Planning to Learn Ronald G. Shapiro, PhD

I enjoyed reading Ivan Misner and Peter George’s article A Culture of Learning in Volume 2 Issue 3 (July 2013) of The RhodeIsland Small Business Journal (RISBJ). Ivan and Peter explain that part of working “on” a business is devoting time to professional development and go on to say that most successful business professionals embrace a culture of learning.   Ivan and Peter also suggest that if you haven’t spent money on business education in the past year, you should think about what you want to learn to build your business and register for something immediately.

I enjoyed reading Ivan Misner and Peter George’s article A Culture of Learning in Volume 2 Issue 3 (July 2013) of The Rhode Island Small Business Journal (RISBJ). Ivan and Peter explain that part of working “on” a business is devoting time to professional development and go on to say that most successful business professionals embrace a culture of learning.   Ivan and Peter also suggest that if you haven’t spent money on business education in the past year, you should think about what you want to learn to build your business and register for something immediately. 

Ivan and Peter are 100% correct that you should be investing time and possibly money in learning so that your business will be more successful.  I would, however, suggest that you employ a more rigorous methodology to initiate your learning process for you and all of your employees.  In Volume 1 Issue 2 of the RISBJ, I introduced a technique for doing this in my article Become an A+ Employer, Differentiate Yourself from the Rest. The traditional start of the academic year is the perfect time to do learning and development planning.  Thus, now would be a good time to begin to implement the following methodology.

Step 1: Document your business goals.  It is easier to get to a destination if you know where you are and where you are going.  Where is your business today?  Where do you want it to be in the future?  What do you and your employees need to learn to move your business forward?

Step 2: Share your business goals.  Let your employees know what your business goals are.  Listen carefully as you solicit input from your employees on how to improve your goals.

Step 3: Prepare an employee learning and development plan. Prepare an employee learning and development plan template.  Suggested sections for the template include:

• Employee’s name and phone number
• Statement of a) where employee is today, b) where they would like to be in the future, and c) general plan to get from a to b.
• Specific skills the employee needs to develop to meet overall business goals as well as their own goals.
• Potential learning activities (including courses, job rotation, online education, meetings, apprenticeships) to acquire the skills to meet the goals.
• A statement that the plan is not a commitment by either employer or employee.  (You may wish to have your attorney draft this statement.)

Step 4: Complete plan for each employee.  Distribute the plan template to your employees so that they can prepare to meet with you and complete the plan.  Employees may complete a rough draft of their plan prior to meeting with you and complete it after the meeting, or you may meet first and either you or your employees prepare the documentation after your meeting.  During your meeting, discuss the development activities (e.g., apprentice opportunities) which you would be able to offer or fund (e.g., courses or conferences) for your employees.  Document these as well.

Step 5: Implement plan.

Step 6: Review plan regularly to be sure that it is implemented.

By all means, don’t leave out any of your employees in the process (not even yourself).  Consider doing a plan with your children, too!

By showing your employees that you care about their development, you may build increased employee loyalty.  By planning how you will spend your learning dollars, you should obtain better value for your learning investment.  By providing a mechanism for developing a highly skilled workforce, you should be able to be a sustainable, safer, more efficient, more productive (and consequently more profitable) workforce.

I would like to thank Dr. Margarita Posada Cossuto for helpful comments.

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