The Non-Training Approach to Workplace Learning looks at the case for a non-training approach in organisations in order to encourage and support continuous learning and performance improvement – in the workflow – without recourse to training. It is anticipated that this approach would be used alongside the traditional training approach,but since most of a knowledge worker’s learning takes place outside training,it would become a key means of supporting wider learning in the workplace in many organisations.
The Training Department (aka the L&D dept) has traditionally focused on designing, developing, delivering and managing instruction – in the form of courses, workshops, e-learning and other training events. In fact “a course” in some form or other has now become the de facto solution to any performance problem in an organisation. But what is needed quite urgently is a. new approach to helping those in the workplace do their jobs, or do them better – in more effective, efficient and relevant ways in the modern workplace – and there are 3 main factors driving this.
1 – The fact that most (probably around 80% of) learning in the workplace occurs outside any training intervention – continuously, informally and frequently – in the workflow, and this can’t be supported through traditional training methods.
2 – The emergence of social media has given individuals and teams the tools to support their own learning and performance needs much more easily and powerfully themselves. And by doing so many are already circumventing the L&D function. There is clearly a need to support the new ways in which people are now working and learning.
3 – More and more people are voicing concerns at the ineffectiveness of training to address learning and performance problems in the modern workplace, e.g. L&D is too slow to respond to individual and team needs, courses are not the most appropriate way to solve their problems, e-learning frequently annoys adult learners as it treats them like idiots.
The non-training approach to workplace learning will be very different to training. It isn’t about designing and delivering courses, but is about working with individuals and teams at the grass roots to both encourage and support continuous learning practices as well as to identify more appropriate solutions to business and performance problems through non-training interventions. It’s all about working smarter. Non-training approaches to workplace learning will require new ways of measuring success.
To find out more, take the short online workshop – An introduction to learning in the social workplace – at the Social Learning Centre.
