Conclusive ways to personnel development
Business is one of the most important players in the “ecosystem of lifelong education”: here lies the ideal basis for closely interlinking theoretical knowledge transfer and practical application and for shaping personnel development in a meaningful way. Success is also based on a pronounced diversity of participants.
How digitalisation is forcing us to rethink our approach
Innovation is taking on a new, across-the-board meaning: In the past, innovations were geared towards getting tasks done faster or more efficiently. In the future, however, new technologies such as artificial intelligence will do tasks for us and lead to insights that our human minds can no longer fully comprehend. What makes all these technologies so special is their convergent impact. They can be scaled globally, can be combined with each other and are thus able to reinforce each other. This amplification effect will lead to exponential progress in the coming years and thus to groundbreaking innovations in all fields of research. This will lead to two major effects:
- On the one hand, we humans will benefit tangibly from the new possibilities of these technologies, because they will make all our lives more sustainable, healthier, more efficient and safer. We will find better solutions for the fight against climate change or diseases such as cancer and diabetes, we will produce more resource-efficiently and organise more sustainable logistics chains, and we will move around more safely and efficiently than before. The prerequisite for these advantages to be exploited is a technological humanism that always puts the well-being of people at the centre.
- On the other hand, technologies will fundamentally change our living environments and thus the demands on us humans – and this with increasing speed. The Darwinian “survival of the fittest” and the adaptability it implies is having an enormous impact on the labour market. Those who do not continuously educate themselves and renew their knowledge and skills will be left behind.
It is therefore all the more important that business actively contributes to ensuring that people understand the upcoming changes in the best possible way and deal with the opportunities, but also the consequences of this technological revolution for their skills profiles at an early stage. I see employers as having a greater obligation to explain their respective business models of the future to their employees and to society in a comprehensible way.
How can pull effects be generated for employees’ willingness to learn and develop?
- If companies explain the purpose of their entrepreneurial activities well and make it understandable how this aim can be achieved with certain future techniques, then there is a high probability that they will arouse the interest of young people. Many young talents are now less attracted by monetary incentives and prospects for a certain educational direction and career path than by the opportunity to participate in meaningful tasks with their labour.
- A comparable effect can be achieved if inspiring minds from the companies become visible to the outside world as a kind of figurehead who combines recognised professional expertise with personal charisma and makes young people want to follow a similar path. There are hardly any idols from the business world in Germany – here is their chance!
- In addition, companies could also become technology translators if they are in a position to do so. This role will become even more important in view of the upcoming great wave of technology. The more people understand the new technologies, the more will develop a fundamental openness and curiosity to acquire deeper technical expertise.
- Another area where organisations can play a valuable role is in advising young people about the paths they might take after completing their schooling. Experience-based guidance on educational pathways is becoming less meaningful because it relies on past-based data. This means that close reference persons such as parents and teachers can hardly be considered for future-oriented counselling (experts speak of the “death of experience”).
Consequently, your very likely path to more junior and skilled staff is to become a “learning organisation” and establish a distinctive learning culture as an integral part of your corporate culture. To achieve this, interlock incentives for continuous learning with flexible, partly digital training offers that can be integrated into the daily routine of your employees. An essential part of this is personnel development, which ensures that your employees remain flexible and adaptable through regular reflection and a change of perspective.
This is where continuous HR development in SMEs comes in, by celebrating professional and personal development as an integral part of the corporate culture and paying attention to a mix of learning, inspiration, networking and fun. Education and further development from inspired experience are the goal. Because what is to be learned can always be conveyed better through personal experience than through pure instruction if it is to be sustainably anchored. In addition, this creates socially competent learning effects that are valuable even though they cannot be tested in exams.
People want to understand on a rational level and feel emotionally addressed
Parallel to technological development, people feel the strong changes in the world of work. Their professional careers will increasingly be characterised by breaks, new beginnings and decided phases of professional reorientation, further training and retraining. Therefore, I see a certain responsibility on the part of employers to include flexible “training time”, which includes staff development, in working hours in the medium term – and in parallel to develop a positive learning culture that does not lead to career losses in case of absence due to further training and development.
It would be in the interest of both employers and employees to reduce the weekly working time (e.g. by two hours) in order to take part in mandatory professional education, personnel development measures or training during this time. These hours should also be used consistently to ensure the transfer of knowledge between the older and younger generations, between departments and between the digitally experienced and the inexperienced. Last but not least, competences of the workforce should be identified in this framework, which cannot be proven with recognised educational degrees or certificates, but are of great importance for the person and the company. In this way, a kind of technological early warning system can be developed in the medium term to recognise impending competence gaps in good time.
Areas of competence in personnel development
New challenges require new skills, which is why we have a duty to further strengthen the following fields of competence:
Future Skills (Metacompetences)
Learning ability, resilience and problem-solving skills are clearly key factors for future capability. A digital platform for human resources development covers these areas. In addition, collective learning is trained into the didactics, so that employees mutually enrich each other in the process.
Social competences (human unique selling propositions)
Human skills that distinguish us from increasingly intelligent machines must be promoted more strongly. These include empathy, creativity and all social competencies that create emotional added value. In addition, a bonus system is conceivable that shows exemplary behaviour or outstanding commitment to the team or other employees. If this is practised publicly, new and other employees can orient themselves on these examples and practise them themselves with the prospect of being named.
Applied knowledge and digital core competencies
The feedback from theoretical to practical knowledge is largely missing in the education system. Here, the business community is predestined to create a joy of learning and a lasting impact.
Fostering the joy of learning means fulfilling three basic psychological needs: Competence, Autonomy and Belonging. People have a natural desire to feel capable (competence), they want to act and decide for themselves (autonomy) and they want to feel connected to other people (belonging). A certain degree of freedom would suit learners if they can decide when, how and with whom they learn. In addition, this strengthens the bond between volunteers in the group of learners.
In autonomous and individual learning, participants experience the security of being able to admit ignorance. This in turn creates more “new-greed”: To fail is impossible with such a beginner’s spirit and joy of learning: Either you succeed or you learn.
If you are now afraid that your investment in the development of your employees could lead to them leaving your organisation, I would like to counter this with the assessment of the successful entrepreneur Richard Branson: “Train people well enough so they can leave, treat them well enough so they don’t want to.”
Learning is like rowing against the current. If you stop, you drift back – Lao Tzu
Notes:
Do you already know the loyalworks® platform for personnel development? Employees recognise personal strengths and social competences through the jointly used platform, so that they can identify more easily with their environment and distinguish themselves from others. They experience their self-efficacy and creative ability in the analogue professional world, which allows them to venture more and more into the digital world. A factor not to be neglected is the development of their personal imagination to actively participate in shaping their own and your common entrepreneurial future.
The platform helps people to understand their current sphere of influence and, through it, tomorrow in their respective professional field and to acquire future-oriented skills that are relevant for the company. Here you can find more information about the loyalworks® platform for personnel development.
Miriam Engel has published two interesting books:
If you like the article or want to discuss it, please feel free to share it with your network.
Miriam Engel has published more articles in the t2informatik blog:
How do you promote employee loyalty?
Loyalty in companies – Part 1
Loyalty in companies – Part 2
Miriam Engel
Miriam Engel is a communications specialist, leadership trainer and certified human resources developer. Her work focuses on team and cultural development as well as employee communication. With the management consultancy loyalworks®, she advises and supports companies that want to retain their employees in the long term and recruit suitable candidates for corporate growth. The expert for loyal leadership and cooperation also offers leadership programmes with IHK certification.
@Photo: Oliver Hehr