The Performance Improvement Blog

ASTD Webcast on Manager's Role in Employee Learning and Performance Improvement

I did a webcast for the American Society for Training & Development (ASTD) on the topic of the manager’s role in employee learning and performance improvement. That must be a hot topic for trainers and managers because the presentation was well attended with over 500 registrants. If you didn’t attend and would still like to listen to my talk and see the slides, go to the ASTD site.

The Cliff’s Notes version is in three parts. First, I defined learning in organizations as “acquiring and applying the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and beliefs that help individuals, teams, and whole organizations improve performance.” The important point is that it is not enough to acquire new knowledge and skills; this learning must be applied and make a difference for the organization.  Supporting learning is not in addition to a manager’s job; it IS a manager’s job.

Second, managers will face barriers to learning in organizations that must be overcome. Five of the biggest barriers are: 1) tendency of organizations to focus on their parts, not the whole; 2) the myth that organizations don’t have sufficient resources to support learning; 3) separating work and learning, as if they are different; 4) top leadership’s passivity toward becoming actively involved in employee learning; and 5) a workplace culture that does not encourage continuous learning.

The third part of the presentation was about what managers can do to support employee learning and performance improvement. Given the definition of learning and the barriers to learning, a tool that can be used by manager’s to become active agents of learning is the 5As Framework, which is made up of:

• Alignment
• Anticipation
• Alliance
• Application
• Accountability

I used Zingerman's Community of Busnesses as an example of the application of the 5As Framework.

Again, a more in-depth explanation of all of these points is available at the ASTD site for the webcast.

Manager's Role in Learning and Performance Improvement

What should be a manager’s role in employee learning? This is the question I will be answering in an ASTD-sponsored webcast on September 24, 2013 from 1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m. Eastern Time.  

In answering this question, the first thing managers have to understand is that continuous learning is the modus operandi for all high performance organizations. Individual, team, and enterprise performance can’t improve without learning. Learning isn’t in addition to a manager’s job; it IS a manager’s job.

By “learning” I mean acquiring the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and beliefs that help individuals, teams, and whole organizations improve performance. An engineer in a prototype department of a manufacturer learns how to operate a 3D printer.  Cross-functional team members in a marketing firm learn how to run their project meetings more effectively. A hospital learns how to put the “wow” in customer service.

Learning breeds learning and success breeds success. Marshall and Kelly Goldsmith make that point in this comment about the importance of employee development (i.e., learning):

Developing people is a strategic process that adds value to both the employees and the bottom line of the organization. Highly committed, highly competent people create financial rewards for the organization; organizations that develop their people and provide opportunities for growth are sought-after by high-impact performers. Great leaders know this simple formula. They understand it and strive to create an environment that supports it. And the result is success!

Google did a study of its employees and found that managers are successful in Google, not because of their technical expertise, although that’s important, but because of what they do to help team members learn and develop and achieve success.

Four trends are making continuous learning an essential part of doing business today.

• Computer technology has made the access to and management of new information easy and timely. Learning can occur at your desk or on-the-go, synchronously or asynchronously, individually or in groups.
• Individuals want personalization of their own learning. They can find instructional material and tools when and where they need them and at little cost in money and time.
• Competition is cheap and can come from anywhere in the world. To stay competitive, you have to be more knowledgeable, more skilled, and better able to apply that knowledge and skill effectively.
• Employees need agility when it comes to information. They need to be able to search, locate, evaluate, select, and apply information. They need to take information from a wide variety of sources, not only from trainers and educators, and translate that information into knowledge and wisdom. They need to be curators of information. 

These trends impact everyone in a company, not only HR and trainers. These trends disrupt the status quo constantly. Annual planning is too late. Waiting for the next budget is too late. Signing up for the next available class is too late. Managers must support and facilitate just-in-time learning that is responsive to emerging needs. A hospital, wishing to become more efficient and effective, has implemented “lean” by inviting the staff of departments to workshops on the application of “lean” in healthcare. That’s admirable and maybe some employees will enjoy learning about lean healthcare, but this approach is unlikely to make a significant change in how the hospital as a whole does things or in the results it gets.

In contrast, Zaxby’s, a franchisor of gourmet chicken restaurants with 20,000 employees, has made training and development part of every manager’s job. Managers have control of their own learning, not corporate trainers, HR, or a CLO. And, because of this, store managers have embraced continuous learning for themselves and for their employees.

However, all managers face organizational barriers to making learning part of everyone’s job. I have described these barriers in a previous post. One of the major barriers to learning is a culture that does not value learning. Producing and selling things is valued, but not learning. Supervisors don’t release direct reports from their workplace to attend workshops and other learning events. Managers don’t recognize and reward employees for learning new skills. Creativity and innovation are discouraged; leaders cling to the status quo.

The 5As Framework offers managers a model for overcoming these barriers. According to this framework, any learning intervention, whether it is a workshop, a course, a DVD or online video, a game or simulation, coaching, mentoring, action-learning, job-rotation, internship, or any of a dozen other ways to structure learning experiences, should be designed with five factors in mind:

1. Alignment: Align learning with strategic business goals
2. Anticipation: Set an expectation for performance improvement
3. Alliance: Create a learning alliance between learner and manager
4. Application: Apply new learning immediately
5. Accountability: Hold learner and organization accountable for business results; measure impact

Zingerman’s, the internationally famous deli and gourmet food retailer in Ann Arbor, Michigan, applies the 5As to the development of their employees. All managers are expected to 1) provide context for the training, 2) reinforce how the training can help the employee/trainee to be successful and 3) help the trainee put the learnings from the training to good use. 

So back to the question: “What should be a manager’s role in employee learning?” The answer is that managers have an essential role. Given the times we live in, managers must make ongoing learning and performance improvement part of what they do on a day-to-day basis for themselves and for the people they supervise.  We have models and tools for making this happen.

Defining Organizational Culture

When we talk about an organization’s culture, what do we mean? The term “culture”, like “engagement” and “learning”, is in danger of losing its meaning as people use it arbitrarily to describe everything about organizations. If we say we want to change an organization’s culture, we need to be very clear about what it is we are seeking to change and how we will know when that happens. Otherwise, confusion will become a barrier to meaningful improvement.

Merrian-Webster lists nine different definitions of “culture”:

1. the act of developing the intellectual and moral faculties, especially by education
2. expert care and training
3. enlightenment and excellence of taste acquired by intellectual and aesthetic training
4. acquaintance with and taste in fine arts, humanities, and broad aspects of science as distinguished from vocational and technical skills
5. the integrated pattern of human knowledge, belief, and behavior that depends upon the capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge to succeeding generations
6. the customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social group; also : the characteristic features of everyday existence (as diversions or a way of life} shared by people in a place or time
7. the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution or organization 
8. the set of values, conventions, or social practices associated with a particular field, activity, or societal characteristic 
9. the act or process of cultivating living material (as bacteria or viruses) in prepared nutrient media; also : a product of such cultivation

These definitions have been modified by thought-leaders to explain the culture of organizations. Here are some examples of how "culture" has been used in relation to organizations.

Vala Afshar, in an interview for MIT Sloan Management Review said, “I guess the simplest definition of culture is what happens when the manager leaves the room. That’s when you can feel and sense — in the absence of authority — whether you are aligned with the company’s core values and guiding principles.”

Similarly, in his book Flat Army, Dan Pontefract, says this about culture: “An organization’s culture is defined by the manner in which employees are treated by their direct leader.”

For Kevin Eikenberry culture is:

•  
  • How we do things around here.
  • The stories we are told.
  • The behaviors that get you promoted.
  • The values the organization lives by.

Jeff Weiner, CEO of Linkedin, defines culture in this way:

Culture is who we are. It’s essentially the personality of our company — who we are and who we aspire to be…our culture has five dimensions: transformation, integrity, collaboration, humor and results. And there are six values: members first; relationships matter; be open, honest and constructive; demand excellence; take intelligent risks; and act like an owner.

My preference is for Edgar Schein’s definition of organizational culture. Taking the perspective of an anthropologist, he says that culture has three levels: (1) the deep underlying beliefs and assumptions that are often difficult for insiders to articulate; (2) the values and principles that structure action; and (3) the symbols and artifacts that are visible on the surface for all to see. 

Regardless of which definition you choose, it's clear that pleasant surroundings, annual picnics, and employee-of-the-month programs, although important, are not enough to create a culture that is aligned with innovation and high performance. That kind of culture is based on deeply held values and principles that are played out in the leadership and operational practices of individuals and teams.