Driving organization-wide behavior change
We are all beginning to recognize and validate that the way we have done training in the past will not be the way we mold behaviors for the future. The strategic imperative of learning today rests on the premise that the only way to drive lasting behavior change is through solidly designed and actively monitored learning and development. It’s important the learning has a well thought out structure, engages our learners and affords a concrete application to all our learners, no matter where they are in their development or their place in our organizational hierarchy.
That’s why the “Know Me, Entice Me, Improve Me, Reward Me” model matters — not just to the people being developed, but to the organizations that are investing in their talent.
This approach to education will require effort, but the rewards are worth it! Managers need to be involved in the training space, not just learners, compliance officers, trainers and vendors. Successful learning is not done in isolation. People don’t adopt what isn’t reinforced. Can you remember a time you attended a training session (computer skills training is a great example)? What happened to your learning if it wasn’t used immediately? It was lost to the sands of time, right? I couldn’t build a pivot table in Excel if you held a gun to my head! I’ve had the training, but I didn’t use it.
You see your brain is a wonderful thing. It processes millions of items every day. And it is very good at prioritizing what is important and letting the rest of it go. That also happens in the training realm when training is not designed, monitored or applied in our everyday lives.
So let’s look at the model and see how we can use it to maximize our learning investment. Managers, listen up! You can help a great deal if you look at your learners (and yourself!) if you look at strategic learning through these lenses.
“Know Me, Entice Me, Improve Me, Reward Me”
Know me: Treat me as an individual and give me a personalized experience
- Know the resources I have at my disposal and my particular areas of interest
- Learn through data my preferred learning patterns – my preferred learning style (online, in person), types of resources I prefer such as thought leadership vs. technical performance support
- Learn who I am, my role, what materials are helping others and make meaningful recommendations to me
- Learn how frequently I wish to be made aware of new materials or materials that may be of interest to me
- Help me identify Goals, Gaps, Development and Opportunities that are specific to me
- Help me see how I am comparing to my performance objectives/personal success and design training opportunities to excel
Entice Me: Connect me to the tools, technologies, processes and people to do my job
- Provide a great user experience in my training. Relias Learning’s easy to use system is a great example. It was built from the ground up for senior care staff and its easy to use interface gets learners in and out with a minimal amount of fuss.
- Take just a few minutes of my day to share something insightful and that I might find useful
- Push information and content to me
- Connect me to the right learning resources that I might not naturally search for on my own
- Suggest information (process, people, information) that may be relevant and contextually useful to me
- Notify me when new resources are available so I can be the first to share new ideas with my team and my company
- Promote my accomplishments (badges, recognition). Relias Learning’s Learning Broadcast is a great tool to communicate, advertise and promote best practices of your brightest talent.
- Create fun ways to connect with peers
- Identify potential mentors and coaches to help me grow
- Provide me a way to easily find information and content
Improve me: Enrich my skills, experience, and education
- Provide me tools I can use to help my team, help show me as a leader, help me bring new thoughts and ideas to my company and my employees
- Provide a collaborative platform to engage with mentors or peers
- Create visibility into career potentials, development opportunities
- Provide me with a clear career path
- Help me to better understand the needs and goals of those I work with and for
- Onboarding: provide me with a solid onboarding experience to help me more quickly and effectively assimilate into the organization. The Relias Learning Assisted Living Quickstart curricula is designed specifically to help learners understand this setting and begin providing that resident experience quickly.
Reward me: Reward and recognize me for my contributions
- Help me to be seen as someone my company wants to keep, promote, and looks to for input on important matters
- Provide visibility of my accomplishments
- Help me to be seen as a well-informed leader or individual contributor
- Recognition
- Let me know when I have done well and encourage me to grow
- Provide me with feedback on my performance
- Manage My Own Destiny/Career
- Actively manage my employee profile to track experiences, skills, and development
“Know me, entice me, improve me, and reward me”
These are what employees want from strategic learning — and it’s what Skillsoft + Relias delivers. We have years of experience leading the market with learning design, content and management.
Our learning-centric approach allows organizations to respond in more thoughtful and proactive ways to sustainably maintain the right talent and close skill gaps.
