The Advisory Hub’s Discover, Plan, Transform methodology also extends to our approach to organisational learning and development:
Training Discovery
Our approach begins with a discovery piece that involves performing a detailed training needs analysis of the project target audience.
A Training Needs Analysis ultimately identifies which employees require what competencies, and provides insight into how those competencies will be developed.
In order for us to execute a high-impact training needs analysis, it is crucial to understand and clearly articulate the desired outcomes of the training, starting with the strategic intent behind the project and cascading this down into realistic employee group outcomes.
Once the required competencies have been established it is necessary for us to understand which employees require the competencies that have been established, and of these employees, what their current skill levels are. This analysis, together with an insight into the culture of the organisation in all its facets provides a framework from which we can develop an effective project training plan.
In conjunction with any findings that we would typically identify as part of a broader business readiness or change management discovery piece, a discovery of an organisation’s culture and its impact on the success of training and implementation provides incredibly valuable insight in the training discovery phase. It is crucial for us to understand employee groups and their locations, the context of previous system implementations, the impact of unions on employee engagement and where resistance to acquiring the new competencies is likely to occur as well as the learning styles that our training team are likely to encounter.
Training Plan
Once the Training Discovery has been completed, the Training Plan can be developed.
The Training Plan is a document that we use for planning the training to be delivered and focuses on the most effective ways to deliver the required competencies and training outcomes, training application, usability and links to the business strategy and project outcomes.
Another crucial element of our Training Plan is the training schedule and establishment of the training infrastructure and logistics to ensure the successful execution of end-user training. The training schedule and logistics details are often the make or break success factor of a project training execution because of resource and time constraints. It is therefore essential that our schedule is planned and communicated well in advance, has been developed in consultation with project stakeholders and employee representatives and has contingencies built into it. This often also involves us setting up courses on an organisation’s Learning Management System and inviting employees to these courses in order to lock-in attendance.
Once we have developed the Training Plan and it has been communicated and signed-off, we commence developing the training resources, documentation and learning collateral. These resources will depend on the training approach but typically they include e-learning modules, webinar structures, training documentation, facilitator guides, how-to guides and quick reference guides.
Training Roll-Out
Our roll-out phase of project training involves delivering training to the established target audience, going live with e-learning modules, delivering training webinars and distributing training documentation and learning guides.
Our delivery of class-room training in particular must be built upon a well-planned approach and clear training documentation that ensures learners are engaged and motivated and that the facilitator is appropriately skilled and experienced to deal with not only the subject matter but also contextual elements including project context and strategy, implementation details, employee requirements and industrial/union relations.
Our training delivery methods are established during the planning phase but delivering a Blended Learning approach is a training principle of The Advisory Hub because it more closely replicates how people actually learn on the job, through experience and interaction with co-workers.
As a result, our training methodologies will typically include instructor-led classroom training, computer based training, e-learning, document repositories, solution champions and coaches.
We strongly encourage a form of assessment be incorporate into the training approach, whether that is a case study that is completed on the job, an e-learning assessment or a computer-based task that is completed on conclusion of an instructor-led class-room based training session.
The final element of our Transform phase of training is to review and document the successes and gaps of the project training initiative. We do this by measuring against the goals and outcomes defined in the training plan and the broader project and organisational initiatives.
Coaching for Change
Employee and manager resistance to change is often our number one obstacle in delivering a successful organisational change initiative.
As a result, we seek to incorporate an approach called coaching for change to assist individuals through certain changes.
Our coaching for change approach provides a safe forum for one-on-one and group meetings. This environment usually allows people to ask questions and receive clarification about the change and to comment on their specific worries and concerns. We also take the opportunity to gather feedback from users and employees about the change and the change management efforts. Once the change has been implemented these coaches will play the crucial role of assisting in workplace learning by coaching users who have problems, playing a supportive role during training and ensuring that capability and usage do not flat-line after hand-over to the business as usual phase.
Our coaching for change also involves communicating key personal change messages and identifying and managing resistance. The coaching for change plan has the greatest impact on moving the organisation successfully through the change and will be managed by our Project Change Manager and facilitated by our accredited Executive Coach.
