Or it can mean linking people with mentors who can help them advance their careers.Įmployee development is about more than productivity-it’s also about building a more equitable workforce. That can mean connecting employees around shared roles, like marketing or sales, or a shared skill base.
People learn best when they learn together. For example, this can take the form of a certificate or a gamified experience in which workers earn points or level up. Finding ways to demonstrate acquired skills is both motivating for employees and useful for managers. Technology is key to enabling this kind of personalized learning journey at scale. Use inclusive language that makes everyone feel welcome and teach skills that are customized to an individual’s role and existing knowledge base. To keep employees involved and motivated, deliver information through engaging stories, rather than static content. Teaching team members a few critical skills they need right now, then providing opportunities to practice as they go, makes learning feel more manageable and helps people retain information. Plus, it’s hard to retain a mountain of information without putting it into practice. Learning all the skills you’ll need for the next decade seems not just overwhelming but actually impossible in light of how quickly technology evolves. According to Salesforce’s research, around three-quarters of employees would rather learn on the job and in small moments throughout the day than in formal trainings. People process information better when they can digest it in bite-size chunks. Time is a precious resource, and we’ve learned that staring at a screen for hours on end is exhausting.
McKinsey estimates that up to 375 million people may need to learn new job skills by 2030 in order to adapt to technological transformation. To keep up with current workplace trends, employees need to develop both hard and soft skills. Providing educational opportunities also breeds loyalty, with two-thirds of respondents saying they would be more likely to stay with a company that invested in continuous learning. According to recent Salesforce research, more than 70% of knowledge workers say that having more opportunities for workplace learning would make them more productive and engaged at work.
ON THE JOB LEARNING DRIVER
Workplace learning has always been a key driver of success for both employees and companies. Hybrid work demands that companies find fresh ways to help employees build the skills they need to succeed. And companies need to go digital fast while bringing their workforce along. Managers want to engage and retain their teams, no matter where they’re based. In this hybrid work environment, employees are looking for ways to develop their skills and careers in order to thrive in a changing landscape.