If you are reading this, there’s a good chance that your role touches L&D in some way. And if you have organizational learning or development responsibilities, you’re likely aware of the upskilling imperative affecting companies globally presented by organizations such as McKinsey and the World Economic Forum. There’s virtually no company in the world not affected by macro-social and economic events such as the Great Resignation, technological innovation, and Covid.

Today, this imperative to upskill employees is forcing senior executives to pay attention to the need for building and instilling a continuous learning culture within their companies. The time for L&D has arrived. This is evident from numerous reports and surveys such as LinkedIn Learning’s 2021 Workplace Learning Report. With such great opportunity comes pressure, the pressure to present solutions and the pressure to deliver measurable results. For many L&D leaders, this point-in-time can make or break their future career development based on how they respond to today’s needs.

How, then, can L&D leaders respond to this challenge so that their function, their teams and their personal leadership are recognized as part of the ongoing corporate strategy rather than a point-in-time or temporary tactic? Here are four considerations to drive confidence in and become a partner with your senior management team as you present your plan for addressing organizational skill gaps:

1.       Be Knowledgeable: Understand the Problem, It’s Root Causes, and How to Solve It

It’s critical to understand both the market trends as well as the internal dynamics that are driving your organization’s need to upskill. There is plenty of market trend data available online to help shape your business case. And that information can help you to ask the right questions internally. We know from industry surveys, for example, that millennials and Gen Z employees are much more likely to leave a job that doesn’t provide them opportunity for learning and development. Meeting this need can reduce regrettable turnover, and reducing regrettable turnover always results in better company performance. Yet, meeting this need across an organization is not easy.  To do so requires a personalized learning approach.  This means that your program is able to engage employees individually, and provides a benchmark of where they are personally at in their development. This takes a very different approach than the one-size fits all model employed through traditional learning and development programs. Without the right technology, delivering a personalized learning program becomes incredibly difficult to execute in a once-and-done model and impossible to sustain over time.  If you explore the market, you will find technologies designed to deliver a personalized learning approach to upskilling and reskilling.

2.       Be Metrics Driven: Knowing What to Measure Is Half the Battle

You need data before you can demonstrate that you understand your organization’s skill gaps. And you need the ability to capture data across your upskilling program lifecycle, from defining the problem to designing and implementing a solution, evaluating success, and optimizing the program. To use one specific example, you need enterprise technology that enables you to define organizational competencies down to a role-based level (role-based competency models) as well as the ability to measure skill gaps from both bottom-up and top-down perspectives. Top-down level metrics allow you to diagnose your gaps at an organizational level and to build corporate strategies around the biggest and most important company-wide gaps. Bottom-up level metrics allows individuals within the company to understand their own, personal gaps against their role.

This knowledge allows you to build your program as an objective-driven initiative with measurable success targets, or KPIs.   While knowing what to measure upfront is half the battle, the other half is the ability to measure your program as it runs. That means implementing a solution with native capability to consistently and continuously measure and report on both the leading and lagging indicators that underpin your program’s KPIs. If you lack the tools or capability internally to identify and measure skill gaps, and to measure learning activity down to the individual employee level, look for solution providers that offer these capabilities. Armed with the right data, you can more easily shape and direct the narrative around your initiative from program inception to execution.

3.       Be Culture Focused: Executive Support Will Help Drive Your Initiatives

Continuous learning and upskilling across an organization only happens when the culture supports it. If your organization is already there, terrific. You have a foundation to build upon. If not, enculturating learning behaviors within and across an organization takes time and requires the right tone from the top. Insist that your upskilling and reskilling programs and initiatives be presented as a part of corporate strategy and culture amplified and highlighted through vocal and visual senior executive support. Make continuous learning a part of every role description and measure it. Changing culture is a function of changing behavior, and as the axiom goes, you get what you measure.

4.       Be Realistic: Set Aggressive Yet Achievable Goals to Build Confidence

While you should lean in on your program objectives, be careful not to over-promise. Driving the right expectations is critical. If your company’s upskilling program is new, you’ll need more time for every step of your process. Build in pilot programs and include time in your plan for gathering organizational input and feedback. Make your implementation process iterative so that you can constantly improve the program as you go. (Think of project/change management models such as Plan, Do, Check, Act as a framework for iterating your program implementation.) Your plan should include both current year and multi-year objectives, keeping in mind Bill Gates’ famous statement that “Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.” Setting realistic and achievable expectations with your management team gives you a much better chance of achieving your targets which, in turn, will build their trust and confidence in you, your teams, and your corporate function.

The time for L&D is now. To be successful in this ever-changing marketplace where change is ever-accelerating, companies must embrace learning and development as a strategic imperative. It is up to L&D leaders to ensure that their executive teams understand the value that the L&D function and its various teams bring the company.