Strategic Human Capital Insights

Recently, organizations have had to adapt to a new operating environment in response to the pandemic. As you think about how you have had to adapt by instituting remote work, extended sick leave, and complying with new regulations, think about how these changes may have impacted your organization's health. 

It would not be unusual for your organization to have reverted to Maslow’s survival mode. And even though you may think that everything is OK, take a candid look at how you would rate the current organizational health of your group, division, or company. And as you look to the future, how do you plan for an organizationally healthy group that starts healthy and stays healthy throughout the year? And, if you need to repair some organizational health issues, what will you do?

What do we mean by organizational health? Health is a relatively simple concept. On a personal level, we use many terms to describe health. The positive terms are robust, energetic, improving, strong, and vibrant. On the less than positive side, the terms are lethargic, sick, failing, deteriorating, and declining. These same terms apply to organizational groups. That's why the term organizational health resonates with managers. It reflects the total dynamic impact of all the individuals' interactions and contributions within each group.  

What should you do to assess the organizational health of your group?
(Keep in mind that your managerial mindset needs to be totally objective & completely honest.)

Here is a 3-part checklist that may help you evaluate, build, and sustain organizational health.

When an organization is going through change (however it is initiated), its ability to strategically leverage Learning & Development (L&D) to accelerate the business through the cycle of change can be a key, strategic differentiator.

Employees who feel satisfied and successful are more engaged and perform at a higher level. This final stage of satisfaction and success is rarely achieved automatically without deliberate planning, action, and accountability.

Accelerating through the change cycle can move an organization to peak performance faster.

This blog was co-authored by Joanne Flynn, Jim Bosserman, and Debbie Gower.  This article combines perspectives and research from three strategic performance and learning and development professionals.

Part 5 – Learning & Development Series

“In the end, we expect our people capability to improve and our results to be better.” - said David Novak, CEO of YUM! Brands

How many other leaders have utilized learning to improve the performance of their business as effectively as David Novak? It is our observation that while many have utilized learning as a catalyst for improving business results, there are other leaders who, in looking back, would observe that they wished they had spent more time and effort on improving the capability of their workforce. 

In this case study, the role of learning and development (L&D) varied through the four transformations, and the business results were dramatically different.  It’s not uncommon for businesses to be distracted and forget about the power of learning to help improve performance and accelerate the pace of change of the business and its people.

This blog was co-authored by Joanne Flynn, Jim Bosserman and Debbie Gower.  This article brings together perspectives and research from three strategic performance and learning and development professionals.

What happens when you make learning a strategic investment in your people?  You “move the dial” on individual and organizational agility and, thus, the performance of the business.

In our series demonstrating why learning and development (L&D) is critical to an organization’s success, we offered points of view about:

• L&D’s “War to Develop Talent” to support organizational growth and change initiatives
• Leadership’s “Make or Break” role in L&D
• “Taking People with You” to develop a readied and enabled workforce
  
  

Discover more about the Learning Function itself and its true need to:

• Establish an active partnership with business operations to understand changing business and related workforce L&D needs
• Validate the results-driven connection between L&D investments and desired business outcomes
• Touch the “minds and hearts” of the workforce to reinforce the commitment to individual and collective organizational improvements
  

This blog was co-authored by Joanne Flynn, Jim Bosserman and Debbie Gower.  This article brings together perspectives and research from three strategic performance and learning and development professionals.

What happens when you make learning a strategic investment in your people?  Discover two real life stories showing how “taking people with you” achieves business performance objectives.  

This is the third post in our series demonstrating why learning and development (L&D) is critical to an organization’s success. We’ve previously set the stage for 1) why L&D needs to elevate its game to support organizational growth and change initiatives and  2) leadership’s “make or break” role in L&D.  Today we highlight the workforce … the “arm” of the organization that executes strategy and a key differential for success.

This blog was co-authored by Joanne Flynn, Jim Bosserman and Debbie Gower.  This article brings together perspectives and research from three strategic performance and learning and development professionals.

As we described in last week’s discussion, the first blog in our learning & development (L&D) series, L&D is critical to an organization’s success. It’s not surprising that CEO’s of organizations continue to assert that talent is their #1 or #2 concern, particularly as it relates to skill gaps. [1]

Significant business change typically requires:

1. Reassessment of business strategies, operating models, organization structures and competencies (i.e., knowledge, skills and behaviors) to address the very nature of work being performed
2. Answering the questions of our people: “How do I get my job done to my very best ability?” and “What is in it for me?”

For many organizations, the sales function is the front line of the marketplace. Keeping the sales function aligned with strategic goals can and does significantly impact growth. So, how could you ensure your current sales function is robust, ready, and up-skilled to accomplish the task? When is it appropriate to determine if it is time for learning and development to play a part in accelerating strategic growth goals?  

This blog was co-authored by Joanne Flynn, Jim Bosserman, and Debbie Gower. This article combines perspectives and research from three strategic performance and learning and development professionals.

What is the role of Learning & Development (L&D) in an organization’s growth and transformation?

What is the role of L&D in dealing with continuous change?

6 Key L&D Strategic Issues

Learning & Development is critical to an organization’s success. Although the “war for talent” focused attention and efforts on recruiting since the late 1990’s[1], the “war to develop talent”[2] recently emerged more prominently on CEO agendas. Why?  Concerns over talent shortages and skill gaps have created obvious obstacles to achieving business performance and transformation goals.

As a result, the investment and ROI to elevate organizational learning functions has become just as, if not more, important as “buying” talent through the recruiting function.

According to a recent Fortune article, “Why Startups Fail, According to Their Founders,” founders / CEOs feel pressure to “keep up the façade of success, even when things are actually falling apart behind the scenes.”  So, how do we avoid some of the most common traps and keep your start-up on course?

2 Leadership Milestones on The Upskilling Journey– A Personal Story

The background to this blog in Part I: I was off to a marketing conference to learn more about recent developments with our inbound marketing platform, new products and new functions.  This literal and figurative journey was overwhelming, to say the least.  Read Part I of this series for the full background.

Below are two issues that leaders must lead their people through on the individual upskilling journey. 

1. Knowledge Inadequacy and Emotional Angst

Leadership: Factor these feelings into the upskilling process.  To ignore this is unthinkable.  Proceed at your own risk!

Some people may look at all this new inbound marketing information and be excited. I face this new reality with trepidation.  I understand marketing, however, marketing technology is not as familiar to me.  I still classify myself as a beginner. These feelings do not inspire confidence. I have an admittedly low competence level with marketing technology tools.  I also recognize there is no denying or avoiding this new knowledge and skills reality. It’s here to stay.  To deny or avoid this new operating reality would create grave business consequences for my newly-launched business.