Insights into developing a learning culture
Penny Tamkin, director of employer research and consultancy at IES, writes in Network News on recent IES work with HR Network members.
IES is currently supporting one of our members to fill some identified gaps in their skills strategy. Specifically, they have asked us to help them develop a learning culture, which will ensure they have the skills they need both now and in the future. To support them in this we have undertaken a range of small, fairly self-contained projects:
Evidence of learning cultures
We have looked at the evidence on the development of learning cultures, specifically the experiences of other organisations in doing so.
Learning champions
We have directly approached organisations which have used learning champions as a tool to support learning cultures. These ‘champions’ can come from very different places in the organisation: in some cases they are peers (Unionlearn[1] is a well-known example), in other organisations HR specialists take on the role, and in others it is line managers who formally support learning.
Effective career pathways
We have offered expert support on developing effective career pathways and exploring job families as another means of maximising learning – both generic and professional.
Improving data on learning and skills
A cluster of activity has sought to generate better information both of the current situation but also to improve the data capability around learning and skills for the future. We have cast an eye over existing survey data to highlight information perceptions of current skills and learning practice, and developed a brief pulse survey to gather additional information on what people think and feel about their learning and development.
Supporting the use of data
We have acted as a critical friend regarding data sources and data manipulation to generate better information on learning and helped develop training evaluation capability through a review of what other organisations do in the way of rigorous evaluation (Return on Investment being the Holy Grail of training evaluation) and the development of an evaluation toolkit.