We are hearing from a lot of firms looking to develop / buy-in training and learning programmes to support their people in 2022 – which is great! however there is a concern that the usual mistakes will be made.

Many leaders and managers still view ‘training’ and learning & development as a cost, and being completely honest, they are often right. We see big sums spent on training programmes that have little, if any, long lasting impact because the most important factors have been given little attention.

Why a sandwich you may ask? Well imagine one with thick bread and a thin filling. Too many firms dive into the filling and ignore the bread. They buy or execute a programme without working out what it is supposed to be really helping with, and how it will have lasting impact on performance and career development.

It’s vital to be clear on these two areas. The 2 slices of bread.

Top slice: What is the real NEED? i.e

➤ What are the skills / behaviours that will drive the strategy and vision and are aligned with the values? That will enable your people to contribute and build great careers?

➤ What are the real learning needs of your people? What do they need help with?

➤ What do you want people to be doing, thinking and feeling as a result?

Bottom slice: How will you LOCK IN the new skills / behaviours? i.e.

➤ What are the goals, targets and KPIs that need to be created to help drive the new behaviours?

➤ How will ‘space and time’ be given to allow people to implement and try out new skills?

➤ What ‘experiences’ are needed to support development?

➤ How can leaders offer mentoring support to help lock-in learning?

➤ What is the communication strategy to support the investment?

If the focus is on the filling (and it usually is) then training will always be seen as a cost, a box-tick exercise. Focus on the whole sandwich and Learning & Development should be an invaluable investment, supporting the growth of your people and positively impacting on individual and collective performance.

Our four step approach – Need, Enable, Lock-In & Measure, underpins all that we do and forms the basis of our approach to designing and delivering solutions that have real and lasting impact on performance and provide a measurable return on investment for our clients.

Please get in touch if you would like to find out more on what you can do to drive improved performance, well-being, connection and engagement in your firm, we’d be delighted to chat.