Learning leaders rarely get thecredit we deserve for impacting employee performance and bottom-line results.It’s frustrating, but if we’re being honest, we as an industry share the blame.We often fail to communicate our successes using language and metrics thatresonate with other business leaders, and our goals don’t always align with whatour counterparts elsewhere in the business had in mind. We often assume thatthose metrics will be difficult to get, heavily scrutinized, and not isolated enoughto demonstrate the impact of learning on the business goals.
In many organizations, the learningand development function is caught in a negative perception loop. Learninginitiatives are not tightly aligned to organizational goals because L&D isbrought into the planning process too late—if we’re involved at all. Businessleaders don’t think to include L&D in the process because they don’t seethe business value that the learning organization provides. They don’t see thebusiness value because L&D fails to illustrate it, because we’re not usingthe right metrics or speaking the language of business to communicate theimpact, and because our initiatives aren’t aligned to organizational goals. Webecome nothing more than a mere afterthought within the strategic planningprocess, a tactical resource to be deployed.
While we can’t force our wayinto planning sessions, we can change the way we measure and communicate thesuccess of learning. Stakeholders in the business don’t care about adultlearning theory, or the latest LMS technology, or the number of hours of trainingdelivered, or course evaluation scores; they care about conversion rates, anddefects per unit, and operational efficiency, and gross margins. We need totake it upon ourselves to understand how other departments in the organization arebeing measured, and we must structure reporting around the ability of learninginitiatives to impact those scores. Most importantly, we must remember that L&Dexists to enable the business to achieve its objectives, whether that meanssmoothly implementing needed organizational changes, improving salesperformance, or mastering compliance standards. We exist solely as an internalservices organization, to help business leaders ready their most importantassets to enact or enable the strategic goals and objectives of the business.With that obligation comes a great responsibility to effectively communicatethe impact L&D has on those resources.
Metrics that prove learning’simpact will lead to greater resource and budget allocations as seniorleadership identifies the ROI that L&D provides. Just as importantly, it isthe foot in the door that learning leaders need to break that cycle ofexclusion and earn a seat at the tactical table. L&D will be seen as avalued asset by the business, and other departmental leaders will seek ourcounsel when embarking on initiatives—we can finally transition from being mereorder takers to becoming collaborative partners.
Ultimately, since the learning strategies andongoing performance support will better align with the overall businessobjectives, the enterprise will experience more consistent performance gainsand a healthier bottom line.
The appropriate dashboard ofmetrics can be challenging to assemble, but it’s easy to defend. To begin theprocess, it is important to identify the metrics that are important to theleaders you support. When you meet with those leaders, begin by understandingwhat metrics they are tracking, why they are important, what sub-metrics impactthem, and what exactly it is that leadership is accountable for. This willprovide insight into how they think about their business and how you cansupport them in achieving their business goals.
Once you have that information,look at their strategic objectives for the year and ask yourself thesequestions:
- What activities can L&D perform to impactthose metrics (or sub-metrics)?
- How can L&D measure the impact, using the businessleaders’ dashboard, to show L&D’s contribution?
- How can L&D negotiate how to measure thebusiness impact with business leaders before the project begins?
- Can we mutually be accountable for the successof the program? (Success, after all, is based on access to the various subjectmatter experts, timelines, resources, etc., that leadership provides.)
- How can we communicate the business impact tothe stakeholders and the rest of the business?
