Learning and development certainly does not want to work at cross-purposes with the overall organization, but it often seems as though many learning initiatives are unnecessary, too expensive, or irrelevant to the business.
One reason may be that your training function has not understood (or been kept fully informed) of the critical business priorities. To succeed, there needs to be:
- A thorough analysis of the overall goals of the business
- Clear communication between the business and training
- Coordination on how those priorities could be served through appropriate learning interventions
- The transfer of training back to the business
Only then, when learning is clearly linked to business results, will HR and training be in lockstep time with your parade. And only then will any investment you make in learning bring you the returns that everyone desires – higher performance.
It is up to both training to earn a place at the executive table and to the business to give learning the respect it will deserve given the opportunity.
