The blind spot as I see all too often involves designing solutions to fit the existing learning architecture and development tools. Status quo solutions can be a greater source of un-sustained workforce performance given the scope of performance restrainers extends well beyond what training can impact.
Category: Point of Work Assessment
If L&D cannot show impact at the bottom-line, L&D remains exposed as a cost center…and the bottom-line contribution can only be seen as an expense. Don’t be an expense when the budget belt gets pulled in a couple notches.
I’m convinced it all comes down to the intentions behind the design decisions we make…and if those intentions are not in lock-step with accelerating and sustaining workforce productivity first and foremost, we are left short…delivering potential at the hands of training solutions versus measurable performance outcomes at Point-of-Work.
There is another aspect of intentional design I refuse to put into just another bullet because it is foundational to successful and sustainable adoption of a performance paradigm. I could argue it’s the longer lens I mentioned in the beginning of this post, but it’s more than that. It’s the motivation…the commitment…the willingness…the readiness…to shift from a Culture of Learning to a holistic Culture of Performance.
We talk a lot about boosting employee engagement and making learning more engaging. Let’s shift our engagement focus to where the workforce works; enabling successful performance in the workflow lifts up employee satisfaction through job satisfaction…and accelerates productivity.
IT will do an outstanding job of testing, validating, fine-tuning, and deployment of the transitioned systems. My question is this, “Is L&D equipped to invest that kind of pre-launch rigor and…more importantly…to post-launch support to the knowledge worker’s in their respective workflows and moments of need?”
Our field of play has shifted closer to…if not converged directly into…Point-of-Work. This shift has disruption written all over it. Rules of engagement are being disrupted by increasing velocity of business demand and continuous change. If the rules change, so too must our game plan, and adoption of a Point-of-Work Solution Discipline represents a new game plan.
Have we lost sight of the end-game? This old dog was raised with the notion pounded into his head that if L&D does not produce measurable BUSINESS IMPACT, our jobs were at risk for being active participants as expenses in a cost center. Being viewed as an “expense” is not a safe place to be when decisions are made as to who goes and who stays. Trust me, if the choice falls between a department generating positive business impact with one that is contributing expenses to the bottom-line, the decision is easily made.
All organizations currently own a dynamic learning performance ecosystem. The inescapable question to ask is,
“HOW OPTIMIZED IS IT?”
A “Point-of-Work Assessment Methodology” is designed to provide the answer.
Our challenge is to optimize “Speed-to-Insight”…which is measured by the sum total of time invested that spans from searching through many information sources…to saving, curating, and forwarding “curated bulk information”…to enable critical-thinking that informs decisions through access to concise SIGNALS to individuals, groups, teams or the entire enterprise as “Actionable Performance Insights”. Everything in between is NOISE.