Creating the Learning Organization by Ken Bernhardt Regents' Professor of Marketing and Assistant Dean for Corporate Relations  Robinson College of Business, Georgia State University Atlanta Business Chronicle - June 6, 2008 Most companies talk about the importance of cultivating and developing their talent, but few actually implement strategies to maximize their human resource base. Georgia State's Robinson College of Business recently convened a group of senior marketing executives from companies who do care about the professional development of their employees, and this column reports on some of the techniques they use to accomplish this objective. Support employees' development activities financially.  This means paying for executive education courses; attendance at professional association meetings, workshops and seminars; and graduate degree programs. Each of the Atlanta-area universities offers a portfolio of short, non-degree courses in everything from project management to six sigma to finance for the non-finance manager, etc.  In marketing alone there are numerous professional associations with local Atlanta chapters including the American Marketing Association, Business Marketing Association, Atlanta Ad Club, Atlanta Interactive Marketing Association, Direct Marketing Association, Sales and Marketing Executives International, and Public Relations Society of America. There are equivalent organizations in most other disciplines. Encourage and support peer to peer learning.  This can include company book clubs, Lunch and Learn sessions taught by employees, and podcasts created by employees and placed in a company podcast library. The key here is to encourage people to share best practices, to grow beyond their own functional area, and to help them understand the fundamentals of the total business. Vendors can often be helpful in supporting this learning. Create a formal mentoring program.  At one top Atlanta company, the senior executives each are assigned one or two high potential junior people to mentor during the coming year.  The mentees are outside the executive's department and meet with their mentors as least once a month.  Both parties benefit from this arrangement.  A number of professional organizations have mentoring programs as well.  Another alternative is to provide professional coaches from outside the company to high potential employees. Have people swap jobs.  How about putting people into temporary assignments outside of their comfort zone?  For example, have a sales person and a marketing person swap jobs for a period of time.  At one Atlanta learning organization, a vice president of marketing and a vice president of operations have swapped jobs for 2 years.  Not only have these 2 individuals grown personally, their peers in their new departments have benefited from new perspectives as well. Provide opportunities for personal growth.  When the company sponsors nonprofit or professional organizations or events, ask for committee and board representation and assign these positions to high potential people in your organization.  These positions enhance the leadership skills of your people, help them build their networks, and develop their talent for getting things as part of a team of people.  Assign high potential junior people to lead the organization's United Way campaign, upcoming retirement dinner, employee outing or planning retreat. Encourage your team to accept speaking engagements at universities or professional associations and offer them public speaker training to support this effort. Assign important projects to cross functional teams.  As an example, push strategic planning down into the organization by forming a planning team consisting of high potential people from throughout the organization.  This will force these people to take a broader view of the company and its environment, will enable them to learn from peers in other parts of the organization, and will help develop the next generation of leaders in the company.  A couple of senior people from different functional areas can coach the group through the process.  Give honest feedback to employees.  One member of the group tells his new employees that he failed mind reading in college.  His point is that if they want help, he isn't likely to know that, so they must tell him when they want feedback or need help. Another member uses what he calls "curbside chats" to provide frequent feedback to employees.  Following a presentation or sales call, he asks the employee what they think they did well and what they think they need to improve.  He then gives his honest feedback.  The purpose is to reinforce positive actions and to give guidance to employees on how they could have done better. This regular feedback is as important as anything else is in enhancing the professional development of the employee. Demand Personal Development Plans from every employee.  In many companies there is a lack of accountability with annual development plans.  It is important that these be made a part of the annual performance evaluation process with employees being held accountable and rewarded for their professional development initiatives. If large companies like GE can review every employee annually, certainly smaller companies can do this.  Instead of the infamous forced rankings used by GE, the goal can be to identify people with gaps in their development and then to help them fill these gaps.  This is especially important for the highest potential future leaders, to ensure that their professional development activities prepare them for the increased responsibilities they are capable of taking on. There needs to be connectivity among the company's talent reviews, development plans and execution of the plans. The company's leadership must role model what they want everyone else to do. This may include such activities as going back to school periodically, reading important business books, being active in professional associations, being willing to try new things, serving on nonprofit boards, mentoring others, and working on improving their own weaknesses. Perhaps the most important thing to note is that in today's business environment senior people have just as much need for professional development as junior people, perhaps even more. Are you getting yours?