Kindergarten, HRO and Learning for the 21st Century Workforce

“All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten.” Ah…if only it were as simple for the 21^st century workforce as the title of Robert Fulghum’s book! Opportunities for learning the skills necessary to excel in one’s selected career have become more challenging in the past several decades – think of the skyrocketing costs of a university education! – and since the beginning of the recession, employers have significantly cut back on their training programs.

This is why I was very pleased to see just this week three HRO service providers’ announcements on what they are doing today to help both clients and the public at large to improve their learning skills. A quick look at these three examples:

First, Manpower sponsored the “Skills for the 21^st Century” knowledge track at the Ashoka Future Forum. According to the announcement, the track was “designed to harness the intellectual power of thought leaders across all sectors to create a common vision for how to prepare U.S. talent throughout the education system, and how to build a culture of lifelong learning among adult workers that ensure the U.S. workforce is able to adapt as rapidly as the global economy is changing.” And during a session entitled, “Putting Adults on the Path of Being Changemakers,” Manpower gave a demonstration of MyPath, its free online career development and social network.

Second, Expertus expanded its collection of free learning webinars. Intended primarily for corporate training professionals, the company has just added three new webinars: “Numbers Don’t Lie – 4 Truths of Learning Measurement Success”; “9 Ways to Trim Operational Expenses to Fund Strategic Learning”; and “Secrets of Successful Learning Systems.”  The gratis webinars are available as recordings and come with presentation slides.

Third, RWD established the Vanguard Leadership Forum, a “center of innovation that provides access to thought leadership around improving the way people work.” The Forum, available free of charge to RWD clients, will focus on topics including Leadership and Team Development; The Performing Organization; Performance-based Analysis and Design; Knowledge, Content and Learning Management; eLearning and Mobile Learning; Simulation and Gaming; Workplace and Social Learning; and Learning Technologies and Tools.

Why was I so encouraged by these announcements? The technology we utilize in our jobs, the way we operate and the skill sets required to perform our jobs are dramatically different than they were 30 years ago, 15 years ago, five years ago, even one year ago, and they will undoubtedly continue to change. Thus, helping foster an environment of continuous learning is imperative for:

•  Current employees and candidates looking for jobs to continually learn new skill sets, including career development and how to leverage social networks

•  Employers, as they need to know how to implement better ways to learn, with better technology and to do so cost effectively. Further, to maintain competitive advantage, employers must adopt a culture of continuous learning

By looking at just these three examples, it appears the tide is turning to a renewed acknowledgement of the importance of continuous learning and improvement of employee skill sets. Yes, we all learned not to run with scissors and not to drink finger paints when we were in kindergarten. But, wise employers create a learning culture, and wise employees seek out learning opportunities that will launch them into and keep them in the top quartile.

Gary Bragar, Lead HRO Analyst, NelsonHall

Will We See An Uptick in Learning/Training Outsourcing When The Recession Eases?

The top driver for outsourcing the learning function is training-related cost savings, to the tune of 10 to 50 percent, depending on the extent of services outsourced and the use of offshored services.

Just last week General Physics Corporation announced a multi-year outsourced training agreement with a leading global software corporation. Among the few other bright notes in the outsourced learning space: IBM won a three year e-Learning services deal with Tianjin Economic Technological Development Area, Raytheon Technical Services was awarded a learning services contract with the U.S. Navy, and ACS engaged in an LBPO initiative with Hertz.

But new learning BPO (LBPO) contracts have largely stalled in the past year. Why? Training is often one of the first line items organizations nix when expenses must be reduced, and the recessionary state of the worldwide economy has had such a severe impact on bottom lines that short-term thinking has prevailed and training budgets have been slashed.

Still, organizations recognize both their new and existing employees are their most critical asset, and that having a ready supply of top talent will help them capture greater market share, achieve their business objectives and beat the competition. Leading edge movers will want to leverage their competitive advantages, including their people, to help make their turnaround happen ahead of the market. Others will be ready to return a focus and funding on learning when we exit the downturn.

We believe there will be an uptick in LBPO contract activity starting in the latter part of 2009 into 2010, particularly by 2Q10. Businesses will still be very cost sensitive, and the pricing and value advantages of LBPO should help restore life to this market. To take advantage of the coming opportunities, our 2008 “Targeting Learning BPO” market analysis indicates LBPO providers will need to demonstrate their ability to:

•  Manage learning while budgets are falling, including utilization of analytics to illustrate the business value of and ROI from specific outsourced learning programs

•  Maximize learning spend by leveraging feedback mechanisms to monitor and prove performance levels, and utilizing technology to monitor the quality of learning content

•  Reduce learning costs by buyers’ typically expected 15 percent for administration and vendor management by employing methods such as use of offshore resources as appropriate and lower cost delivery modes including virtual classrooms and e-Learning

The bottom line is that developing talent remains a major issue for most organizations today. And because the top people development challenge is cost pressures, organizations must make certain they have the right people getting the right learning opportunities, whether through in-house or external third-party trainers, to meet today’s competitive “get it right the first time” imperative.

Gary Bragar, Lead HRO Analyst, NelsonHall