Skip to main content

4 shifts in L&D

These are the 4 broad shifts I have seen in the L&D landscape over the last few years (this is a slightly elaborated post from the year end update). These are not shifts - these are more my learnings and you can classify these as my approach to L&D more than anything else. 

  • The death of inspirational training. A few years ago, this was the norm. Inspiration driven training with quotes, examples, visuals was supposed to move the audience into taking action. I have written about it here. Bordering on motivational talk, it exhorted the audience to "change". Net result - zero. Smiley sheets full marks.  There are still occasions where you might want to use it sparingly, but well not so much.
  • The death of day long trainings. Earlier trainings ran for 4 days like a test match and then came down to 1 day (8 hours). Post pandemic, I have found it useful to keep trainings to 2 hours max. What that also means is cut down on the inspiration talk and all that dive into the topic right off. So, the keep the training crisp, structured and very focused.
  • The death of "everything". Earlier trainings were like a Mughlai Chinese Andhra North Indian restaurant that served breakfast, lunch and dinner. Now we decide. If we are an Udupi restaurant - probably even just a breakfast specialist and try not to do too many things. Partcipants come, learn a specific skill and go back with specific tasks to practice. So, that means ultra focused skill building
  • The death of L&D as engagement. Sure do that if you money to spare on in-person training or with consultants. But the best L&D is always focused on business outcomes. Nothing more, nothing less. 

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Be Civil. Make nice!

Popular posts from this blog

The man who saved Pumpelsdrop

This was a story we had in college if I am not mistaken. Perhaps it was in school, but a delightful story it was. The story goes somewhat like this ( reproduced from here ), but the college version we had was slightly different from this.  I t was a dull, gloomy and a depressing morning in a town named Pumpelsdrop in northern England. The Great Depression had brought all the businesses to a standstill. The bored automobile dealer was spending time alone, as usual. But, this seems to be an unusual morning as an odd entity (customer) appeared on the horizon. A man in a bright suit walks up to the dealer and says, "I need to buy a Rolls Royce Phantom II. We have a business conference coming up and I need to impress my customers". Then proceeds to pay 10% of the deal with a single check for 2000 pounds. The rest he says will pay when he takes the delivery.   The auto dealer was stunned. He was delighted to hear that someone is holding a business conference of some kind and ...
Post a Comment
Read more

And the unconference happened

 Most conferences have an agenda. No, not the stated agenda, but an agenda of marketing, airtime to sponsors, ensuring the past and future customers are invited, of ensuring that the "stars" of the industry are invited and attention showered of them. All in all it is a your scratch my back, I scratch your back syndrome. Some of these become cliques and claques and therefore the real point behind a conference is lost. And then there is the unconference - organised and run by the alumni of the ISABS ODCP program. And as the name suggests, this is truly an un-conference organised by the alumni, for the alumni. No funders - except the alumni themselves. No sponsors. Just the team.  I havent seen a more tastefully organised conference (yes, its an unconference).  To begin with - the location - not a typical star hotel, but an outdoorsy place. The food - simple. The welcome - personal. It was like a homecoming. The setting was warm and welcoming. It was a smaller conference. Ju...
Post a Comment
Read more

Why does elearning exist?

 Elearning is one of those niches that does not deserve to exist. Yes, it was a novelty 20 years ago, but not now. It cannot exist. But somehow it does. Disclaimer: I used to head a content team once upon a time. And I used to ask those whom I hired - tell me the last thing you learnt from an e-learning. The answer is - pretty much nothing (and this is a good decade ago).  Why?  If you want to learn a recipe, you go to Youtube, or Reels or something like that. If you are terribly old fashioned - as in, you read - then you go to a website and read the recipe and make it.  Most other things you learn by doing or learning on the job or asking an expert.  If you have to learn something in depth, then there are other ways.  So, where does e-learning fit in all this? E-learning is one of those products that the customer hates, but has no choice, because someone has decided it is the best way. For instance, you have to learn a new CRM or some other product - you w...
Post a Comment
Read more