the business's progress toward goals, as measured by key performance indicators.
To gauge your existing initiatives through the PROOF lens, begin by assessing their alignment with your organization's strategic goals. Ask yourself:
• Are our current training initiatives filling a specific need or skills gap?
• Do our training initiatives align with our company's central purpose and long-term vision?
• Do our learning efforts directly contribute to specific, measurable outcomes that significantly influence the organization's success?
• Do organizational leaders understand the intended outcomes of our training initiatives?
Results-Oriented: Set Clear, Measurable Objectives
In the late 1960s, Dr. Edwin Locke found that setting challenging yet achievable goals leads to a remarkable 90% success rate in performance enhancement. This principle is relevant not only in theory but also when it comes to talent development professionals designing training programs.
To harmonize effectively with PROOF, consider the following:
• Identify key performance indicators that directly align with your organization's overarching goals.
• Develop practical and attainable goals for each training program, focusing on outcomes that propel individual growth and overall organizational advancement.
Optimized Learning: Craft Engaging Experiences
Optimizing learning revolves around creating engaging experiences that resonate. This involves thoughtfully designed learning journeys, diverse content formats catering to varied learning styles, a logical progression from basics to complexity, interactive components for active participation and supplemental resources for in-depth understanding.
The article "Training Methods: A Review and Analysis" by Barbara Ostrowski Martin, Klodiana Kolomitro and Tony C. M. Lam underscores the effectiveness of using a mixed-methods approach to best engage learners and achieve desired outcomes.
Consider these steps:
• Craft learning experiences that align with key learning objectives.
• Offer a range of content formats to cater to diverse learning preferences—encompassing a mix of audio, visual, self-paced and group learning.
• Structure the learning journey coherently, building from foundational concepts.
• Infuse interactivity to keep participants engaged, whether in-person or online.
• Supplement the journey with additional resources for those seeking deeper exploration.
Ongoing Reinforcement: Go Beyond The Training Room
Adapting to the fast-evolving business landscape necessitates ensuring that employees can apply newly learned skills immediately. This means training strategies need to extend beyond the classroom to support the integration of new skills.
The Society for Human Resource Management's 2022 Workplace Learning & Development Trends Report echoes this sentiment, highlighting the significance of cultivating ongoing learning reinforcement as a contributor to a positive employee experience.
To infuse continuous learning, consider these strategies:
• Integrate ongoing support, such as post-program coaching, mentoring and additional learning opportunities.
• Establish online or in-person learning communities where employees can share insights, ask questions and collaborate on real-world projects. This peer-to-peer learning fosters a sense of belonging and encourages continuous knowledge exchange.
• Assign cross-functional projects that require employees to apply and expand their newly acquired skills. This practical application reinforces learning and demonstrates its value in real-world scenarios.
• Collaboratively develop personalized learning plans for employees, tailoring their ongoing development to align with their career aspirations and the evolving needs of the organization.
Feedback-Driven: Cultivate A Culture Of Feedback
Creating a feedback-driven culture catalyzes a shift in how employees perceive growth, and it elevates training effectiveness. Encouraging ongoing exchanges of insights between employees and talent development professionals nurtures shared ownership over progress. This communication loop enhances strategies through real-time observations, suggestions and evaluations.
The potency of this paradigm extends beyond communication; it requires openness to feedback from all levels. Valuable insights can emerge from any part of the organization, bringing together perspectives to drive profound change. Embracing feedback as a catalyst ensures the training's adaptability and alignment with evolving workforce needs.
For cultivating a feedback-driven culture:
• Promote open and constructive communication between employees and talent development professionals, establishing an ongoing feedback loop.
• Welcome feedback from all levels, and use it to refine and enhance training initiatives.
By aligning your training with the PROOF framework, you won't just transform training—you'll elevate it. The process begins by ensuring that your training goes beyond checkbox exercises to foster employee growth and propel your business forward.
Are you prepared to harness the power of PROOF and elevate your training efforts? The decision is yours to make.
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