Building a dynamic company culture through continuous learning and development: Part 2

Today’s fast-paced modern economy has made workers prioritize jobs that provide career growth and development opportunities. A successful learning and development (L&D) strategy is shown to:

• boost employee engagement
• improve collaboration
• supports inclusion and diversity
• foster positive culture

In part one of our conversation with learning and development specialist Brandon Handy, we talked about the ways it impacts an organization.

Part two is how learning and development impacts employees.

How does learning and development impact employees? 

BH: Learning and development is one of the most important factors in employee retention. It touches every facet of a company. 

In my role, I’m working with many different departments and employees within the organization. It begins with examining where your employees are using interviews to understand their growth goals. 

How does learning and development impact company culture? 

BH: Learning and development is the foundation of how information is disseminated, so it has a massive impact on the culture. It’s how you train your managers to drive company initiatives. It’s how you train your employees to address problems within the company. And it’s how you train employees to search for information and collaborate with one another.

But it begins with several important questions: 

• What do we want our culture to look like within the organization? 
• What kinds of employees do we need or want at the company?
• What skills do our employees need to become more well-rounded?

Once you have these answers, you can start looking at learning and development solutions. Ultimately, you’re going to drive your company’s culture by educating and training your employees to hit the goals you set with leadership. 

Learning and development facilitates the flow of communication to drive the culture shifts and the culture training that you need.

Based on what you’re seeing in the market, what skills are important right now?

BH: First, let’s differentiate between soft skills and hard skills because there’s a common misconception between them. 

People often think of soft skills as easy to obtain and hard skills as being more difficult to obtain. But this is inaccurate. They are both important, and the learning journeys for each can be challenging. 

Soft skills

Soft skills are generally skills that are transferable to different positions. They are things like presenting, collaborating, and leadership skills. 

The No. 1 skill we’re seeing in the market right now is communication. Because of the rapid evolution of technology, with so many different mediums for communication, it’s really important that working professionals know how to communicate effectively using all the available tools. And it’s actually more challenging than most people realize, with the number of communication mediums we have, from email, text, and phone to Slack, IMs, GChat, and more.

Communication sounds obvious and easy, but a good communicator who is proactive about tasks, timelines, and blockers can have a massive positive impact on an org. And the opposite is also true. 

Another skill I’ve been seeing within the marketing community is creativity. And this is huge for Medium Giant! It’s looked for in every level of the company. Agencies want people who can synthesize the fast-moving industry and make sense of it. That takes a high level of creativity. And it looks very different depending on the role.

The third skill I’m seeing kind of across all industries is collaboration. A lot of people, especially those who are new to the job market who spent the last couple years working during COVID, don’t have as much collaborative experience as employees in previous years. 

It’s really important coming into business that employees know how to work with others — things like knowing how to resolve conflict, being flexible in your opinions, and making compromises. These all help foster a level of teamwork that makes the business stronger.

Hard Skills

Every industry is going to have its own set of hard skills because they involve more specific tactics, software, applications, and practices. For our industry, data analytics is one of the most important hard skills we’re often looking for. Companies out there have so many data points but aren’t sure how to put them into action. 

Unfortunately, while data analytics is more important than ever, we’re seeing a shortage of data analysts. There has been a decline in university enrollment year after year, with a significant increase in dropout rates. Hard skills like data analytics are often taught in universities, so the decrease in enrollment correlates to the shortage of professionals in the market. 

That’s one of the reasons data analytics is in high demand and will continue to be. 

What if an employee says they don’t have time to prioritize learning and development?

BH: We hear this the most. Employees always tell us that they don’t have time.

If you don’t have time as an employee to do learning and development, you need to talk to your manager. And managers should make time for their employees to prioritize learning and development.

Now, it may not be an everyday thing. Obviously people have different projects and priorities, but your manager should be able to help you set aside an hour a week, every other week, or even once a month to do some sort of professional development.

Granted, an hour a month is not a ton — but it’s a step in the right direction. Ultimately, people should be engaging in professional development on a regular basis because it’s going to help them grow, and it makes them a better employee, which drives the company’s bottom line. 

What resources would you recommend for employees?

BH: Within the marketing world, networking and knowing other people is king. So the first thing I would tell people to do is reach out to others and find communities. There are often organizations, blogs, and other places where you can meet people and connect, whether online or in person. You want to initiate that free exchange of information between you and the other person.

The other thing I would encourage people to do is look inwardly to determine what training and development you need. Be honest with yourself. Where are your gaps? What training do you wish you had that you don’t have? What’s affecting you every day? What skills do you wish you had or would make your job easier? 

It also helps to think about what technologies are big in your industry. That way you can kind of be on that cutting edge of technology.

Consider where you ultimately want to be and what your next career step is. If your next step is some sort of management role, then look at what you need to get to that level. Is it management or leadership training? Is it a specific skill set in marketing? Is it a specific technology? 

It’s about self-evaluation, and then trying to move forward from there. 

Final thoughts?

BH: If an organization says their employees are their greatest resource, but aren’t investing in them, then what are they doing? We need to make sure that companies are giving employees the tools they need to be successful. 

At the end of the day, we want to cultivate employees who are growing in their careers, and learning and development is how we achieve that.