The Optimized People Development System

Tag: Systems Thinking

  • Doubling Down on Internal Workforce Development Efforts

    Doubling Down on Internal Workforce Development Efforts

    The heavy cloud of concern over the American labor force continues to weigh down employers. Frustrated and exasperated leaders at all levels are struggling daily with the difficulty of finding and keeping people. My team at the Tennessee Manufacturing Extension Partnership certainly hears the frustration from those we serve.

    Driven by tenacity and a pressing sense of urgency, more business leaders are looking outwardly and investing in long-term solutions with multiple partners while ramping up efforts to attract people to work now. Investing some of that valuable time and effort inwardly could also help address the challenges of finding and keeping a stable workforce.

    Look again.

    Many manufacturers in Tennessee have already taken a close look at their people development efforts. Some have revisited their policies, some have expanded their benefits, and others have bolstered training and development. Still, there are probably other improvements to be made. In the spirit of continuous improvement, there’s always a chance to dig deeper and uncover new efficiencies and opportunities.

    The Optimized People Development System suggests that a good starting place is to create a Talent Stream Map. Based on the value stream map used in lean thinking, the Talent Stream map makes the PDS visible with all its beauty and wonder right alongside all its warts and freckles. Once all the stakeholders have their say and the TS map is complete, it becomes easier to explore possibilities for improvement.

    Look deeper.

    Asking more questions at more levels of the PDS can reveal overlooked opportunities. How can we improve recruiting is a good question. Can we expand where we recruit is also a good question. How are we attracting potential team members and when does attracting turn into recruiting? Can we do that part better? Digging into why we are recruiting will almost certainly stimulate some interesting discussions that cause other parts of the PDS to be reexamined.

    Another good question is, how are our retention efforts? What if we explore how we are personalizing retention? When do we begin our retention efforts in earnest? How can we do that part better? There are many questions that will come from looking more intently at all five areas of the PDS. Challenge the system stakeholders to stretch their question asking skills.

    Applying continuous improvement means to constantly ask more questions and explore more possibilities to make things better. If the organization has a good or even a very good people development system, there are surely other improvements that can still be made. Better questions help us to find those hidden opportunities.

    Hidden in plain sight.

    As the team explores the PDS, they often find things that were obvious, but unnoticed. In one instance, as a group of stakeholders stood in front of their TS map and discussed the flow of communication, they discovered that one tool they were using was not working as designed. They saw this after several questions about how the tool was supposed to be used and when. It was being used, but not consistently and not in the same way by all departments. They suddenly had a meaningful way to improve one of their processes.

    Stakeholders of another system unearthed persistent inconsistencies across departments regarding how training was being delivered and even what training was available. Eight supervisors described how they
    individually understood the company’s training approach, and ultimately discovered that they all had a different understanding of that extremely important aspect of people development.

    It has never been tougher to find people to help an organization fulfill its goals and purposes. Looking at and engaging with outward workforce development efforts to ease the struggle is important. However, overlooked improvements in the organization’s internal processes could also help fill positions and keep them filled.

    Discovery of these opportunities comes from thoughtful, purposeful exploration at all levels of the PDS and a willingness to dig deeper. Even though you’ve looked already, look again. Go another layer or two in. There just might be overlooked opportunities that could help reduce the amount of frustration and helplessness that your team is dealing with.

    Image by nugroho dwi hartawan from Pixabay

  • Finding the Starting Point

    Finding the Starting Point

    Finding the Starting Point

    The optimization process for the people development system is no different than any other system improvement journey. Start by thoroughly understanding the current system. Mapping the current state of the PDS with all the stakeholders can help uncover the “why” and “how” parts and allow for more precise improvement efforts.  

    Here’s an article that I wrote about one company’s mapping efforts.

    https://tmep.cis.tennessee.edu/wire-company-creates-map-improve-their-people-development-system

    Image by TheAndrasBarta from Pixabay

  • Avoiding Slow Surrender in the People Development System

    Avoiding Slow Surrender in the People Development System

    They are usually abandoned gradually, though unintentionally. They live on determination, but when discipline fades, these are among the first attributes to disappear. Ironically, growth and success often cause them to be compromised and quietly forgotten. They are the fundamentals, the essential, bedrock practices so vital for success.

    It’s been said that fundamentals win championships. Look up almost any famous athlete and they often point to their mastery of the fundamentals as the main driver of their success. The concept applies to organizational habits as well; especially when it comes to developing and keeping a strong workforce.

    “Ladies and gentlemen, this is a human being.”

    Football is a complex game. When coach Vince Lombardi embarked on a journey to build a championship team, he went all the way back to the most basic concept. He reintroduced his 1961 team to the football, not to a strategy, to some new rules, or to new ways to play the game, but to the ball itself. He refocused their attention on the most basic of the basics. A detail easily taken for granted. This article from James Clear discusses the impact of Lombardi’s simple idea.

    At its most basic level, an optimized people development system is about people. Its role is to serve people well, treat them well, and keep them well. To do this, the system must value relationships and foster effective communication. Appreciating the whole person and committing to their development and growth are basic principles for an effective PDS. But it’s easy to lose sight of the basics.

    Fast-paced workplaces busy trying to remain competitive and satisfy customers, can let important practices drift, and begin to assume that the basics are somehow happening. Surely everyone knows that the organization values people, right? A detail easily obscured by daily pressures.

    If your PDS seems to have lost something, has grown weak, or worse, has never been strong, perhaps there’s a need to revisit the fundamentals. Was there a time when the PDS was more focused on people? When the basics of valuing every individual were much more prevalent? Has the system crept away from this basic tenant?

    Of Great Consequence.

    Merriam Webster.com offers another nuanced meaning of fundamental, “It applies to something that is a foundation without which an entire system or complex whole would collapse.” The role of the PDS is fundamentally important.

    This system supports all other organizational systems. Practically every organizational system requires people (sounds basic, doesn’t it?). If those people who operate all the organization’s systems are unhappy, underdeveloped, or undervalued, there can be serious consequences. However, when systems are difficult to see (as the PDS is), it is easy to forget how important they really are.

    In practice, this means that leaders and stakeholders of the PDS must constantly assign high levels of importance to the PDS and be disciplined about maintaining this focus. Previous posts on this blog explore this idea in more detail.

    Avoid a Slow Surrender.

    Mahatma Gandhi once said, “All compromise is based on give and take, but there can be no give and take on fundamentals. Any compromise on mere fundamentals is a surrender. For it is all give and no take.”

    Abandoning the fundamentals that empower an organization’s people development system is a slow surrender. It starts when the stakeholders fail to value relationships. When they forget that treating people with dignity and respect is non-negotiable, when they fail to encourage their people to learn and grow, they give up future potential and miss the opportunity to deepen engagement. Communication weakens and powerful components of success slowly disappear.

    When the perceived importance of the PDS diminishes, training gets pushed off and staff development sees little or no investment. When leaders take the PDS for granted, they can inadvertently compromise the organization’s vision.

    Modern methods for finding, training, and retaining people are very complex. In the spirit of Vince Lombardi, leaders should ensure that the basic practices that support their people development system are not lost in the melee. In addition, they should strive to constantly highlight the importance of the system to the organization’s goals.

    To keep the fundamentals at the forefront of the organization’s collective mindset takes discipline and determination. Champions pay attention to the fundamentals. They commit themselves to them and practice them consistently. Building a championship-caliber people development system requires the same level of commitment.

  • Make Sure Your System Can Sustain Your Status – Tip #4

    Make Sure Your System Can Sustain Your Status – Tip #4

    There’s fierce competition in all industries to find, train, and retain the talented people that thriving businesses need. In recent posts, we’ve been looking at four tips to help organizations win or improve their performance in this competition. The fourth tip is about staying power.

    Becoming an employer of choice is about more than simply having people choose your organization over others from a list of prospects. A strategy for moving up the list of preferred employers should include a commitment to continuously improve your internal people development system.

    Embarking on an effort to improve your ranking as EoC would be an exercise in futility if the system you use to find, train, and retain people is not functioning effectively. Some companies striving to become EoCs often take time-worn steps such as training leaders, working on retention plans, or maybe offering training to high-potential team members. These are all good steps, but many times they have less-than-desirable outcomes.

    If you expose your leadership team to quality training then send them back into a PDS that is inefficient, disconnected, and practically invisible, how effective can they be with this new training?

    If you add new benefits and retention bonuses and then subject the people for whom they are intended to a PDS that does not facilitate strong communication and provide opportunities for relationship building, what are the odds that your investment in retention will pay off? You get the picture.

    The PDS must be strong enough to improve your position in the EoC race then help you hold that position and possibly climb higher. Here are some ways to strengthen this important system. To start, use systems thinking to help your team see the whole PDS – its connections and interactions and the opportunities for improvement; this is where lean concepts can be applied to make the system more efficient and effective. Then, strive to become a learning organization to drive engagement and create the stickiness that keeps people coming back.

    See The System

    The PDS is a non-linear system. It is complex and involves many people acting at various times and at various levels. Making it visible starts with a current state map. Get all the stakeholders to help build the map and identify gaps and opportunities. What data is being collected? What tools are being used? Who is involved at various places across the system? How is each area influencing what is happening in the other four areas?

    Once the map is completed, a strategy can begin to take shape to improve the PDS and its effectiveness.

    Lean The System

    Like most other systems, there can be waste in the PDS. Some of that waste is tangible, like money and lost opportunities. Some are intangible, such as time, effort, and potential relationships. Once the system is more visible, efforts can be made to reduce or eliminate waste.

    Waste can occur when a trainer is investing time training someone using poorly designed training programs. In the recruiting process, waste can come from job postings that are ineffective. If a company cannot launch new products or expand operations due to workforce issues, perhaps the fault lies with a weak PDS.   

    When a good recruit is mismatched in a job, the opportunity to maximize that person’s potential can be lost; often leading to their departure from the team. If the PDS does not support great retention and performance management activities, powerful, potential relationships might not develop. This is a type of waste with long-term ramifications. Lean thinking is about continuously improving a system. This particular people-centric system should not be overlooked when it comes to pursuing perfection.

    Make the System Sticky

    A learning organization attracts people and holds their attention. In such an environment, everyone understands the importance of learning, and everyone participates in learning. Development pathways and training matrices are prominent, learning is celebrated and rewarded, and engagement deepens.

    Team learning, personal mastery, and knowledge sharing are just some of the key elements engrained in a learning organization. The best employers understand this and constantly work on creating a culture of learning. The journey to become a learning organization requires a shared mindset whereby a team works individually and collectively to increase knowledge, skills, and abilities. The PDS is the mechanism that allows this mindset to take root and thrive.

    You’re Already in the Race

    So, how do you position your firm in the minds of your employees and potential employees as a great place to work? It takes a well thought out strategy that includes:

    1. Building a strong, continuously improving system to develop people.
    2. Understanding the nature of the competition.
    3. Helping stakeholders grasp the importance of their role in the organization’s success; and
    4. Recognizing that there are important choices to be made, and not just by the talented people the PDS will bring in.

    Decent wages and benefits that attract people are the table stakes in today’s labor market. However, in this instance, winning such a ubiquitous competition involves the idea that people will not only choose your company but will enthusiastically choose to stay and make meaningful contributions. And, leaning on a time-honored axiom, remember; that becoming an employer of choice is a marathon, not a sprint.

    Image by Peggy und Marco Lachmann-Anke from Pixabay

  • Who’s in? – 4 Tips to Win a Competition You May Not Realize You’re in

    Who’s in? – 4 Tips to Win a Competition You May Not Realize You’re in

    An employer of choice makes better choices about who to bring on board because they have made good choices about their people development system and the culture they want to build.

    In this blog series, we’ve been exploring how all employers are competing to be an employer of choice, even if they don’t realize they are in the game. To improve their position in this race, the first tip is to learn about other competitor organizations they are up against. The second, is that the stakeholders of the organization’s people development system should realize that the potential employee they are after isn’t the only one making choices.

    In addition to hiring decisions, stakeholders of the company’s PDS make crucial choices about the way the system is administered and supported. Those decisions feed back into the employer of choice calculus.

    The third tip relates to the people who own the PDS.

    Let the whole team in on it.

    “That’s HR’s responsibility.” I often hear responses along these lines when I ask leaders about their internal workforce development efforts. It takes more than just the HR team to make the PDS work well.

    There are many stakeholders of an organization’s workforce development processes. These include frontline supervisors, line leads, department heads, and senior managers. Unfortunately, we sometimes forget to tell many of those stakeholders that we are aiming to be a preferred employer and that we need their help in doing it.

    They don’t know what they don’t know.

    Leaders at all levels influence the culture. A great example is their attitude toward training. If they are unwilling to give their team members time to attend training or if they complain about the process, their team will be negatively impacted. By extension, if they do not understand and appreciate the need for a learning culture, they will short circuit efforts to build such a culture.

    Stakeholders are important connectors across the five functional areas of the PDS – recruiting, onboarding, training, retention, and performance management. Do we let them know this? Do we train them to be good stewards of the PDS and the people that this system serves?

    Recruiting great potential talent is wasted when those new hires are passed on to team leaders who do not play their part well. Conversations that begin in the recruiting phase should continue through the onboarding and into the training and retention phase. The PDS should allow this communication to happen easily and consistently.

    If all stakeholders do not know the extent of their influence, and how to make that influence positive in nature, how can the company become an EoC?

    Help them see their part.

    Much of the leadership development that is offered to frontline and mid-level leaders is focused on the leader and their ability to engage people. Making good decisions, communicating well, and thinking strategically are all important learnings for leaders.

    It is just as important that all the leaders and stakeholders of the PDS see the system and understand their role in its performance. They also need the training and development to help them fulfill that part of their responsibilities.

    Building a healthy and vibrant company culture depends on the efforts of all the players. Get them involved in the competition for EoC by telling them who they are competing against and why winning (or at least moving up the rankings of employers) is so important to the company’s future and theirs.

    Once the stakeholders on board and collectively pushing to win the competition for EoC, the system must be able to sustain your new status. Which is the topic of our next post.

    Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

  • Is Your People Development System Invisible?

    Is Your People Development System Invisible?

    I learned to see in my twenties and I haven’t looked at things quite the same since. I’ve always had good vision, thank God, but it took me a while to understand the difference between seeing something versus simply looking at something. This deeper, more intentional way of seeing has been very valuable, especially when it comes to systems and the relationships supported within them. To improve a system, you first have to see it. And with the people development system, that takes some effort.

    Back then, with a manual SLR and dreams of being the next Ansel Adams, I spent hours reading about photography and experimenting with the systems that yielded unique images. Some of them actually turned out quite nicely. Most of them, not so much.    I remember one writer emphasizing the need to see things… really see things. Spend time absorbing details, appreciating them, and considering how the elements interacted. He used the example of looking at the lawn versus seeing the details of a blade of grass. It was an obvious point; obvious, that is, once the concept was pointed out to me.

    Well, of Course it is!

    An organization’s internal workforce development system is an open system. It flexes to operate as data flows, demand changes, and circumstances dictate. And it does this at various times, in multiple places, at different levels, involving many stakeholders. A previous post explores this idea in depth. It is a common system within most organizations. And that often causes it to be taken for granted.

    Of course, the functions of our people development systems are connected! And, of course, this critical system is connected to the other systems that make up the whole organization. That assumption, “Well, of course it is!”, can dismiss the need to purposefully study the system. To see the connections and explore the gaps and opportunities. Some important functions just seem to happen – people come to work, they move around on the org chart, some training goes on, conversations are happening. These activities go on as seemingly automatic reactions in the background.  

    Lack of Familiarity Breeds Contempt

    If something fits into the “Well, of course it is…” category, there can be a stubborn, embedded belief that it simply does not warrant deeper exploration. Expectations have been set and accepted without question. Because of this, some not-so-obvious options to improve the system can be missed, forcing it to continue to operate below its optimal levels. Most people in the organization know at least something about the PDS. They are familiar with many of its functions. They may know some of the various stakeholders. They can see the artifacts that speak about the system, and they most likely understand something of the complexities involved. Unfortunately, some people will develop negative opinions about the whole based on their knowledge of the parts. This could be avoided if the system were more visible and more information about the system made available.

    Bring it up, Talk it up, Build it up

    What is the current state of the PDS? A mapping exercise can help the team see how the system connects and how things flow through the system – things like data, communication, and of course, the people. Hang it on a wall for all to see. Use flip chart paper and sticky notes; the more paper, the better.

    Getting all stakeholders to appreciate the system, its complexities, and how they contribute to its functioning can help identify potential leverage points to help improve the system. Let all stakeholders speak into the mapping process, and they will begin to appreciate the dynamics of the PDS. What works and should stay? What doesn’t and should go?

    Once the current state map of the people development system is captured, use lean concepts to minimize waste. Look at the various tools used in the system, and evaluate their effectiveness. Consider the data captured from the system and how that data is used.

    The PDS is the main tool for engaging the whole team. How does it communicate to all stakeholders? Where does it promote the concepts of a learning organization? Does it celebrate learning? Does it say we value learning and development for everyone? It is difficult to improve something you can’t see…or that you don’t take the time to thoughtfully examine. An optimized people development system is one that is continually scrutinized and examined for improvement opportunities. Leaders peer intently into the details and ask questions. Like all continuous improvement efforts, it never truly ends. And it could help your team see this important system in a whole new light.

    Image by Oliver Kepka from Pixabay

  • Change for the Change Maker

    Change for the Change Maker

    I believe we humans have gotten better at adapting to the pace of change. But the big, pressing changes often distract us from paying attention to other, less obvious adjustments that might make our systems work more effectively. In the last post, we looked at the internal people development systems of organizations and how they are all about change management. These systems manage change and can instigate change. They are also open to transformation to make them more effective.

    Seeing the system might be the first change needed

    The connections seem obvious; but it is easy for stakeholders to lose sight of them. The PDS is a complex, dynamic system operating at various times, in multiple places throughout the organization, and involving multiple people. The difficulty lies in seeing the whole system in operation.

    Change ripples through the system. The training function expands abilities and capacities. Recruiting alters team structure and makeup, while onboarding aims to change perspectives and motivations. Retention seeks to strengthen relationships and boost trajectories while the performance management function improves capabilities and potential. Together, these all work to sustain or change the organizational culture. Inefficiency in one area flows through the system and impacts the other areas.

    Weak, neglected connections still allow the system to operate, but with less effectiveness. On the other hand, enhanced connections share data, ensure consistent communication across the PDS, and use tools like training matrices and development pathways to engage teams.

    Constant change, aka continuous improvement

    It’s often easier to improve a visible, linear system like a production line that makes widgets than to improve a non-linear system that lives within larger systems. But lean thinking can be applied to the PDS.

    Adopting a continuous improvement mindset within the team can help ensure that the processes that make up the PDS are focused on delivering value to all of its customers.

    Lean thinking is about eliminating waste, which certainly exists within most PDSs. It might be the waste of time that occurs with outdated training methods or poor training tools. It might be wasted opportunities when performance management efforts are ignored. Wasted effort of underdeveloped trainers is another example.

    Learning organizations are always changing  

    Grow the individuals within the system, and the system itself will change. The optimized PDS appreciates and cultivates the love of learning throughout the organization. The effects of this level of improvement within the PDS show up as improved engagement, more ideas generated, and deeper relationships formed. This improvement radiates outward to all other organizational systems.

    Changes to chase

    Other changes that can impact the PDS. One is a change in expectations. Expect the system to operate better, then put in the work to make it happen. Changes in perception. Help the team see the system, understand its power, and challenge the status quo. There are also changes in the level of dedication to constantly improve the PDS. It takes concerted effort and determination to improve this system. This level of improvement requires strong leadership and commitment from all stakeholders.

    Some of the improvements we can make to our people development systems are subtle. But the system is open to continuous improvement. If it is restricted and ignored it will never be able to be the change maker it is intended to be.

    Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay.

  • Searching for Leverage

    Searching for Leverage

    How do you move a team? An organization? Not so much in the physical sense but in the sense of motivation. How do you move people toward change? Setting the vision for their team is one of the more important tasks leaders have. Theirs is the challenge of identifying those key aspects or that most influential of things that will have a positive, lasting impact and ultimately help the team achieve its goals. Sometimes the best options for exerting the forces necessary for that movement are not so obvious, even to the people deeply entrenched within the organization’s systems.

    The Lever

    Leverage points, for leaders, are those opportunities that can exert force against the norms. A very powerful lever was identified at the world’s largest aluminum company in 1987. 

    In The Power of Habits, Charles Duhigg recounts The Ballad of Paul O’Neal. It’s the story of when O’Neal, an unconventional choice for the role, took over as CEO of Alcoa and informed shareholders that to turn the ailing company around; he intended to focus on one key aspect – safety – not profits, not investments, not acquisitions, or growth. The goal was zero safety issues across the whole company. Duhigg describes the reaction of the shareholders (and his own reaction) as something of a stampede for the exits. Most thought O’Neal had lost his mind. 

    The lever he chose was of common interest for everyone concerned with the organization. Ultimately, O’Neal’s safety program leveraged this common bond to improve morale and engagement, increase innovation, and drive quality.

    Even before accepting the job, O’Neal searched for something that would “transform the company.” Safety was not the big, shiny lever. Nor was it the most widely accepted lever. It was, however, the company-wide habit that influenced a host of other habits across the organization. Change this one thing, and several other dominoes would fall. And fall they did. Profits hit record highs, net income rose, and market capitalization soared.

    O’Neal’s reasoning fits easily into Duhigg’s observation that “Keystone habits say that success doesn’t depend on getting every single thing right, but instead relies on identifying a few key priorities and fashioning them into powerful levers” (p. 101).

    The Fulcrum

    If O’Neal surmised that the keystone habit of safety was the lever, he also understood that systems thinking was the fulcrum on which it operated. Their system was broken. It wasn’t living up to anyone’s expectations. Remarkably, as the force exerted by the new focus on safety rippled through the organization, feedback loops began to send different signals and internal connections began to alter and improve.

    Changing this one keystone habit did, in fact transform Alcoa, moving it to a much stronger position foundationally and fiscally. The complex collection of systems known as the Alcoa Corporation began to move toward its shared vision.  

    Systems thinking urges us to consider the far-reaching impacts that levers might have if and when they are pulled. Peter Senge said, “Vision without systems thinking ends up painting lovely pictures of the future with no deep understanding of the forces that must be mastered to move from here to there” (p. 12).

    Paul O’Neal helped his team gain an understanding of the forces they had to master to reach their vision. He did this by identifying a less obvious point of leverage that had the greatest potential to impact the whole system.

    The search for those less obvious, impactful levers is not always easy. Leaders have to learn to look deeper and wider. It isn’t enough to be a visionary leader. It requires learning to see relationships, understand connections, and to follow the important system patterns where some powerful levers of influence quietly wait to be discovered.

    References

    Duhigg, C. (2012). The power of habit: Why we do what we do in life and business. Random House, NY.

    Senge, P. M. (1990). The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. Doubleday, NY.

    Image by PublicDomainPictures from Pixabay 

  • Things that Move a People Development System

    Things that Move a People Development System

    “Are you sure about that?” It was a great question, simple and thought-provoking. After reading my last post, a good friend and mentor challenged me to consider my assertion that time was the most important element of the system used to develop an organization’s workforce. His questions are a favorite part of our visits, although the great lunches we typically share are pretty good too. On this occasion, his question helped me to realize that more clarity and definition are needed. If the system is really about people, aren’t they the most important element?

    Several things affect the behavior and the performance of the people development system. I see these three as the most prominent influences on the system – functional areas, elements, and customers.

    Functional areas

    As has been stated many times in this blog, these form the framework that promotes the activities necessary to find people, bring them on board, and sustain their development journey:

    • Training
      • Recruiting
      • Onboarding
      • Retention
      • Performance Management

    These functional areas of the system work together to provide various services, facilitate communication, and foster relationships, among other things.  

    Elements

    The empowering factors that influence the system’s behavior:

    • Internal elements
      • Time
      • Tools
      • Data
      • Leaders/stakeholders
      • External elements
        • Time
        • Market conditions
        • Social factors 

    System elements dictate what people are experiencing within the functional areas, how the areas are performing, and how the PDS reacts to opportunities and changes.

    Customers

    The people – individuals and groups – who rely on the PDS and are affected by its performance.   

    • Internal Customers
      • The people being developed. Those involved with the system components.
      • The teams that receive and work with those being developed.
      • The organization as a whole.
      • External customers
        • All the people that the organization serves as clients.
        • Families of internal customers.
        • Communities that these families belong to.

    Optimizing the functional areas is very important. There are plenty of other posts on this blog that discuss this. I do believe that time is the most important element that empowers the PDS. All of the other elements are critically important. But without valuing time and allowing enough of it for learning to occur, for relationships to be built, and for the culture to grow, they tend to be less impactful.

    On the other hand, the customers are the most important focus of the PDS and this should never change. In order to ensure that they are getting maximum benefits from the system, all of the components that make up the system and the elements that empower it must be understood and managed well.

    What other components of the PDS do you see?

    Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay 

  • What if Outsiders Saw Our People Development System?

    What if Outsiders Saw Our People Development System?

    If a group of strangers asked to visit your manufacturing facility to learn about your training and development efforts, what would they discover? How would you explain your organization’s approach to training and development? Would the collective attitude toward learning be evident as they walked around?  What would they learn from talking with trainees and trainers? Such a scenario could be exhilarating and validating. On the other hand, it could be challenging, possibly even embarrassing.

    Last month I was part of a group that visited six manufacturers, some large and some small, in Munich, Germany. Like so many before us, we wanted to learn about their much-vaunted dual training approach known as the Vocational Education and Training system. The companies welcomed us in, as did other system partners. They were gracious and eager to share.

    Switching Places

    The trip was co-sponsored by the American Council on Germany and by MAGNET. We were a collection of workforce development professionals mostly from a dozen Manufacturing Extension Partnership centers around the US. After the exploration, I wondered what would happen if the roles were reversed. What if it were my company and our people development system that a group of professionals wanted to see?

    Over our week-long exploration of these companies, we saw fully equipped, well-organized, and dedicated training areas with ongoing projects that young apprentices (some only 15 years old) had been working to complete. Conversations with several of these learners revealed a growing connection to the company and to the people investing in their futures. Would they see that level of investment if they came to my place?

    Seeing More

    We learned about requirements for trainers and how they are supported. We saw how the companies connected to the greater workforce development system. Leaders, from the C suite to the production teams were passionate about training the next generation. Would my visitors see such enthusiasm for developing people?

    Learning and development are valued at many different levels. In their view, this long-term endeavor connected individuals to teams and teams to industries. To our German hosts, these traditional educational efforts are important because, ultimately; they connect communities to the nation’s interests. Would such a level of appreciation for the overall impact of people development be evident in my facility?

    Walking around each factory, we experienced a bit of their cultures. In every instance, there were positive attitudes toward learning. In some cases, about half of the existing workforce had traveled the same type of career development path, which no doubt helps form bonds and provide encouragers for the apprentices. Clear development pathways were the norm. The level of commitment to learning was high and very consistent. Would my company culture send the same messages?

    Self-reflection

    These German companies let outsiders peek under the hood of their people development system. Undoubtedly, the whole German system drives the success of the VET process. However, inviting people in to see your operation is much more up close and personal. I don’t actually lead a manufacturing company, but I suspect it requires some serious self-reflection beforehand.

    Opening up your internal system for inspection and critique requires a certainty that the system is working well, that the tools are effective, and the performance is reliable. The confidence to throw open the cupboards would have to be based on clear successes and on knowing that the system is capable of serving future needs. It would take faith in your team as well. If visitors talked one on one with learners and trainers the strengths or weaknesses of the system could be exposed.

    Optimization of the PDS is the pursuit of answers to questions that force us to look closely at the whole system and its performance. Seeing it from the perspective of others is a good exercise. If it validates our beliefs and our actions, great. If sharing some aspects of our system makes us uncomfortable, these are the areas that need attention.

    What would other professionals see if they looked closely at our PDS? Maybe we should invite them in and find out. But, only after we’ve looked through the cupboard ourselves!

    Image by Tumisu from Pixabay