Weekly Business Insights from Top Ten Business Magazines | Week 302 | Leading & Managing | 2

Extractive summaries and key takeaways from the articles curated from TOP TEN BUSINESS MAGAZINES to promote informed business decision-making | Week 302 | June 23-29, 2023.

It’s Time to Face the Three Challenges of Learning

By Lynda Gratton | MIT Sloan Management Review | June 26, 2023

Listen to the Extractive Summary of the Article

Most executives acknowledge that learning is crucial to the performance of their business. But at a recent research workshop the author and her team ran with executives from over 40 companies, it became clear that organizations’ traditional learning models are facing pressure from the emergence of new work models. The participants identified these three learning challenges as the most acute:  increased workloads have reduced learning time, hybrid work has increased the complexity of learning, and finding workers with specialized skills.  Organizations are addressing the three essential concerns in the following three ways:

1. Organizations are using personalization to maximize the value of learning time.  One way of making sure every hour devoted to learning counts is by closely aligning learning with the specific needs of the learner. This kind of personalization is typically hard to deliver at scale. But experimentation with virtual and online instruction has opened up routes toward personalizing learning.  One approach is to develop learning plans, or pathways.  AI-driven career diagnostics is another option.
2. Organizations are leaning into the hybrid experience.  The pandemic increased the prevalence of hybrid working and set the scene for learning to be as flexible as work is.
3. Organizations are reducing skill shortages by focusing on transferable skills.  In the face of tightening labor markets and skill shortages, the most obvious learning strategy is to focus on reskilling current employees rather than recruiting new ones. 

3 key takeaways from the article

1. Traditional learning models are facing pressure from the emergence of new work models in the organizations including hybrid.
2. Three learning challenges emerged in this new environment are: increased workloads have reduced learning time, hybrid work has increased the complexity of learning, and finding workers with specialized skills.  
3. Organizations are addressing the three essential concerns by using personalization to maximize the value of learning time, leaning into the hybrid experience, and reducing skill shortages by focusing on transferable skills.

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Topics:  Personal Development, Leadership, Training