Strategic Learning

Learning and development is an integral part of a successful human resources strategy. Learning and development assures that employees have the skills they need, on an individual and group basis, to meet performance objectives for short and long term company success. The strategy is a continuing cycle of business strategy, selection of employees, learning and development, performance management, and rewards.

The cycle requires that the learning and development staff is involved with business strategies. When a learning and development staff is fully knowledgeable about business strategy, they can develop functional plans to achieve the business objectives. An emersion in business activities ensures that learning interventions are available to grow business competencies and skills necessary to achieve performance objectives.

Performance objectives are gathered from the input of leaders in the different business units within the organization. An annual training plan is developed based on the objectives. It requires flexibility to react to changes in business needs and new strategic opportunities. Once approved, the plan is implemented, but regularly evaluated to determine if changes are needed to accommodate changes in business objectives.

Implementation
The implementation is done with the learners in mind as the appropriate learners are selected. Within the learning culture created by the human resources strategy, each employee has an individual learning plan, developed with their manager, to meet short-term development needs as well as prepare for business growth and related staffing needs. These learning plans establish who needs what training and is part of performance management.

Performance management, that monitors the effect of the training against learning plans and business objectives, follows the training. Performance management and rewards offer both incentive and motivation to the learners. They become aware of their impact on the company objectives and its success. Management becomes aware of available resources to meet future objectives.

Maintaining the continual cycle assures that when the business needs new expertise or more resources, employees are trained to meet the new requirements.