How to Take a Business Approach to Training

A Business Approach to Training Is Required to Compete
Despite widespread executive rhetoric about the importance of reskilling and upskilling workers, most Human Resources and Learning & Development functions fail to take a strategic or business approach to training. Instead, most corporate learning is tactical, event-driven, and disconnected from operational realities and strategic priorities. From a strategy standpoint, this is a material failure for any organization that needs to attract, develop, engage, and retain top talent to win.

Maximizing the return on corporate training investments requires Learning & Development leaders to operate with a clear business mindset. That means:

• Stepping into a broader, more strategic, and more proactive leadership role.
• Anchoring the corporate training strategy to the enterprise’s strategic direction.
• Ensuring that every learning initiative helps to better execute a strategic priority.

When training is designed to move the metrics the business cares about most, it stops being a cost center and starts becoming a strategic enabler.

A Business Approach to Training Is Worth It

McKinsey reports that companies that invest in developing leaders during significant organizational change are 2.4 times more likely to hit their performance targets. We know that our clients are facing increased pressure to impact business outcomes, reduce costs, and meet learners where they are. We also know that L&D must better integrate with hiring, onboarding, performance management, succession planning, and training measurement.

If L&D functions do not directly link themselves to different areas of the business and impact employee performance, they will struggle to remain relevant when they are needed most.

How to Take a Business Approach to Training
Successful L&D leaders design a thoughtful corporate learning strategy based on the company’s strategic priorities and overall talent management strategies. Done right, a business approach to training builds core capabilities for the short- and long-term while measurably impacting business performance. Unfortunately, postmortem data reveals that most business leaders believe that their L&D function is out of sync with current business and talent objectives.

To be effective, L&D functions must:

1. Identify and Upskill Priority Areas
   L&D Team must be able to prioritize, assess, and align employee capabilities to business  and talent strategy each and every year. They must be proficient at leadership simulation assessments for high stakes roles, people manager assessment centers for middle and frontline managers, and training needs assessments for individual contributors. All skill investments must correlate to what matters most for people and business performance.
   
   Have you prioritized the capability gaps that must be closed to fully execute your people and business strategies?
   
   
2. Partner with the Business to Help the Business
   Organizational culture assessment data shows that the majority of business unit leaders perceive the training function as taking a reactive and administrative approach to developing talent.  Most L&D professionals behave like — and are treated as — transactional order takers.  This does not earn them a seat at the business table. 
   
   L&D must build trust with and influence key stakeholders in other functions in order to help them to move their people and their work forward.
   
   Can you L&D team become trusted business advisors?
   
   
3. Align Learning Solutions Directly to Strategic Imperatives
   L&D teams must explicitly align every learning solutions with company goals and high priority areas. If, for instance, employee attrition is impeding success, the team must be able to prioritize the root causes of attrition and design a targeted retention program that will measurably address the issues related to managerial and employee mindsets and capabilities.
   
   Does your L&D function explicitly map learning solutions to key business imperatives?

The Bottom Line
Business leaders are held accountable for business and people outcomes. The corporate training function should be no different. Focus on the “must-haves” not the “nice-to-haves.” The more business-like you can be, the more accepted you and your fully-aligned learning programs will be with the business.

To learn more about how to take a business approach to training, download The #1 Reason Training Initiatives Fail According to Executives

by Tristam Brown: CEO

Tristam Brown is an executive business consultant and organizational development expert with more than three decades of experience helping organizations accelerate performance, build high-impact teams, and turn strategy into execution. As CEO of LSA Global, he works with leaders to get and stay aligned™ through research-backed strategy, culture, and talent solutions that produce measurable, business-critical results. See full bio.