Client Profile
The client is a major German soft drinks production and bottling company.
Their talent management development programme runs over a year, and it’s important that participants gain maximum benefit from this programme. Learning, and applying that knowledge, is crucial to business success.
The challenge
CLS was asked to design and deliver a one-day workshop to develop understanding and practical skills to support more learning on the job, through the job.
The company wanted to follow the 70-20-10 model, where 70% of learning is done on the job. Exploiting this model more effectively is done by supporting managers in understanding how to learn. A highly participative workshop was delivered in German.
The solution
CLS developed and tested a pilot workshop with participants and HR stakeholders, before refining it to the finished design. The final workshop design helped participants to:
- Establish current practice and needs
- Define clear personal learning targets
- Share different approaches
- Clarify resources and opportunities at work develop
- Understand how to exploit these resources
- Appreciate the advantages and methods of working in a learning group
- Use Kolb’s model to understand the learning cycle
- Develop listening and questioning skills to support self-development
- Define very specific action plans for the next 3 months
Participants worked collaboratively to make sense of their learning targets and resources, and supported each other in making changes to reflective practice.
Participants
The people who took part were generally young managers in their mid to late 20s, with a mixed educational background, working in a very hands-on environment. One of their key challenges is to give time and priority to reflection, when they are faced with daily work pressure.
This group also need to help their teams and peers to learn.
The Workshop
CLS designed a workshop to enable managers to work on their actual needs and identify ways of building a reflective attitude.
Our trainer facilitated the workshop, using highly participative, interactive techniques to encourage the managers to work together and explore the themes.
Outcomes
The challenge for the business is to develop a supportive culture so people can learn in this way, at work.
The managers found the workshop of real benefit. They discussed and practiced new techniques, skills and approaches to their own learning. They also supported each other and their teams, so that reflective practice becomes part of their approach at work. They also re-defined learning to take advantage of the wide range of opportunities available in the workplace, every day.
There was a very positive response from participants. They particularly valued the group work, collaborative focus, learning with and from each other. Especially important for the participants was the experience of working with question techniques which are designed to support others’ development.
