Ever wondered who keeps track of all the content in Go1’s expansive content library? Look no further than the content curation team, led by Head of Content Curation Shannon Herrera. 

Now an L&D expert, Shannon started her career in a different industry – banking. She spent 10 years working for Silicon Vally Bank (SVB), joking that “not everybody knew who Silicon Valley Bank was until about six months ago, but now everybody knows who they are!” 

Part of Shannon’s role at SVB involved training colleagues to use the bank’s systems, and she quickly fell in love with this aspect of her work. “Training was always something that I ended up doing as kind of the job on top of my job,” she said. “I found that the days that I got to train were the days that I really loved, and that was the part of my job that I was passionate about.” 

After discovering this passion, Shannon decided to go back to school and earn her master’s degree in instructional design. She completed her master’s program while working at SVB, then pivoted into L&D and got a job creating custom content for Fortune 500 companies. Shannon worked in this role for more than three years – and then the pandemic hit. 

“I joke that the pandemic hit and I got a headhunter call and it was like, I could either talk to a headhunter or bake bread,” Shannon said. “And so I took the headhunter call really early in the pandemic. I started with Go1 on May 5, 2020.” 

Shannon started in an individual contributor role at Go1, then moved into a manager role. Now, Shannon leads the content curation team who, she says, are “the expert librarians of Go1.”  

The content curation team is made up of L&D professionals with diverse backgrounds. Some have worked as teachers, while others have backgrounds in information science. “Their experiences are quite different, and their skillsets are really different, which is such a valuable thing on a team,” Shannon said. 

As Go1’s expert librarians, Shannon’s team acts as the source of truth about all things content. They’re Go1’s internal content consultants, collaborating with marketing, product, customer experience, and other teams to ensure all communications regarding content accurately reflect the Go1 library. Content curation also plays an integral role in the sales process as they work with salespeople to help meet prospects’ content goals and build learning plans, playlists, and competency maps for new and current customers. In addition to these responsibilities, the team also creates thought leadership pieces that can be used by sales to help them better serve prospects and customers. 

When asked to describe her team, Shannon said they are, first and foremost, helpful. “They like helping other people and they like it when other people are succeeding,” she said. “All of them get personal satisfaction seeing the deals closed that they're a part of and seeing that playlists are being utilized. It's really about building other people up.” 

Shannon also finds joy in helping others. In fact, it’s what drew her to L&D in the first place. “The thing that I like about L&D is helping people find their ‘aha’ moments – those things that kind of click,” she said. “Whether that's helping them do their job better or being able to meet a customer request, that's the thing that brings me personal joy at work. And in this role, I get a lot of opportunities to do that.” 

While Shannon’s role has provided plenty of personal fulfillment, she has also learned a lot from it. Go1 has helped Shannon challenge her assumptions about what makes content good. “I created training for an agency and we had a very strict... way we [did] things,” she recounted. “We thought we were the best and we would tell everybody that we were the best.” 

“It was interesting coming here and getting more perspective on what customers were actually consuming versus what I would have deemed as ‘good,’” Shannon said. “Hearing customers say, ‘My entry-level employees only have this much time per day, and they're gonna have to be in an open space taking this training. What kind of training do you have that is really quick, like less than 15 minutes?’ It's really expanded my mentality on what good is and how that can be really different depending on who that end learner is, versus this attitude of, all adult learners are the same.” 

Shannon’s openness to new perspectives enables her to stay curious in her role and challenge her assumptions. “We make a lot of assumptions about who our customers are and what they need and what they're doing,” she said. “It's good to check in on those assumptions, whether it's talking directly to customers or talking to our CSMs about what they're experiencing, getting more feedback on that.” 

By approaching her role with an attitude of openness and curiosity, Shannon finds she can try new things and experiment. For example, the content curation team found that when it came to choosing content for their teams, many customers simply didn’t know where to start. In response to this problem, Shannon’s team created “Skills for Business Success,” a tool that maps competencies that are consistent across most small to medium-sized businesses. While the content curation team spent a lot of time building the tool, they didn’t know how it would be received. “It was a gamble,” Shannon said. But the risk paid off. “It has been our most successful asset and we've gotten really great feedback on it.” 

Whether she’s helping customers meet their goals or educating colleagues about where and how to find content, Shannon loves that Go1 enables her to make a difference in people’s lives. “Making it so that [customers] feel more equipped for their jobs or maybe they're more prepared for a promotion – Go1 directly helps our customers do that for their employees,” Shannon said. “Go1 does good in the world, and I really like being a part of that.”  

For more insights, subscribe to the Go1 newsletter to stay on top of all the latest L&D trends. Or, you can book a demo today to find out how Go1 can help with your team’s learning needs. 

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We’re introducing you to our Head of Content Curation and giving you an inside look into content curation at Go1.

Meet the Team: Shannon Herrera

Welcome to July! Halfway through the year. Are you on track to meet your learning goals this year for yourself and your organization? If you’re not sure what to focus on next, we have two great playlists in the 12 Months of Learning calendar focused on leadership to help both new and experienced leaders sharpen their skills. 

Note: The June Content Insider was skipped. The Content Insider will be released by the 15th of each month going forward.

What content providers should you check out this month?

Topic coverage: General Business Skills, Leadership & Management, Communication & Interpersonal skills, Sales, Recruiting & Hiring, Time Management, Productivity

50+ courses in Premium, ranging from 3 to 366 minutes in duration

Top courses: Dynamic Leadership - Developing Trust, Personal Productivity - Goal & Task Prioritization, Impactful Communication - How To Be Assertive, Rockstar Recruiting, Prescriptive Selling

Smart, engaging, unexpectedly humorous courses  

Topic coverage: Leadership, Personal Development, Diversity & Inclusion, Health & Wellbeing, Technology Skills

320+ courses in Premium, ranging from 8 to 18 minutes in duration 

Top courses: Promote the Inclusion of the Neurodivergent, Inclusion: Why it matters, LGBTQI+: Inclusion in the Workplace, Disability in the Workplace: Best Practices, Big Data: What You Need to Know

Topic coverage: Leadership, Emotional Intelligence, Sales & Customer Service, Wellbeing, Marketing, Resilience, Communication, Negotiating Skills, Social Media, Entrepreneurship, Remote Working

95+ courses in Premium, some shorter courses but most are over 60-minutes in duration 

Top courses: Mastering Sales: How to Hold a High Price, Difficult Conversations: How to Master Them, Become a Coffee Expert: How to Make the Perfect Cup, Resilient Business Leadership, Feedback & Difficult Conversations, Sales: The Psychology of Selling

Courses are hosted by global experts in their field

What great new content have our current content providers added to the Content Hub?

Coorpacademy continues to add to our library with over 900 new courses, including courses in Spanish, Italian, and Russian. There are two exciting additions:
- Clue: Murder on Skill Island is a thrilling whodunit that will test your detective skills… but not only! We’ve unleashed its pedagogical potential to explore cognitive biases, enhancing critical thinking, and unraveling the secrets of the mind. Dive into the immersive world of Clue, where learning meets Colonel Mustard!
- Take a break with Trivial Pursuit, the ultimate Hasbro game that has been livening up evenings throughout the world since the 1980s! This series of courses — which inspires, educates, and entertains — will fuel intellectual curiosity within your team and encourage a culture of continuous learning. Expand your cultural horizons and develop your general knowledge!

Packt added over 200 new technology courses in a variety of topics, from DevOps to US Animations.

Cegos added 38 new courses, including their MyStory as a Senior Salesperson series.

The Expert Academy added seven new series focused on topics such as strategic thinking, writing proposals, and body language.

We are in the midst of our annual performance reviews, which always makes me reflect on my strengths and weaknesses and how I can improve. So, this week I listened to the 10-minute audio course by Simon Sez IT, Leveraging Your Strengths. This quick listen offered some great insights on assessing your strengths, including a practical guide to leveraging your strengths. I loved the idea of doing a SWAT analysis on your strengths and weaknesses when starting a project to better understand where you can grow and where you may need assistance.  

In July, we have two great playlists in the 12 Months of Learning calendar to help both your new leaders and your experienced leaders sharpen their skills.

The Go1 Content Insider - July 2023 edition

In July, we have two great playlists in the 12 Months of Learning calendar to help both new and experienced leaders sharpen their skills. 

Which awesome content partners have we added to the platform? 

The University of Sydney’s Centre for Educational Measurement and Assessment, under the esteemed leadership of Professor Jim Tognolini, presents two insightful courses. First, we embark on a journey to empower teachers through the meaningful use of data and evidence, addressing the need for data-literate educators to drive student success. Professor Tognolini expertly guides us in collecting relevant data and transforming it into actionable evidence to enhance teachers’ professional judgement. Next, the course on Modern Assessment Theory and Assessment Strategies for Higher Order Thinking unveils powerful techniques for crafting assessments that stimulate higher-order thinking and yield remarkable student outcomes. Excitingly, there’s more to come, so stay tuned for another round of enriching courses in the pipeline!

Melissa Sadin, the founder of Ducks and Lions: Trauma Sensitive Resources, presents an engaging webinar titled The Building Blocks of Happiness. This captivating session is designed for K-12 teachers, aiming to explore the profound connection between happiness, resilience, and overall wellbeing. Delve into your current state of happiness, considering how life events can impact your health. Gain insights into the impact of trauma and adverse childhood experiences on the wellbeing of students. Define resilience and be equipped with practical strategies to cultivate resilience and foster happiness in your classroom.

Student Volunteer Army (SVA) is an esteemed charitable organisation at the forefront of empowering young individuals to embrace volunteerism as a driving force for positive change. We are thrilled to offer the SVA Skills Builder, a program designed to equip students with the essential skills to plan and execute volunteer activities effectively. The Skills Builder program serves as a catalyst, encouraging students to explore local and global issues, fostering a sense of community and nurturing empathy among our youth. Beyond academic pursuits, this program hones vital soft skills which enable students to flourish in the real world, preparing them for life beyond the classroom. Join us in this transformative course, where you will discover how to utilise the Skills Builder Program to orchestrate impactful volunteering experiences for your students, inspiring them to make a lasting difference.

Which great content partners are coming soon to EC Premium?

Lyn Stone is the founder and creator of Lifelong Literacy. She uses research, evidence, and linguistics to produce programs, methods, and texts for students, teachers, and educators worldwide. With a strong focus on the Science of Reading, her courses look at the definition and underlying processes involved in literacy development. You will explore a treasure trove of practical tools to boost students’ reading and writing skills in your classroom.

Kirstin Bourne is a bespoke educational consultancy, and Kirstin is a dynamic education professional driving positive change. With a keen understanding of school challenges, Kirstin goes beyond exam results, focussing on curriculum, teaching methods, and data-driven practices. Her experience ranges from sector-wide program implementation to personalised support for subject area managers. Kirstin will release two courses covering whole-school literacy and new approaches to English teaching in secondary schools. 

She Maps is committed to fostering diversity and providing invaluable support in the field of STEM. They achieve this mission by delivering comprehensive drone and geospatial programs to schools and educators worldwide. Designed for both primary and secondary students, She Maps programs equip teachers with fundamental skills, laying the foundations to explore advanced units of work in flying drones in schools. Coming soon, there will be a program to transform STEM education and help teachers embrace the limitless possibilities of drone technology.

Check out a short preview of some courses by Imperial First Aid. With a team of highly skilled paramedics equipped with real-life experience, Imperial First Aid has crafted a series of videos to empower you with invaluable skills that can make a life-saving difference on the playground and positively impact the wellbeing of your students and their families.

Imperial First Aid Ad

Our Featured Playlists are included in all schools’ Learning Hubs and are a great way to see a variety of high-quality content from different providers, all with just one click!

Ignite a vibrant and empowering culture in your school that sparks inspiration with our featured playlist, Transforming School Culture. Dive into this dynamic playlist, brimming with practical advice and captivating case studies aimed at elevating your school’s culture. Explore an array of engaging topics, from nurturing a positive organisational culture to implementing transformative strategies and unleashing the power of effective Tier 2 PBIS (Positive Behavioural Interventions and Supports) techniques. Unlock the secrets of fostering collective leader efficacy and witness the incredible transformation of your school into a warm, supportive, and inclusive community. 

As Chief Executive Officer, Dave leads our global team and works with our largest partners to ensure your school or organisation has a great professional learning experience with EC.

Dave has worked in K-12 Education for more than two decades as a teacher, principal, system leader, and thought leader. Dave is the co-founder of EC, co-author of Dream Team (ASCD and published in multiple languages) and Edupreneur (Wiley), speaks on the world’s largest education stages (BETT, ASCD, EduTech), and has led PL programs for state and national governments and organisations across the globe.

Fun fact about Dave: he spent years teaching in some of Australia’s most remote First Nations communities.

Mother Teresa Catholic Primary School is located in Darwin, Northern Territory. It employs 95 staff and welcomes students from Early Learning to Year 6. As one of the newest schools in the Northern Territory Catholic Diocese, Mother Teresa Catholic Primary School consists of a culturally rich and diverse cohort of students and families from across the world. They believe that together they can ‘Do small things with great love’ to ensure the education, development, and formation of their students is top notch.

The staff at Mother Teresa actively utilise EC Premium Learning Hub to access a range of professional development courses, aiming to promote excellence in education and instil a lifelong passion for learning. In Semester 1 of 2023, staff enrolled in more than 110 courses on EC Premium. Notably, the bespoke Teacher Induction course, designed in collaboration with their Education Success Manager, received the highest number of completions, supporting all staff members in a successful start to the school year.

In this month's EC Premium Content Insider, we'll take you through some awesome new content partners (and some that are coming soon) and shine a spotlight on Mother Teresa Catholic Primary School.

The EC Premium Content Insider – June 2023 edition

During a recent webinar powered by People Management in partnership with Go1, the panel explored how leaders can use L&D to empower employees, build capacity, and address skills gaps within their workforce. Featured guests included Sebastian Tindall, Director of L&D Operations at Vitality, and Ollie Browning, VP of Sales EMEA at Go1. We’ll recap the highlights of this insightful discussion below. 

To kick things off, host Daniel Wain from People Management reflected on LinkedIn’s 2022 Workplace Learning report, highlighting the increasingly centralised, cross-functional, and strategic nature of L&D. The report found that 83% of organisations want to build more people-centric cultures, while 93% of employees are concerned about retention. Most business leaders recognise L&D as a critical way to boost retention and lower attrition, yet only 16% of executives support implementing L&D, according to Go1’s 2020 State of Learning Report. 

Daniel followed these insights with an audience poll, which found that just over half (51%) of the audience are satisfied with the L&D opportunities their workplace currently offers. This result begs the question: how can agile L&D strategies help increase engagement and effectiveness? Sebastian stressed that implementing L&D is merely one part of the learning journey, adding that organisations should focus on building skills proactively to anticipate future demands. 

Following this, Sebastian discussed the biggest mistakes he has seen in L&D and how to overcome them, explaining that L&D should not be perceived as a compliance-driven initiative pushed by the organisation, but as a solution driven by line management with tangible benefits for individuals. Sebastian continued, noting that learning is an organisational requirement that happens organically and can’t be controlled or limited. Ollie added that businesses must promote talent mobility and fluidity and recognise learning outside of formal experiences. 

Transparency in outcome goals and leading by example can help workforces prioritise their L&D journey and understand learning as a shared responsibility. The panel emphasised that managers should be responsible for fostering supportive learning cultures and tapping into existing talent potential. Encouragingly, the earlier audience poll reflected this need for accountability, with 72% of the audience saying their managers encourage their pursuit of learning. 

In response to an audience question about approaching global L&D while considering different cultures, the panel emphasised the shared goal of people wanting to learn in their roles, while acknowledging cultural nuances. They added that developing a global L&D strategy means understanding the specifics of the audience being served on a local market level and prioritising consistency to unify wider teams.

To conclude the webinar, the panel predicted upcoming L&D trends. While AI and personalisation will continue to be prevalent, Sebastian emphasised the importance of analysing automation and infrastructure design across the people portfolio. Coherence of implemented L&D systems and consideration of their integration across platforms, data, and teams is crucial for success.

As a key takeaway, the panel agreed that a successful L&D strategy should align with current and future business objectives and begin with a comprehensive analysis of individual business needs. Deciphering what’s critical from a performance perspective and the challenges on which learning will have a quantifiable impact is vital to revolutionising L&D. 

During a recent webinar, the panel explored how leaders can use L&D to empower employees, build capacity, and address skills gaps within their workforce. We’ll recap the highlights of this insightful discussion.

People Management: Building effective leadership through L&D

Developing your people is one of the most valuable investments an organization can make. Investing in your employees allows them to develop, so your business can continue to grow.

As such, more businesses are focusing on the power of their people by helping them create a personalized learning and development program. This begs the question: how can you align learning and development with business strategy?

By failing to align the two activities, you risk wasting money and resources because you’re upskilling employees in ways that aren’t beneficial to your border business goals. While it’s important that employees complete training related to their goals and interests to maximize engagement, it’s just as important to ensure this training aligns with your organizational goals.

With this in mind, we’ll explore how aligning learning with business strategy can improve the ROI of your training. We’ll also examine why you shouldn’t create a training program after your business strategy, and what steps you can take to ensure your learning program works in tandem with your business strategy.

Why you shouldn’t create a learning program after creating your business strategy

Creating a business strategy is a vital step for any business. Doing so gives you a roadmap outlining your business direction, goals and objectives, and how to get there.

At this point, many businesses begin to create a learning program. While this is fantastic and will no doubt yield positive changes, this approach means your learning program won’t be as effective as it could be. This is because:

You risk missing opportunities that you could have included in your business strategy.

You may not be able to provide the exact training you need to suit your strategy, which means you can’t follow through on your strategy effectively.

You won’t have a solid understanding of the resources or budget required.

It prohibits proactivity and innovation, which risks you falling behind your competitors.

It delays upskilling your employees, which can impact efficiency and productivity.

It can be more challenging to set targets and ways to measure results.

To avoid issues that impact your strategy and affect your learning and development program’s ROI, you must create your program alongside your business strategy.

How to create a learning program aligned with business goals

When devising your business strategy, you should create a learning and development program at the same time to ensure the two align and support each other. To do this, there are several things to consider so that everything works toward the same goal.

What skills do your employees need to achieve your business goals? Are they hard skills or soft skills? Are they critical to the overall success of your business?

Use data-driven employee reviews to identify skills gaps. This will give you an idea of the scale of training needed and whether this aligns with your goals.

Speak to stakeholders throughout the organization to thoroughly understand what is needed from a training program so it can be as effective and inclusive as possible.

Senior leaders can provide insights into business objectives, including short-term and long-term priorities.

Department heads can share how their teams contribute to these goals and how upskilling in certain areas can align.

Managers can offer feedback on capacity and how training will impact their teams.

Business development can share information on target markets, strategies, and customer demands and behaviors. 

Even customers and clients can provide valuable input, telling you what they need from your business.

What learning opportunities can your employees take advantage of that align with your business goals? While creating your business strategy, it’s imperative to clearly understand what resources you need to deliver the appropriate training. By understanding budgets and timeframes, you can put yourself in the best position to align with your strategy.

For example, if you determine that it’ll take your sales team 12 months to upskill in negotiation tactics, resilience, confidence, and active listening, don’t set a goal to increase conversion rates and average customer value by 5% within eight months.

Establish what KPIs and metrics you’ll use to measure the success of your program, focusing on how they will contribute to your business goals.

Communicate to employees the role they play in the company’s future

Open and honest communication with employees about their role in your organization’s future plays a massive part in the success of a learning program. When employees know their personal growth is a significant contributor to the company’s growth, it can increase engagement and motivation.

Use data from your LMS to track employee engagement and encourage managers and team leaders to offer support or guidance where necessary. 

Technology will play a vital role in how your learning program supports your organization’s business strategy. For example, your LMS can collate data that contributes to key decisions, tracks engagement, and measures KPIs. Online training platforms such as Go1 also integrate with LMS’ to provide instant access to thousands of courses that can upskill your workforce in soft and hard skills. With the right integrations, you can automate much of the process, meaning it doesn’t require additional time or resources. Automation makes personalized learning at scale achievable, affordable, and a key contributor to your business’ success.

Regardless of your experience or expertise, your business won’t get everything right 100% of the time. So, be prepared to make changes to your learning program (as well as your business strategy) to get as close to 100% as possible.

The business world is fast-moving, so even if you get it right initially, you might be wrong again in a few months. So, keep up with trends, evolve when necessary, and make positive changes to keep your business at the forefront.

Learn how to overcome these hurdles and achieve success from your learning programs in our eBook, 5 new thinking habits for a smarter, stronger L&D. 

Without support from your senior leadership team, you will never maximize the value or ROI of your learning program. Senior leaders must be on board with this approach, as their input is required to interweave employee development with your business strategy.

During challenging times, one of the first things to get cut is the L&D budget. Yet, cutting this budget will stunt growth when it is needed the most. Focusing on your organization’s learning culture will ensure employee development remains a priority at all times because, without your people, your business simply cannot flourish.

We’ll explore how aligning learning with business strategy can improve the ROI of your training

How to align your employee learning program with your overall business strategy, and what steps you can take to ensure your learning program works in tandem with your business strategy.

How to align your employee learning program with your overall business strategy

When developing your employees, a one-size-fits-all approach is ineffective if you want to get the most out of your workforce. Rather, personalized development plans are essential to ensure your organization remains competitive and upskills and develops employees. 

So, how do you effectively create personal development plans in an organization with thousands of employees? Creating personal development plans at scale may seem daunting, especially if your business has remote employees or global teams. However, this doesn’t have to be the case. You can create a personalized development strategy for every employee, which is neither expensive nor a logistical nightmare.

We’ll look at how your organization can create personal development plans at scale, analyzing the benefits of this approach, key considerations, and a step-by-step guide for creating personal development plans for your business.

What does personalized learning at scale mean?

Personalized learning means creating learning and development plans that help individual employees grow in a way specific to their goals, strengths, weaknesses, and interests. This strategy should align with your organization’s overall goals and objectives so they can work in tandem to ensure your business is on track. 

Because personalized learning allows employees to develop in unique ways, it improves engagement, increases retention, and ensures employees are in the best position to be productive and successful in their roles.

Personalized learning at scale takes this approach but with your entire workforce. However, in an organization with hundreds or even thousands of employees, this would be a long, inefficient, and laborious process if done manually. Thankfully, tools are available to automate and streamline the process, making it not only possible, but vital if you want to remain competitive.

A one-size-fits-all approach to learning is possible for some topics, such as mandatory compliance training in a specific industry or safety training such as fire or first-aid. However, taking this approach with general learning and development isn’t an effective use of time or budget.

Personalized learning empowers employees to take control of their development, leading to a more engaged and productive workforce.

What are the benefits of creating personal development plans at scale?

Switching to a scaled approach to employee development doesn’t need to be a logistical challenge or an expensive drain on resources. Many aspects can be automated, relying on data your organization likely already collates. Here are some benefits of creating a personal development strategy at scale.

Employee development aligns with your organization’s goals

Offering your employees a blanket approach to learning can stifle growth. Personal development ensures that employees with a range of skills, strengths, and interests develop in unique ways that contribute to your organizational goals.

When employees have a customized learning plan that is specific to them, they’re more likely to engage with learning materials and retain what they’ve learned. As such, they’re in a better position to utilize their new skills, thereby increasing your team's overall skill set.

Improved efficiency and productivity business-wide

If you allow employees to develop in areas that interest them, they will have higher levels of efficiency and productivity, positively impacting your team’s overall output and performance. 

When employees are more engaged, they’re also happier and more confident, which improves job satisfaction.

Creating personal development plans can also increase your return on investment. Due to the greater efficiency and output, your business should be able to increase its offering to customers.

Increased opportunity to promote from within

By upskilling employees in ways that transform and develop your organization, you will have more opportunities to promote from within and retain top industry talent for longer.

More job satisfaction and the opportunity to progress within your organization leads to lower employee turnover. Accordingly, there’s less disruption to operations, reducing the need for lengthy and expensive recruitment processes.

Scaled personal development will produce data you can use for future business decisions, including data related to ROI, progress, engagement, and skill gaps.

Key considerations when scaling learning 

If your organization is new to scaling personalized development plans, there are several hurdles you should be aware of to help with quick and effective implementation.

Ensure you have all the necessary resources and tools, such as your LMS being integrated with relevant systems to allow you to produce useful data.

Communicate this new strategy to your workforce, detailing what it means for them and the future of your organization.

Ensure you have enough learning content - or the ability to quickly source relevant courses - to cater to a wide range of development needs and paths. At Go1, we have thousands of eLearning courses that can be accessed instantly.

Be mindful that as well as having unique goals and objectives, each employee will also learn differently. Employing a wide variety of learning materials, such as micro-learning and gamification, will further improve engagement and retention. 

Keep overall business goals and objectives in mind with every decision, ensuring your new strategy aligns with these goals.

Utilize your LMS to see how employees engage with their training. Support struggling employees and work with them to increase their motivation.

Use data to continuously improve your learning and development strategy so it’s as efficient and effective as possible.

Ensure your workforce has enough time to dedicate to learning and development.

Set goals and objectives for learning as part of performance reviews, but don’t pressure employees as it can lead to anxiety, stress, and burnout.

How to create individual learning plans that are effective at an organizational level

Creating a scaled personal development strategy at your organization shouldn’t differ drastically from your current learning and development program. But, by using the data you likely already have, you can customize learning for everyone to not only benefit your employees, but your entire organization.

Step 1: Have a clear understanding of what your organization needs to meet its goals and objectives

Ask yourself: what organizational goals and objectives will contribute to growth and profit? Once you know this, you can outline the skills, knowledge, and competencies needed to make that happen.

Step 2: Use data to identify individual employees’ strengths, weaknesses, and professional goals

Collate comprehensive data on your employees and their performance to date. Then, analyze this data to identify knowledge and skills gaps that learning and development can address.

Utilize this data as part of performance reviews so employees can work with managers to set goals that align with your business goals. You can then use eLearning courses and other resources to achieve these goals.

For example, if your goal is to increase the average customer value and an employee in sales would like to increase their confidence, a negotiation course will allow both to achieve their goals.

Step 4: Monitor progress and provide feedback

While a personal learning and development plan naturally encourages greater engagement, monitoring progress allows managers to provide support and guidance when needed.

Regular feedback from employees and managers will also allow you to make continuous improvements to refine development plans and to ensure they always align with broader business goals. 

While adopting a scaled approach to personal development will undoubtedly yield better results than a standardized development plan, chances are there will still be room for improvement. Continue to use data to analyze and review outcomes, so you can make changes to improve your efficiency and effectiveness.

Following the above steps will allow your employees to expand their knowledge, develop their skills, and increase their confidence to be more effective at an organizational level. To start, all you need is the data that should already be available to you! 

At Go1, we can help your organization create customized personal development plans for your entire workforce with an extensive library of online courses across multiple industries.

Download our 5 essential tools to help you develop a future-fit organization, or speak to an expert to find out how Go1 can support your organization’s learning and development plan.

We’ll look at how your organization can create personal development plans at scale, analyzing the benefits of this approach and key consideratons.

How to create effective personal development plans at scale

We’ll look at how your organization can create personal development plans at scale, analyzing the benefits of this approach and key considerations.


How to create effective personal development plans at scale

Some people see performance reviews as a simple box-checking exercise that disrupts the day-to-day operations of a business. However, that couldn’t be further from the truth - especially when performance reviews are data-driven. 

While a subjective approach to performance reviews can lead to issues such as inconsistency and biases, using data ensures every member of your workforce receives an honest and fair review. It also allows your management team to use this data to make improvements that resonate across your organization.

So, we’ll analyze how you can use data-driven performance reviews to identify your employees’ strengths and weaknesses so you can make solid, data-led strategic decisions for the betterment of your business.

The issues with traditional performance reviews

The traditional approach to performance reviews has focused on how superiors perceive an employee's performance, attitude, and work ethic. While this method of assessing performance is standardized across multiple businesses and industries, it leaves vast room for improvement for several reasons.

By not using data, a traditional performance review is open to subjectivity. What might be perceived as a good performance by one manager may be perceived as poor by another. However, without data, there is no way to determine which review is more accurate. The relationship between employees and managers can also heavily influence a performance review, leading to biases and a lack of transparency.

With subjectivity also comes inconsistency, which means any information collated in traditional performance reviews can be unreliable. There’s also the risk that different managers use different criteria to assess their teams, resulting in a lack of standardization.

A negative impact on engagement and workplace culture

Performance reviews relying so heavily on subjectivity and the biases that come with it can harm employee engagement, leading to a workplace culture built on resentment and anxiety.

Similarly, traditional performance reviews usually focus on the negative aspects of an employee's performance, which can cause reduced productivity.

Many businesses limit traditional performance reviews to annually or twice annually. With such long stretches between performance reviews, issues can go unnoticed, achievements can be overlooked, and growth opportunities can be missed, which can all have negative impacts.

Traditional performance reviews often focus on the past rather than the future. Plus, when your performance reviews are subjective, you can’t implement accurate goals and development strategies. As a result, your employees’ effectiveness and efficiency will stagnate.  

What are data-driven performance reviews?

Data-driven performance reviews are a method of delivering employee performance reviews that forgoes the subjective approach of traditional reviews and instead relies heavily on data.

With data-driven performance reviews, employees get a fair evaluation that focuses on the positives and how they can improve. Accordingly, employees can grow and develop, allowing your organization to deliver ever-improving service to your clients.

How can your organization approach data-driven performance reviews?

Unlike a traditional performance review, a data-driven approach ensures that both your employees and your organization will see the benefits. That means it takes a strategic and thoughtful approach, not a one-size-fits-all.

To do this, consider the following steps:

Outline the KPIs - The first stage is outlining which employee KPIs align with your organizational goals. These KPIs will vary depending on an employee’s role, responsibilities, and seniority and should be measurable and objective.

Establish a way to gather data - Use reporting tools to gather qualitative and quantitative data related to your KPIs. Many tools let you automate this process so it doesn’t impact efficiency elsewhere. Data can include reports, project updates, evaluations, and feedback.

Analyze the data - Analyze the data with your KPIs in mind, evaluating how the two align. At this stage, you will be able to identify where employees are performing well and which areas need more attention. It will also enable you to spot skills gaps and opportunities to offer training to improve their performance.

Set employee goals - Based on the data you have gathered, you can collaborate with employees to establish clear objectives that align with your overall business goals. By following this step, you will also create data you can use in future performance reviews.

Offer continuous feedback - Infrequent performance reviews aren’t reliable, so switching to quarterly or monthly reviews will ensure continuous improvement.

Offer managers training - Switching to a data-driven approach may not come naturally to all your employees, so offering training will ensure managers use data effectively to drive performance reviews.

Using data to assess employee performance makes it easier to ensure employee growth contributes to the overall success of your business. Data-driven reviews also encourage transparency, celebrate the success of your employees, and establish a culture focused on development.

What data do you need to ensure performance reviews contribute to your business goals? 

To ensure your organization’s performance reviews align with your business goals, you need to understand what data is most valuable. The data examples below can provide key insights:

Individual performance data - Data related to each employee offers the opportunity for a fair and objective review. For example, data could include timesheets, sales targets, error rates, task completion rates, conversion rates, customer feedback, or sales targets. This data offers a clear and transparent view of how employees are performing and the areas in which they could improve, leaving no room for subjectivity.

Quantitative performance metrics - Objective and quantitative performance data are imperative to evaluate how an employee’s performance contributes to the success of your business. Examples include customer lifetime value, monthly revenue, response time, project completion times, and conversion rates. Using this data in performance reviews allows you to spot trends and ways employees can grow to improve these results.

LMS data - Data from your learning management system (LMS) allows you to see how learners engage with your content and identify how you can offer employees additional support.

Feedback - Feedback from across the organization, as well as from customers and clients, can provide a dataset that doesn’t risk the bias that can come from only using one source. Feedback can also include any data related to employee recognition and rewards.

Employee satisfaction survey data - Using this data will allow you to determine how your employees perceive your organizational culture and correct any issues that could impact performance, efficiency, productivity, motivation, or engagement.

Best practices for managers running data-driven performance reviews

Adopting a data-driven approach to performance reviews can seem daunting at first, but the benefits to your employees and business mean it should be a priority. Managers will have to switch how they approach performance reviews to ensure a fair, consistent, and standardized approach across your organization.

Here are some tips for managers and business leaders who want to adopt this approach:

Ensure your managers are familiar with your overall business goals so they can build an employee's performance review with these goals in mind. 

Collate a comprehensive set of data that aligns with your KPIs, so managers can deliver a complete and objective review. This ensures employees receive goals and development opportunities that benefit themselves and the business.

Remove biases and favoritism from the process, and don’t be afraid to be honest with constructive criticism just because you may be closer to some members of your team than others.

Don’t compare the data of one employee with the data of another. The goal of data-based performance reviews isn’t to increase competition among employees, as this can lead to cultural issues. Data should remain confidential.

We’ll analyze how you can use data-driven performance reviews to identify your employees’ strengths and weaknesses so you can make solid, data-led strategic decisions.