Join Sean Kavanagh, CEO of the Ariel Group, as he shares findings and recommendations from an industry study that explores the changing face of learning strategy. Given a 24/7, global, technology-infused, ever-changing business context, this study asks some hard questions: Are we lowering our standards by leveraging technology to teach things like communication and leadership? How do we create good learning in a cross-generational environment where millennials and boomers co-exist but many not always cohabitate well? Do we need to integrate learning fully into workflow, so that it is less time away from the daily happenings of the job?

1. Leading Learning in VUCA Times:
How Does a Volatile Uncertain
Complex Ambiguous Context Impact
Strategy?
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2. Leading Learning in VUCA Times:
How Does a Volatile Uncertain
Complex Ambiguous Context Impact
Strategy?
Speakers: Sean Kavanagh
CEO
The Ariel Group
Gabriella Strecker
Vice President of Client Solutions
The Ariel Group
Moderator: Kellye Whitney
Managing Editor
Chief Learning Officer magazine
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6. Leading Learning in VUCA Times:
How Does a Volatile Uncertain
Complex Ambiguous Context Impact
Strategy?
Kellye Whitney
Managing Editor
Chief Learning Officer magazine
#CLOwebinar

7. Leading Learning in VUCA Times: How Does a
Volatile Uncertain Complex Ambiguous Context
Impact Strategy?
Sean Kavanagh
CEO
The Ariel Group
Gabriella Strecker
Vice President of Client Solutions
The Ariel Group
#CLOwebinar

9. OBJECTIVES AND AGENDA
• Objectives – Share Early Findings from Ariel Industry Study
– Contextualize – what is VUCA and why do we care?
– Move beyond current norms and historic assumptions about what
makes “good” learning strategy
– Share innovative practices for today’s learning challenges
• Agenda
– What is VUCA?
– Agile Learning: Adapting traditional theory for today’s world
– Accountability for Learning: Motivating Learning
– Technology – What’s it really good for?

10. 9

11. VUCA
• Bob Johansen coined the term VUCA in 2009
– Institute for the Future (www.iftf.org)
– Author of Leaders Make the Future: Ten New
Leadership Skills for an Uncertain World
• There are 3 things I remember from Bob’s talk:
– Turn Participation into Engagement
– Reverse Mentoring: The Younger Generation
Teaching the Older Generation
– The positive flip side of VUCA is Vision,
Understanding, Clarity and Agility
10

12. VUCA POLL
How is your company’s culture most affected by VUCA times?
1. Increased pace of performance
2. Decreased follow through and accountability because more
people are doing more things all at the same time
3. A general sense of being unable to keep up
4. A general sense of not having strong relationships at work
because you only talk to people on the phone or via skype?
5. An empty or lonely hallway/cube space/common area devoid of
people relating to each other
11

13. DEMOGRAPHICS
• Industries Represented
– Financial/Professional Services
– Manufacturing/Consumer Product Goods
Cross Section
– Health Care/Pharmaceuticals of Industries
– Entertainment
• Company Size (in number of employees)
Mid to Large Learning Leaders:
Sized Companies
– 52%: less than 100, 000 but more than 1, 000 Manager or Above
– 30%: less than 1,000
– 18%: 100, 000 and above
• Learning Leaders v trainers or consultants
– 35% Director and above Overwhelmingly
see Learning
– 34% Manager or Senior Manager as a driver
– 15% Consultants or enabler
of change
– 15% Other
• See Learning as… N = 20 one-hour interviews
– 69%: Driver or Enabler of Change 38 questionnaire responses
20 learning summit participants
– 31%: Performance Support
12

14. 13

15. CONTRADICTIONS: ROLE OF LEARNING
• 69% of respondents see Learning as an Enabler of Change and YET
the learning models in use do not support that:
▬ 78% described a Competency Based model: agreed upon set of
competencies defined by role with a set learning curriculum that repeats
itself year-on-year
▬ 20% as Value Based: aligned with the business need of employees by
developing programming related to current gaps/pain points
▬ 0% of respondents described their company’s learning strategy as Needs
Based aka internal customers come to the Learning organization and
request development programs
14

16. AGILE LEARNING POLL
Is a learning strategy based on a competency model inherently static
and uneasy to shift, change, adapt as times shift, change and adapt?
YES it is inherently static and hard to adapt to changing times
NO it can move and adapt as needed
If you select NO, send us some chat notes to tell us why you think this. ☺
15

17. CONTRADICTIONS: ROLE OF LEARNING
• 69% of respondents see Learning as an Enabler of Change and YET
the learning models in use do not support that:
▬ 78% described a Competency Based largely a
If Learning is model: agreed upon set of
competencies defined by role with a set learning curriculum that repeats
itself year-on-year
competency based model
– yet wants to act as a Driver or
Enabler of Change –
▬ 20% as Value Based: aligned with the business need of employees by
we have a challenge:
developing programming related to current gaps/pain points
Competency models → STASIS
Change →
▬ 0% of respondents described their company’s learning strategy as Needs
DYNAMISM
Based aka internal customers come to the Learning organization and
request development programs
16

18. FROM THE BOOZ-ARIEL LEARNING SUMMIT
• Three biggest downsides of a competency/curricular/learning calendar
approach
– Learning can become reactive to demands or development plans, not
proactive or integrated with daily realities
– We create memories in the classroom, but not behavior change
because employees “learn to” a pre defined competency but not to their
daily reality
– We focus on “fixing” behavior in the short run, not developing talent for
the long term
17

19. CONTRADICTIONS: HOW THE LEARNING
CONTRADICTIONS: SITUATING LEARNING
ORGANIZATION IS ORGANIZED
• 57% of respondents organize Learning CENTRALLY or as an INTERNAL
CONSULTING PRACTICE
It’s hard to drive change in a
nuanced and fast paced way
• 28% have Learning SITTING IN THE LINES OF BUSINESS
from a centralized model.
Driving an army tank takes
more gas and time
than driving a VW Bug.
18

20. SO, WHAT TO DO? SOLUTIONS FOR LEARNING’S
ROLE AND SITUATION
Study data told us WHAT: position the Learning organization at the nexus
between strategy and execution
Strategy Learning Execution
19

21. SO, WHAT TO DO? SOLUTIONS FOR LEARNING’S
ROLE AND SITUATION
Booz-Ariel Learning Summit started to show us HOW: Position learning as
a perennial “DO”, an active/action oriented process:
Train employees
& managers to
Value learning on-
recognize when
the-job as much as
learning and
in the classroom
application is
Train managers happening Implement process
to see, leverage & for debriefing to
exploit opportunities capture on-the-job
to enable employees learning in a
to try new tasks & systematic way;
responsibilities make the tacit
explicit
20

22. 21

23. ACCOUNTABILITY POLL
What is the role of self reflection in motivating learning?
1. Required: the root of all motivation to learn lies in seeing your
own gaps.
2. No role: learning must be about driving business results. You learn
what the business needs you to know to be successful.
22

24. CONTRADICTIONS: READINESS
Readiness: individuals and/or teams are poised and eager to
learn so as to adopt new behaviors and improve their results
• 62% see readiness reflected mostly in the DESIRE of an INDIVIDUAL
EMPLOYEE to learn as opposed to that learn forseeing the business
Employees want to individual
need for learning their own development.
• 35% define readiness as a reflection of MARKET CONDITIONS
Businesses need them to learn
for the betterment of results.
changing thus requiring individual employees to behave and perform
differently
23

25. ….AND WE AGREE READINESS MATTERS FOR
BEHAVIOR CHANGE TO STICK
• 76% of respondents said it was IMPORTANT or ESSENTIAL
• 17% of respondents said readiness was USEFUL
…So why do we measure
it anecdotally as opposed to
statistically or financially:
83% via conversation or
observation of meeting
24

26. HOW TO CREATE READINESS:
WHAT OUR RESPONDENTS SHARED
Pavlov knew something about this:
• Demonstrate results – see those that learn benefitting
• Reward those who develop themselves and publicize that reward
Although 44% of
respondents measure learning
(including readiness),
only 32% have a measurement
and evaluation strategy
…and of that 32% only half
provide metrics to senior
leadership.
25

27. HOW TO CREATE READINESS:
WHAT OUR RESPONDENTS SHARED
Pavlov knew something about this:
• Demonstrate results – see those that learn benefitting
• Reward those who develop themselves and publicize that reward
….so did Jung:
• Attach motivation to learn to employees’ values and beliefs
• Challenge employees with interesting problems that pique their
interest
• Have a culture where learning happens from successes and failures
• Create an environment where everyone is learner and teacher
And so does a focus on People Development:
• Selection: Hire the right people
• Connection: Provide on-the-job application opportunities
• Direction: Reframe managers as Talent Developers and employees
as learners, not just performers
26

28. SO MAYBE IT’S A “YES AND….”
Turn Participation into Engagement
– Appeal to Employees’ intrinsic motivations to learn (values, beliefs, self
actualization)
AND
– Show Employees the lever is learning and let them receive the pellet of
reward (monetary, status, stretch assignments/promotion, celebration)
IN A WAY that is ALIGNED with and ENABLING of:
Vision
Understanding
Clarity
Agility
27

29. 28

30. TECHNOLOGY POLL
True or False:
E-learning can inform me, but it can’t transform me
29

31. BUILD IT AND THEY WON’T COME!
46% of respondents are NOT using Social Media to learn or even to
support learning
54% who are using Social Media use it primarily as an Information
Sharing and Networking Device, not a Teaching One: Pre and Post
learning, messaging, and reinforcement
No Pre- and post-
messaging &
reinforcement
Networking Teaching
30

32. SO WHAT TO DO?
KNOW WHEN TO HOLD ‘EM; KNOW WHEN TO WALK AWAY
Deploy Social Media for its intended, best and highest use: being social,
socializing, creating connections in ways other than face-to-face
– Use it to build event excitement
– Use it for leadership messaging at scale
– Use it to network and find informal mentors, coaches, guides in your
organization; to act as one; or to help others to find them
– Use as a reinforcement, not a primary learning tool
– Don’t see it as a replacement for dedicated time to learn OR to engage
with others
31

33. SO WHAT TO DO?
REVERSE MENTORSHIP – LEARN SOMETHING, WILL YA?
• Leverage your organizational “young’uns” to teach you what you
don’t know
– This is not defined by age (though it can be) but rather by techy & savvy
fluency
• Be a contrarian
– Go against the grain in your own thinking, push yourself to turn your
assumptions upside down, to change the conversation, to change your
mind, ask yourself “what am I missing?”
32

34. TAKING OUR OWN MEDICINE
• We asked all of our respondents where Learning and Development
professionals, and the industry, should focus its own development?
• Here’s what they had to say, in their own words…
33

35. THE VUCA OPPORTUNITY
VISION • Position learning as ROI & demonstrate it as such
Drive for organizational and • Integrate Learning into other people processes: individualized leadership
business culture that includes development; performance management; succession planning, recruiting, etc
learning in its core identity
• Tell stories of effective learning organizations what does it feel like to work there
–
as am employee? As a leader?
• Create rigorous criteria for who can practice in the field so there is more
consistent value returned to the businesses
UNDERSTANDING • Learn the business model you work within
Stay current with org strategy • Be open to influences from outside the business…especially the needs of the end
and market shifts customer your employees serve
• ☺
Read and network (maybe even through social media )
CLARITY • Translate market trends, end customer needs, and strategic objectives into
Learning is the nexusof necessary employee behaviors and create learning around that
strategy and execution • This could mean evolving the approach from quarter to quarter to stay current
AGILITY • Develop consultative, facilitation and coaching skills, not just training delivery ones
Reimaginelearning as a • Learn from our MarkComm colleagues what it takes to “land” a message all the
- –
flexible, multi faceted solution approaches and passes required
that can take many forms
• Get out of the events business and into the service one
• Transform managers from drivers of performance to developers of people & talent
35

36. THANK YOU
Sean Kavanagh
skavanagh@arielgroup.com
Gabriella Strecker
gstrecker@arielgroup.com
http://www.arielgroup.com/
36

37. Questions & Answers
Sean Kavanagh
CEO
The Ariel Group
Gabriella Strecker
Vice President of Client Solutions
The Ariel Group
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