Events

Let me start by saying that I have argued the other side of the case I’m about to make.

Also, I see great value in just-in-time learning, feedback in the moment, and the ability to access the exact piece of information you need at the exact moment you need it. Digitizing and chunking content that we used to put into two- or three-day workshops is wonderful, and, with the use of technology, allows us to build really personalized development experiences for employees. I think it’s great for developing skills and improving performance.

I do wonder, however, about the broad stroke with which the idea of “snackable” learning is discussed and applied. Is there a place for it? Absolutely. Have we relied on courses only for too long? For sure. Is making something shorter the key to solving all employee development problems? Nope.

In the past, we needed employees to complete certain tasks in a certain way in order to increase the efficiency of our organizations. Today, business is moving so fast that we need them to think outside the box, be agile, and improve the system as they go. We need them to think critically. And often, to teach employees to do this, long form works better. Some things need to be presented in context. Sometimes a story works better than bullet points. And sometimes we should encourage employees to spend an hour thinking rather than surfacing an answer immediately.

Ironically, instead of a long form blog about this topic, I’m going to provide a bulleted list reasons that long-form may be a good addition to the L&D quiver of tools:

• Jeff Bezos says so. In his 2018 annual letter, Jeff Bezos reiterated his rule that PowerPoint is banned from executive meetings. He maintains that “narrative structure” is more effective because stories inspire, bullet points don’t. Instead of presentations, he asks “presenters” to craft a six-page narrative (no bullets and real sentences). The team spends 30 minutes reading in silence and then they discuss.
• “Snackable” often creates soundbites and echo chambers instead of real learning. So personal example here: I posted an article and quoted a stat this week about organizations that measure learning impact. I didn’t quote it correctly, which gave the impression that the stat was global, not local to India. One person corrected me (bless him). Everyone else shared it. There is opportunity for deeper context and higher precision in long form that isn’t available in the soundbite.
• There is a case to be made for “effortful” learning. Mary Slaughter and David Rock from the NeuroLeadership Institute wrote an article in Fast Company this week about achieving “desirable difficulty”. They posit that the brain needs to feel some discomfort when it’s learning, much like your muscles need to feel some level of discomfort when you’re training. Long form often requires more effort.
• Executives prefer long form for business insights. A study done last year by Forbes and Deloitte lists the top two preferred formats of executives for business insights as feature-length articles and reports, and business books. Interestingly, while they are very pressed for time, the C-Suite prefers longer forms for learning. Bruce Rogers, Chief Insights Officer at Forbes Media says: “CXOs need to think and act strategically, which is why they more often opt for longer pieces that take them from hypothesis, through case studies, to conclusion, and are based on credible data.”

I’m interested in your thoughts – how often are you incorporating long form into your employee development plans, and/or are you seeing a resurgence?

Simply put, L&D’s sole reason for existing is to ensure a skilled workforce. Hard stop.

In a world where businesses change so rapidly, employees move around frequently, and roles are constantly being adjusted, the job is now harder; but not impossible. New mindsets, technologies, and ways of working are creating opportunities for innovation in the employee development space.

Our learning and career research for the next six months will focus on creating an agile workforce. And as we set out to determine what exactly we should study, five fairly significant trends emerged.

• The rise of reputation
• Using tech to do completely different things
• A more integrated breed of L&D function
• Data as a development enabler
• Learning organisms

Trend #1: The rise of reputation.

To this point in history, organizations generally determine who needs what training, or who gets what role based on a very one-dimensional view of the employee – generally what can be found on a resume or in an employee profile: level, education, role, tenure, or leadership responsibility. Learning and performance initiatives, not to mention readiness discussions about subsequent roles, are often triggered by one or more of these variables.

However, this is no longer adequate for two reasons. First, organizations are developing more open career models and encouraging movement outside of traditional career paths. Second, employees find development opportunities on their own – both inside and outside of the organization. As a result, most companies lack a good understanding of current skills and knowledge of employees, let alone the direction they’d like to take in their careers.

Organizations are beginning to augment information found on resumes or in employee profiles with other information that indicates the reputation employees have developed. For example, organizational network analysis, or ONA, provides information about an employee’s reach within the organization, which can indicate a person’s influence, the resources they have at their disposal, and what parts of the organization hold their interest. Several vendors, including Degreed, Pathgather, and Edcast, among others, build transparency about networks into their systems.

Other reputation markers or indicators, shared through other systems like LinkedIn, Github, Yelp, or, if you’re in academia, RateMyProfessor, provide external data about how employees are perceived among their peers, or how they may need to develop to be more successful.

Trend #2: Using tech to do completely different things.

Most organizations use learning technology to automate things that they are already doing. A classic example of this is moving a course online rather than teaching it in the classroom. It’s both cheaper and more accessible, but chances are, there are few differences otherwise.

But we think there is more. In the past three months or so, we have seen organizations and tech vendors break out of traditional learning molds and begin to do completely different things through new technologies or combinations of technologies. While AI, VR, wearables, and the like, were considered too futuristic even a year ago, we are finding applications that help organizations personalize development experiences and build skills that they haven’t in the past.

Additionally, organizations are beginning to leverage technologies originally intended for other purposes for employee development. Slack and other messaging tools, business tools, like O365, (have you seen the resume helper that pops up when it thinks you’re drafting a resume?) are able to integrate opportunities for growth at the point of need. In fact, some of the biggest threats to the learning technology space will most likely come from the outside.

In the next few months, we’ll be talking about these technologies and their applications. Our goal is to help leaders categorize, understand, and make better decisions about the technology they use for development.

Trend #3: A more integrated breed of L&D function.

In the past, L&D functions have tended to be fairly siloed and often internally focused. Many have used vocabulary, metrics, and infrastructures that make sense only to them. This has made progress difficult for the L&D function, but has also hobbled the larger organization. Its tendency to remain separate has slowed down its ability to react to changes in the strategy and align to other business functions.

Lately, however, a new breed of L&D function has (finally) begun to emerge. Often led by leaders without an L&D pedigree, functions focus on alignment to the business strategy and external customer needs.

One way they do this is by integrating more tightly with other people practices. This integration enables systemic solutions – particularly those that result in a culture that supports the strategy. For example, if an organization competes on customer service, how employees are rewarded, trained, recruited, and led, should all be aligned to delivering great customer service.

These L&D functions are also aligning more closely to the rest of the business by viewing learning as something that happens inside the context of the work itself. Using the work for development simplifies the learning process (because context is built right in) and allows the organization to develop individuals at the same time it is improving the work, which leads to a more agile workforce.

Trend #4: Data as a development enabler.

While we’re at the beginning of this movement, we are seeing organizations start to use data to personalize development. Latent data collected from existing work tools – such as email, cloud storage, and calendars provides rich and useful information.

External vendor partners, such as Cultivate AI and Keen Corp are leveraging natural language processing (NLP) to turn latent data into data that can be analyzed. Analysis can determine politeness, engagement between individuals, and even bias. This information allows the system to provide in-the-moment feedback that helps them correct work at the same time employees are being made aware of language choices or biases that may hold them back.

This type of data can be a game changer for L&D. It moves them beyond smile sheets and completion data and helps them create systems that deliver business results, not just fulfill learning objectives. We’ll most likely be talking about this quite a bit in the following months.

Trend #5: The learning organism.

In more evolved organizations, learning has pretty much taken on a life of its own; they have in essence become organisms. that learn, grow, and develop based on their habitat and the ability to make use of it. The more in sync these organisms are with their habitat, the more quickly they are able to react to change, take calculated risks, and evolve as necessary.

We’ve noticed that more evolved organizations view the habitat in at least four buckets: the company’s attitude toward learning in all of its forms, the ability to use work and tasks as the main conduit for development, the infrastructure and technology in place, and the actual, physical and virtual environments. Evolved organizations emphasize alignment of these four areas and make them into a cohesive environment that encourages the organism to find what it needs, when it needs it.

In the coming months, we’ll be exploring this idea further, providing case studies, insights, and best practices for building the right habitat for development.

Do these ideas resonate? Did we miss something big?

With the currently extremely low unemployment numbers, many organizations are searching for a way to respond better to their employees' needs and are increasingly investing in this space. This is important, as this acceleration is driving several other substantial trends. Below are the top five on our radar right now.

• Converging people practices – but they need to create business results (not just a common employee experience)
• Designed networks – seeing the world and creating it as we want it to be
• Diversity and inclusion – now core HR responsibilities
• A new era in people data – with great power comes great responsibility
• Leading in a time of artificial intelligence and other advanced technologies – developing new leadership muscles and reflexes

Trend #1: Converging people practices that create business results

Many organizations are trying to be more responsive to employees’ needs. However, if talent organizations operate in silos (e.g., separate performance management, learning, leadership, and other talent management activities), it is difficult to adequately understand employees’ needs and respond appropriately. Understanding this, many leaders are talking about “talent management and learning converging” and creating a “consistent employee experience.”

There is a lot good about this approach. Many organizations are trying to holistically understand employees’ experiences and bring together their talent practices in more integrated ways. Companies are using a variety of tactics, such as design thinking and agile development methods, as well as new tools, such as employee listening and pulse survey technologies (vendors include Glint, TinyPulse, and Waggl, among others), to create programs and experiences that are much more holistic, consistent, and responsive to employees. This is good.

This approach can use some refinement, however, when it comes to why organizations are creating a “consistent employee experience.” The purpose cannot be just to “treat employees like customers” or to increase engagement scores or happiness (not that we have anything against engagement or happiness). Rather, the purpose of an employee experience should be to reinforce the organizational activities and behaviors necessary to drive business results. For example, if an organization needs to focus on innovation, then its “consistent employee experience” should focus on driving innovative behaviors. The organization should recruit, develop, assess, promote, and reward for the characteristics that drive innovation. A consistent employee experience should exist to keep the business laser-focused on success.

Trend #2: Designed networks – seeing the world and creating it as we want it to be.

A lot has been written about the importance of networks in organizations, but leaders are beginning to design for them more intentionally. For example, Cisco implemented Team Space to help leaders better understand their teams and how to work with them more effectively. Vendors have also taken up the charge, with organizations such as Polinode, Syndio Solutions, Swoop Analytics and TrustSphere, and consultants such as Rob Cross, offering solutions that help companies understand the networks in their organizations and how to design them intentionally. Some learning vendors, such as Degreed, EdCast, and Pathgather, as well as performance vendors such as Zugata, are also beginning to integrate network data into their solutions to make them more responsive and personalized.

This focus on designed networks will likely accelerate, as new data make clear the impact of individuals’ context on their performance and how changes to networks and teams can drive impact for the organizations. Yet, a focus on networks and teams will force a re-thinking of talent management activities. For example, how should an organization approach learning, succession management or performance management, when the focus is first on the network, not the individual?

Trend #3: Diversity and inclusion – now core HR responsibilities.

Recent social movements, epitomized by the #MeToo movement, have highlighted that many HR departments have not responded adequately to issues of diversity and inclusion (D&I) in their organization. As employees expect their organizations to be more responsive, this will include D&I. Expect to see D&I more integrated into sourcing, talent selection, performance management, learning, leadership development, succession management, and other practices. Given the positive impact of creating an inclusive culture on business outcomes, this pressure to integrate is good. Also, we are at the beginning of a rush of technologies that will help leaders understand opportunities to behave in different ways, not just count representation numbers (for example, ADP, Cultivate AI, Entelo, Limeade, SAP SuccessFactors, Syndio Solutions, and Zugata all have solutions focused in this space).

Trend #4: A new era in people data – with great power comes great responsibility.

People have been shouting about Big Data from the mountaintops so long that it is hard to hear the messages about it anymore. That said, technology solutions are beginning to capture pre-existing data that could not be analyzed before – and organizations are starting to take action on those insights. As mentioned above, there are a host of vendors focused on organizational network analysis. Other vendors are translating text into data, offering natural language processing (such as Fama, Cultivate AI, Glint, and IBM), which can help identify trends in text feedback.

But, as they say, with great power comes great responsibility. While there is a rise in powerful tools to analyze new data types, there is also a lot of discussion about data privacy and ethics. This is even more so the case now, with the recent Cambridge Analytica story — and that company's ability to predict behaviors by combining personality, relational, and activity data — coming to light. Europe is much further ahead of the United States when it comes to data and privacy rules, with the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) coming into effect this May. This topic of data ethics and transparency will likely accelerate dramatically across the next year.

Trend #5: Leading in a time of AI and other technologies

As others have written, rapid changes in technology, as exemplified by artificial intelligence, automation, and cognitive computing, represent large-scale opportunities and disruptions for organizations. Much less discussed is how leaders’ behaviors need to change to be more responsive to employees' needs.

There are at least three questions to examine here. First, how can these advanced technologies enable leaders to be more effective and responsive than before? For example, technology at Cultivate AI and Keen Corporation analyzes sentiment, tone, and response time in email and chat interactions, enabling leaders to understand when there has been a change from historical levels. Other technology, such as that from Bunch AI, allows organizations to analyze historical and current communications in Slack, and compare them to common cultural models and norms. The technology then provides suggestions on how to evolve culture and tools to monitor on a continuous basis. While these tools (and lots of other not-mentioned tools) are potentially powerful, leaders need to understand how and when to use them effectively. Unfortunately, there is currently little information on this topic.

Second, how do these advanced technologies change the experience of leaders’ “followers”? Historically, at least some portions of leaders’ power came from information asymmetry – leaders had information that their followers did not. However, information is increasingly ubiquitous, and with the rise of technologies such as those cited in the paragraph above, information and insights may become known to followers before or at the same time as to leaders. Further, as exemplified by “fake news,” the information followers receive may not be accurate, but followers may not understand this. Finally, with the increasingly sophisticated analysis and communication tools available, followers may create insights or find someone who has knowledge that exceeds that of their leaders.

Third, given these changes, how do leaders need to behave differently? We posit that a big part of the shift will come from leaders diminishing or relinquishing a “command and control” approach in favor of a “curate and coach” approach to leadership. While information is critical, understanding context, mapping potential actions and their consequences, determining appropriate communication approaches, and connecting followers to others within their network, will become increasingly critical to leaders. Doing this effectively will require leaders to develop new muscles and reflexes that many lack today.

This represents our initial thinking on what’s changing with talent management today. What do you think? Is there anything you especially agree – or disagree – with from this list? Are you a vendor offering solutions in this space (if so, let me know!)? What other suggestions do you have? We’ve put together this conjoint analysis survey, where you can vote on the top trends for talent management, make suggestions of others to add to the list, and see what others think. You can also feel free to email me at stacia at redthreadresearch.com or make a comment in the comment field below.