Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10

Transcription

1 Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10 White Paper White Paper

2 White Paper > Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10 Abstract Many organizations around the world are investing time and effort to redesign their learning and development strategy and practices using 70:20:10 principles. Although the 70:20:10 model is on the surface a simple one, it carries with it significant change implications. Organizations implementing 70:20:10 need to think about, and review, their level of readiness if they are to successfully exploit the approach. Factors such as organizational culture, executive support, manager and team leader attitudes, HR and L&D capability, technical infrastructure, and tools and processes all play a part in successful adoption of the 70:20:10 framework. This paper, the first in a series of three focused on successful 70:20:10 implementation, discusses these organizational challenges and provides guidance for addressing each. It also includes a simple organizational readiness checklist you can use to determine the areas you may need to focus on, and where potential obstacles may occur. After the introduction, there is a brief overview of the 70:20:10 model. About the Author Charles Jennings is a leading thinker and practitioner in learning, development and performance. Charles has consulted on, and led, learning and performance improvement projects for multinational corporations, government agencies, not-for-profits, and other organizations for more than 35 years

3 Development generally begins with a realization of current or future need and the motivation to do something about it. This might come from feedback, a mistake, watching other people s reactions, failing, or not being up to a task in other words, from experience. Michael Lombardo and Robert W. Eichinger, in The Career Architect Development Planner. 1 Introduction This paper is the first in a series of three explaining the requirements for successful adoption of the 70:20:10 model for learning, development and for achieving high performance. The second paper addresses issues of technology, tools and process readiness. The third focuses on building the business case for 70:20:10. The 70:20:10 model, above all else, is an agent for change. It is a framework for extending our focus on learning beyond classrooms, workshops or executive retreats and out into the daily workflow. It helps us move from a world of learning events into an environment where continuous learning and development is part of daily work. Change management experts emphasize the importance of organizational readiness and preparation for change. However, unlike individual readiness for change, organizational readiness has not been the subject of extensive theoretical or empirical study 2 and there are no cookie cutter solutions. So it s important to understand what should be considered in your own organization as you start the 70:20:10 adoption process or embed it further. If 70:20:10 is to be successfully implemented in an organization, collective behavior 3 needs to take place. People across the organization need to be provided with a clear understanding of the change that s going to occur, their role in the change, and how it is likely to affect them. There are other considerations that also need to be taken into account. This paper addresses the following of these considerations: Cultural Readiness Executive Support Readiness Team Leader and Manager Readiness HR and L&D Readiness Technical Infrastructure Readiness Tools and Process Readiness This paper also provides a simple practical checklist to use as part of the organizational readiness process. The 70:20:10 Model: A Brief Overview Our understanding of how high performers reach the heights has become far clearer in the past few years. This new knowledge is now being reflected in the way organizations are looking to change their approaches to learning and development. High-performing people engage in cycles of continuous development. Some of this development occurs through e-learning, classroom courses, workshops and other structured learning activities. However, the bulk of the development that leads the way toward high performance comes through learning from the daily workflow and from others in the workplace. Of course, an airline pilot or surgeon, or any other worker for that matter, will usually need to undertake structured training on their way to qualification in their field. However, when we study how the high performers have reached high levels of excellence we find it is invariably through challenging experiences, practice, conversations with mentors and peers, tapping their professional networks, and reflection. Additionally, high performers are motivated to get better at what they do. Continuous learning and motivation together create the path to high performance. With this in mind, an increasing number of organizations across the world are turning to the 70:20:10 framework as a way to support this process of continuous learning and motivation. The framework provides a simple and structured mechanism that offers the potential to extend the focus on learning beyond the classroom and into the workflow. 70:20:10 has emerged from a range of studies over the past 40 years that have shown informal and workplace learning to be increasingly pervasive and central to learning in organizations. 1

4 White Paper > Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10 Studies have produced varying figures of the amount learned in these ways, 4 and each organizational culture will display its own profile of workplace, social and structured development opportunities. However, these studies all indicate that most learning occurs not in classrooms, but in the daily workplace. The 70:20:10 numbers themselves are usually credited to a small study by Morgan McCall and his colleagues working at the Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) in the early 1990s. The output from one piece of research, a survey with a small group of high-performing managers, reported: Lessons learned by successful and effective managers are roughly: 70% from tough jobs 20% from people (mostly the boss) 10% from courses and reading This ratio underpins the basic reference model for the 70:20:10 strategic framework. It is important to appreciate, however, that 70:20:10 is not a rule or rigid formula. The ratio of experiential, social and structured development in any situation will be dependent on factors that are specific to individual context. In a highly regulated environment we would expect the 10 to assume greater importance. In a highly innovative environment we would expect to see a skew toward more 70 and 20 types of development. 70:20:10 Cultural Readiness Organizational readiness for 70:20:10 starts with culture. The role of culture and the need for a cultural shift to change approaches to learning were identified and explained by Chris Argyris and Donald Schön as long ago as Argyris and Schön s work on double-loop learning made it clear that one of the major elements that hold learning back is organizational culture. To break single-loop learning where principles are never questioned, and to develop true learning cultures, they argued double-loop learning is needed Companies can learn how to resolve the learning dilemma. What it takes is to make the ways managers and employees reason about their behavior a focus of organizational learning and continuous improvement programs. Teaching people how to reason about their behavior in new and more effective ways breaks down the defenses that block learning. 6 Chris Argris, Professor of Education and Organizational Behavior, Harvard University 2

5 where experiences, and reflection on those experiences, help change organizational norms and enable organizations to do things totally differently. Argyris work was a significant influence on Peter Senge, whose vision for a learning organization 7 incorporates not only personal mastery but also building shared visions and continual loops of team learning. For organizations wishing to implement 70:20:10 at the core of their learning strategy, there is a need to get an understanding of the cultural norms that exist and then assess whether they will support or work against the underlying principles of 70:20:10. These underlying principles are: Learning is a continuous process, not a series of events Most learning happens as part of day-to-day work and by interacting with other people in the workflow and beyond The organization, its managers and every individual worker all hold responsibility for incorporating opportunities for learning into everyday work Equally, they all hold responsibility for extracting and sharing learning from work Even if there is a match of cultural norms of the organization with these principles, there s still a need to ensure that everyone in the organization understands the implications of adopting the 70:20:10 model and their own responsibilities within the framework. Initial work will involve a well thought-out and executed communications campaign with the communications and internal marketing specialists working alongside the HR and L&D teams. A cultural readiness campaign will make it clear to everyone across the organization the change that s going to occur, their role in the change, and how it is likely to affect them. When the business case is built for adopting 70:20:10 (the subject of the third paper in this series), evidence-based reasoning of the benefits of 70:20:10 to the organization will need to be clearly laid out. The cultural readiness work should draw on this evidence-based reasoning and give people the opportunity to question and challenge the proposed change. Learn more about how Informal Learning delivers significant benefits. Start small and build on success. Executive Support Readiness Without executive support, any change initiative is likely to fail. A high level of executive support is absolutely critical for 70:20:10 adoption. 70:20:10 usually requires fundamental changes to workforce development mindsets and processes. It is not a matter of simply reconfiguring L&D or HR processes. This executive support required goes beyond general approval and any financial sign-off that may be required. Executives need to both actively support the principles of 70:20:10 and act as role models themselves. At the outset, it is important to engage as many senior executives as possible. A single executive sponsor is usually not enough. 70:20:10 impacts everyone every individual contributor, team manager, manager of managers, and the senior leaders themselves. One senior executive, even the CEO, is not able to exert influence wide enough for 70:20:10 adoption to be successful, although it is certainly helpful if the CEO is actively involved. One step in ensuring appropriate executive support and involvement in a 70:20:10 implementation is to establish or reconfigure your learning governance board or council. Many organizations have learning governance boards, but often membership is primarily made up of senior HR, talent and L&D managers who deal with detailed operational matters. 70:20:10 extends learning beyond the management and control of these groups so it is imperative that the membership of a governance board or council is primarily senior executives. If you are to engage senior executives in this way you need to make it clear that governance board membership will not be onerous. The focus of the board will be to make strategic and operational decisions that will determine the quality of the organization s most valuable resource its people. Team Leader and Manager Readiness 70:20:10 succeeds or fails on the actions of team leaders and managers. People managers have greater impact on improving performance and developing high-performing organizations than anyone else, including the HR and L&D departments. This fact has been known for years. Mary Broad and John Newstrom s work on the transfer of training indicated that even with formal training (the 10 in 70:20:10) the actions managers take before and after training events have the greatest impact on the effectiveness of the training. This involves managers selecting the right people for the right training; working with the trainer(s) to ensure the training is aligned with their own expectations; and, importantly, supporting their people once training has been completed and providing opportunities for the new learning to be applied. 3

6 White Paper > Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10 Newstrom, in a study in 1986 (nearly 30 years ago!) found that HR professionals estimated only 15% of training content was still being applied by learners one year after training. In today s fast moving world, we can only expect that figure to be lower. Newstrom reported the three most powerful forces leading to this low percentage and working against the transfer of training and conversion into improved performance were: lack of on-the-job reinforcement; interference from the immediate environment; and a non-supportive organizational climate. Each of these speak to the need for readiness organizational readiness, manager readiness, and technology, tools and process readiness. Managers also determine whether people stay with their organization (the adage you join an organization and leave a manager has been validated over and over again). So not only are managers best placed to support employee development and drive high performance, they are best placed to help maintain that high performance. A key part of your organizational readiness work should focus on ensuring team leaders and managers understand the benefits, and agree that their role in developing their people is at least as important as operational excellence, if not more important. You should also ensure these team leaders and managers have tools to help them deliver on the people development aspect of their job. Learn more about how collaborative technology helps learning and talent programs. HR and L&D Readiness The right HR and L&D mindset and capability is essential to support 70:20:10 learning. HR and learning professionals should ready themselves for 70:20:10 by making sure they understand their new extended roles and the new skills and capabilities they will need to support learning in the workplace. Implementing 70:20:10 involves extending the focus on learning. This means HR and learning professionals will be stepping into territory many have not explored previously. The requirement to step beyond designing, developing and delivering courses, programs and e-learning (although, of course, these activities will still be required) means HR and L&D professionals need to bring new capabilities to play. For example, performance analysis skills (rather than training skills analysis) are required from the outset. Designing solutions for the full 100% is essential. Training needs analysis supports the 10, not the 100. Performance analysis requires the skill to analyze the root cause of performance problems and then craft solutions to support learning in the workplace through: encouraging and facilitating social and networked learning; enabling informal coaching and mentoring, and; designing structured learning that leverages and links to the workplace. Equally, curation and community support skills and capabilities become as important as instructional design skills in a 70:20:10 world. As does the ability to design performance support solutions. A 70:20:10 view means the learning landscape immediately becomes richer, more complex, and more nuanced. One of the other main readiness challenges for these groups is adopting the mindset that most learning can be facilitated, supported, encouraged but not managed. Watch the webinar Social Learning is Taking Off! Are you on board? Technical Infrastructure Readiness Technology alone is not enough, but it is a critical factor in a successful 70:20:10 strategy. A rich and flexible technical infrastructure is absolutely necessary for a successful 70:20:10 implementation. Shlomo Ben-Hur, former chief learning officer at Mercedes-Benz, DaimlerChrysler, and BP and now professor at IMD Business School, explains that we are living not so much in an era of learning technology, but of mobile, cost-effective technology. Ben-Hur argues that maturing technology infrastructure and changing workforces and workplaces have come together to create a perfect storm. It is essential for the technology infrastructure to support the changing workforces and workplaces, and this, according to Ben-Hur, means going beyond traditional learning technology design and functionality. 70:20:10 practices will demand this. The technology required to support both the richness and the reach of 21st century learning where people expect to exploit learning wherever they are and at any time of the day or night in rich and engaging ways must be designed with experiential and social learning prominently in mind. Tools and technology to support social sharing; user-generated content; extensive 4

7 repositories of rich media materials that can be accessed at, and just before, the moment of need ; expert location; and many other requirements need to be woven into the technical landscape. The second paper in this series will explore the technological readiness in more detail as this is a critical element in supporting the 70:20:10 learning approach. Tools and Processes Readiness Marshall McLuhan once explained that we shape our tools and then our tools shape us. Our interaction with both technological tools and with sometimes more mundane processes bears McLuhan s observation out. We can deploy the most sophisticated technologies and build complex and detailed organizational processes to support new learning and development approaches such as 70:20:10, but unless we understand how to best use the technologies and how to best structure our processes, there s a very good chance we will end up with complexity that actually lowers our ability to build capability and to get work done. The British Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) data on national labor productivity shows that since the 1980s and despite vast investment and research in technology, tools, and processes, our ability to achieve greater productivity overall has been very limited (around 1% growth per year). A significant contributor to this relatively low increase in productivity has been lack of ability to deploy and use tools and processes in the best way possible. The right tools are critical, but the right use of those tools is just as important. The second paper in this series will explore readiness for 70:20:10 learning in the context of tools and processes in more detail. Learn more about how Saba s Learning@Work LMS supports the 70:20:10 model. 5

8 White Paper > Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10 Organizational Readiness Checklist This checklist has been designed to be a reflective action tool. Use it to carry out a quick assessment of your organization s readiness for 70:20: Checklist Item Our organization has a strong culture of learning and development that is supported by senior executives and managers. Our organization has a clear learning strategy that is focused on exploiting experiential and social learning in addition to structured development. At least some of our senior leaders understand the benefits of learning on the job and actively support our efforts to create a learning culture. Most of our managers and team leaders understand their roles as developers of their teams as well as agents of operational excellence. Our employees are aware that their learning and development is the joint responsibility of themselves, their managers and the organization. Our HR performance review and development objectivesetting process encourages experiential and social learning and development. Our learning governance council/ board has representative membership from our key stakeholders. It does not consist of only HR/L&D people. Our senior L&D teams work closely with HR management and HR business partners, even if L&D sits in the business line and reports to business managers. Our L&D teams always engage with senior stakeholders during the design and development of learning solutions to ensure their needs are being met. Our L&D leaders understand 70:20:10 and the implications it might have for L&D skills and capability development and for mindset change. Our IT policy and our technical infrastructure support a range of new ways of working and learning (mobile, social, just-in-time support). Our L&D team has an ongoing review process for new tools and processes that can support extending learning into the workflow. Level of Readiness low moderate high Actions 6

9 References 1 Lombardo, Michael M; Eichinger, Robert W (1996). The Career Architect Development Planner (1st ed.). Minneapolis: Lominger. p. iv. ISBN Weiner, B. (2009) A theory of organizational readiness for change. In Implementation Science 2009, 4:67. 3 Ibid. 4 Learning through experience/informally research reports: 70% (Tough, 1971, 1979); 70% (Bruce, Aring, and Brand, 1998); 62% (Zemke, 1985 and Verespej, 1998); 70% (Vader, 1998); 85 90% (Raybold, 2000); 70% (Dobbs, 2000); 75% (Lloyd, 2000). 5 Argyris, C. and Schön, D. Theory in Practice: Increasing Professional Effectiveness (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1974). 6 Chris Argyris, Teaching Smart People How to Learn, Harvard Business Review Vol.4 No Senge, P. The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization. (1990), Doubleday, ISBN

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