Avoiding the 10% trap of workplace learning

The pandemic is accelerating the shift of working and learning in organisations towards individualisation, agility and digitality. Just look at how many are working and learning digitally at home and how fast this change is happening.

From my Learning&Development perspective, I notice that there are currently three types of organisations and how they are responding to the massive shift in workplace learning:

Innovators

Some organisations that have already thought about the agile, digital future of learning before the pandemic and have invested in minds, tools and new formats accordingly, are (more or less) relaxed about the 2020 change.

Translators: Most organisations, however, out of the necessity of no longer being able to offer on-site training and seminars, have translated their previous training measures into the internet, i.e. have continued to offer their courses via virtual channels.

Reflectors

Some organisations have understood through the pandemic that the previous way of qualification via courses and training programmes as well as day trainings and web-based trainings no longer works. They have started to fundamentally rethink learning.

Translators

Most organisations, however, out of the necessity of no longer being able to offer on-site training and seminars, have translated their previous training measures into the internet, i.e. have continued to offer their courses via virtual channels

New and old budgets are flowing into familiar learning opportunities. Is this strategy working?

Of course, the web-based trainings, guides and checklists as well as learning videos offered via learning management systems still have their justification. And a good seminar that is now only offered via video as a webinar does not have to be meaningless. But: Employees will continue to learn with formal learning offers. In the short term, this understandable strategy works, because in the pandemic, it was necessary to react immediately.

The 10% trap of workplace learning

Looking ahead to 2021, however, organisations that see potential in their corporate education and training and want to do more for a sustainable, digital and agile learning culture should be aware of the 10% trap of learning.

The 70:20:10 Framework

Charles Jennings' 70:20:10 framework is highly relevant and will become even more significant in 2021. It is widely cited and used to justify new learning impulses in organisations - and rightly so. Paradoxically, many organisations find themselves in the 10% trap, often without realising it. For example, many HR departments invest the majority of their budgets in formal rather than social and informal learning opportunities.

If we assume, according to the 70:20:10 model, that employees develop only about 10% of their competencies through formal learning opportunities and that the majority of the training budget ends up there, organisations are largely burning resources in an area of learning that has the least impact on employees' skills and thus on the business.

Take 70:20:10 seriously and reallocate budgets

Measured by the impact of informal learning on the development of job-related knowledge and skills, organisations should in future devote 70% of their resources to providing the tools and content that enable employees, managers and teams to learn largely on their own in their day-to-day work. This displaces the organisation's central claim to control, but in return releases a lot of creative and innovative potential. This is exactly what makes many agile companies successful: empowerment, grassroots initiatives and a strong corporate culture. In addition, organisations should think about the employees' workplace and start to design it as a learning environment.

3 starting points to get out of the 10% learning trap:

1. Train HR developers and trainers to become agile learning coaches so that they can accompany and support employees in their everyday learning.

2. Establish the rule: working time = learning time and give all employees unlimited access to existing learning resources and programmes as well as free content on Wiki, YouTube and Co.

3. Team up with managers and start a pilot project in teams and departments to support people and set up their workplaces in a way that promotes learning.