Literary Insights

BOOK LINK:

Here is a summary of the contents page:

The book is divided into three parts:
- Part I introduces the concept of continuous learning at work and building a learning culture. It contains three chapters.
- Part II focuses on five specific ways to make learning core to the way work is done. It contains five chapters.
- Part III makes the business case for a learning culture and discusses maintaining a learning culture long-term. It contains two chapters.
Other sections include acknowledgments, foreword, references/notes, author bio and index.
The chapter titles give an overview of the topics covered: developing agile learners, using feedback to fuel learning, marketing learning and development, integrating learning into work flows, signaling the value of learning, and making continuous learning imperative for business success.
The page list provides the page numbers for each chapter and section, running from page i to page 212. This allows readers to easily navigate to specific parts of the book.

So in summary, the contents page outlines the book’s structure into three parts, previews the main topics covered in each chapter, and includes the standard portions like references and author info. It aims to provide a navigational guide for readers.

The passage discusses the rise of the “continuous learning” model in the workplace due to rapid changes in technology and skills becoming outdated more quickly.
Traditional training approaches are no longer effective, and companies need to transform into learning-driven organizations where working and learning are intertwined.
Learning cannot be reserved only for higher-level employees, it must be open to all levels for the culture to be successful. Everyone has a role to play.
Key components of a successful learning culture discussed are: developing agile learners, using feedback, marketing learning opportunities, integrating learning into work, signaling the value of learning, and making upskilling a business imperative through care/maintenance of the culture.

The main points are that continuous learning is now necessary for both employees and companies to adapt to changing skills needs, and true learning cultures require learning to be embedded throughout the organization and open to all levels, not just driven from L&D/HR departments.

Traditional corporate training programs are often ineffective because they are mandatory, boring, static, passive, outdated, punitive, used as a reward, and lack clear outcomes.
Learning and development needs to be taken to a more strategic level to address the needs of modern workers. It cannot just be one-size-fits-all mandatory sessions.
Training needs to be delivered in self-paced, on-demand, bite-sized formats like video to fit busy workflows. Gatherings should be high-value.
Advances in learning science provide insights on effective learning that need to be implemented in corporate settings, not through becoming experts but by applying principles.
The author drew on experience teaching Spanish and English in high school where they made many mistakes initially due to lack of preparation time and guidance. Over time experience helped improve methods.
Learning science principles that can apply to corporations include making content relevant, providing context, spaced repetition, retrieval practice, testing effects and generating feedback. These optimize long-term retention over passive absorption.
A learning culture requires support and engagement from leadership, resources, accountability and learning being seen as strategic, not just compliance-based training. It is an ongoing process that pays off in performance, innovation and retention.

Here is a summary of the key lessons from the passage:

Lesson 1: Necessity is the mother of learning. People retain knowledge best when they have an immediate need to apply it and ongoing opportunities for practice and reinforcement. Spaced repetition and retrieval practice are important for long-term retention.
Lesson 2: Pedagogy (instructional methods) must be prioritized over novelty. New technologies and tools should not be adopted solely for their novelty - their impact on learning outcomes must be evaluated. Instructional goals and design come before the delivery medium.
Lesson 3: You are responsible for creating the energy in the room. Environmental and physical factors like room layout, lighting, temperature, and breaks affect learning engagement and outcomes. Sound instructional design considers cognitive load and limits on working memory. Presentation style and materials should avoid overloading learners.

The key takeaway is that effective learning requires understanding human cognition and applying research-backed instructional strategies, not just novel technologies or tools. Pedagogy and meeting learners’ needs must drive choices around content delivery and environment.

The passage discusses foundational concepts for effective learning from psychologists Lev Vygotsky and Stephen Krashen. Vygotsky’s notion of the zone of proximal development focuses on guiding learners from what they can achieve independently to what they can achieve with support. Scaffolding provides this support through ancillary activities that help navigate the ZPD, similar to training wheels on a bike.

Krashen’s affective filter hypothesis posits that a learner’s anxiety, embarrassment or feelings of being judged can constrain language acquisition. Creating trust and reducing these feelings is important. Fear, both internally and from high-performance cultures that discourage mistakes, kills learning.

The passage also discusses using visual motifs and design principles from Nancy Duarte to bolster learning efficacy. It emphasizes addressing individual learners’ strengths rather than weaknesses, relating Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and concept of peak experiences. Gamification with proper mechanics can motivate learning by having learners invest in the process.

Building a learning culture requires organizations and individuals to become comfortable with constant change. Being adaptive to change, or having “change agility,” is key for thriving in today’s modern workplace.
Change agility means seeing change as an ongoing opportunity rather than a threat. Embracing adaptability positions people and teams for success in the changing workforce.
Adaptability is crucial because simply hiring replacements is too expensive to keep up with the growing skills gap between what employees have and what employers need. Hiring top talent is also increasingly competitive.
It is costly for companies when employees leave, so develop existing talent through learning and reskilling can fill at least half of future talent needs, according to research.
Both organizations and employees benefit from a culture of adaptability and lifelong learning. Employees are demanding more opportunities for professional development to stay relevant in a changing work environment. Accepting change as the new normal is important for building a successful learning culture.
Workers increasingly feel the need to constantly update their skills to keep up with rapid workplace changes. Research shows 84% of US workers think there is a skills gap and more than a third feel personally affected by it.
Developing “change agility” - the ability to adapt seamlessly to change - is important for both workers and organizations. Constant learning is needed to navigate a career that may span 5 decades and involve shifting job roles.
Building blocks for change agility include being ready for change, thinking outside the box, reducing subjectivity, tolerating ambiguity, and effective communication during times of change.
Learning and development (L&D) needs to evolve from a traditional “sage on the stage” model to better support continuous learning. Organizations like PCL Construction embed L&D into HR and make it a strategic priority driven from the top.
For L&D to be effective, everyone must see learning as their responsibility, not just the purview of HR or a single learning leader. It should be baked into processes across the employee life cycle.
Learning and development (L&D) should be integrated throughout the employee life cycle rather than just as training programs. It needs to evolve along with employees’ careers and skills.
L&D plays an important role in supporting companies through change and transitions. Having strong relationships across the organization helps L&D anticipate business shifts and needs.
L&D professionals should focus on serving business needs by understanding goals, priorities and challenges through conversations with employees at all levels.
To stay relevant, L&D also needs to adapt to changes and look ahead at emerging trends to develop future-focused offerings.
Marketing and communication skills are important for L&D to promote learning opportunities and drive engagement from employees.
Developing a learning culture involves defining key elements like agile learning and rewarding learners. L&D plays a strategic role in guiding organizational transformation.

The passage discusses the importance of developing a culture of continuous learning in the workplace. Some key points:

Learning opportunities should be accessible and democratic, not reserved for only some employees. Everyone should have access to resources to support their learning needs.
Learning should be separated from notions of reward/punishment and seen as core to all jobs in an age of constant change.
Employees at all levels and ages need to adopt a growth mindset of continual learning. Even more experienced employees have much to learn from younger colleagues.
Companies should focus on developing “agile learners” who can adapt to new situations through learning. This includes fostering reflection on past, present and future learning needs.
Managers specifically need training to become coaches who can guide employees’ learning and steer feedback conversations constructively.
A learning culture involves democratizing access to learning resources and empowering employees to take charge of their own development. The L&D team provides guidance and support for this.

The overall message is that developing continuous learning as a routine practice at all levels is key to building an adaptive and high-performing workforce.

Here is a summary of the key points about Accenture’s DEAL Hour program:

DEAL Hour stands for “Drop Everything And Learn Hour” and designates a specific time each month when all employees stop working to engage in a learning activity.
During this hour, employees typically take online courses from Accenture’s marketplace. The L&D team also selects some courses for employees to take together and discuss.
Although only one hour per month, it acts as a reminder for employees to continue learning and launches more learning activity as people keep working on what they started during DEAL Hour.
The goal is to send the message that continuous learning is important, not just during the designated DEAL Hour time each month. It aims to get employees in the habit of ongoing learning.

So in summary, DEAL Hour is Accenture’s approach to carving out dedicated time each month for all employees to engage in learning together, with the broader goal of promoting a culture of continuous learning across the organization.

Here is a summary of the key points from section d:

The durable learning model has been used to assess and improve over 10,000 pieces of instructional content at Accenture.
The principles of durable learning can be broadly applied across organizations of different sizes through small tweaks to existing content.
Specific suggestions are provided for making learning content more relevant, engaging, contextual, effortful, generative, social, include more practice, and be more spaced out.
To promote the durable learning mindset, Accenture created cards summarizing each of the eight principles that can be used in diverse contexts to socialize the principles.
Accenture integrates “learning to learn” content across its programs to help learners become better learners by understanding how their brain works.
The field of learning science is still evolving and there is more to learn about how the adult brain learns best. L&D professionals should stay up to date on new research findings.
The section concludes that by teaching people how to learn, they can learn for a lifetime, not just for a single training or course.

Here is a summary of the key points about creating a feedback-focused culture:

Organizations can benefit from nurturing a growth mindset where workers feel trusted, committed, and supported to take risks. A growth mindset views abilities as things that can be developed through effort, rather than fixed traits.
Feedback is essential for personal and professional growth. It helps identify development opportunities rather than just pointing out mistakes. Regular, frequent feedback helps normalize it and reduce fears.
Leaders should build trust so people feel safe sharing and receiving honest feedback with positive intentions. Feedback aims to maximize strengths, not just fix weaknesses.
Preferences for feedback delivery vary, so ask individuals how they prefer to give and receive it. Affirming feedback can be public while constructive feedback works best privately.
Making feedback a regular routine and separating it from reviews helps people get comfortable. Language like “additional thoughts” feels less judgmental than “feedback.”
At Udemy, tight feedback loops between instructors and students/platform help improve experiences. Surveys, hackathons, and Q&As also provide feedback at multiple levels.
Best practices for receiving feedback include assuming good intentions, keeping an open mind, seeking clarification, and giving feedback honest consideration without getting defensive. The goal is learning rather than proving others wrong.

The passage discusses how learning and development (L&D) professionals need to think like marketers in order to drive learning and development effectively. It emphasizes the need to be creative and innovative to cut through noise, resistance to learning, and misconceptions about training.

It presents a case study of how the company Udemy redesigned its onboarding process from being boring to being more engaging. It used a 5-step framework for creativity: 1) Consume - actively look for ideas in the content and media you consume. 2) Flip the script - look at problems from a different perspective. 3) Force connections - look for unexpected links between ideas. 4) Find inspiration everywhere - creativity can come from anywhere. 5) Prototype - quickly test ideas through prototypes.

For Udemy’s onboarding, playing the popular Pokémon Go game inspired using augmented reality and gaming elements for onboarding. The redesigned onboarding immersed new employees in an interactive scavenger hunt around the office to learn about the company. This creative approach helped drive learning and engagement for onboarding.

The company wanted to revamp their onboarding process which was currently 8 hours long and not very engaging. They identified key issues like lack of interaction and low retention of information.
They defined what qualities they wanted in the new onboarding: use time efficiently, allow self-directed learning, incorporate social learning, promote retention.
This translated to key objectives of engaging employees in the mission, sharing knowledge about the company (Udemy), and creating opportunities for employees to bond.
They used a creativity framework involving incubating ideas by taking time away and letting them develop unconsciously. This led them to the idea of a mobile augmented reality scavenger hunt game (Udemy GO) to achieve the objectives in a fun way.
The game incorporated activities, missions and challenges to expose players to company information and allow self-paced learning. It also facilitated collaboration and connection among coworkers.
They had to figure out how to build the AR app as they lacked technical skills. They found an easy-to-use AR experience builder tool online by researching how other teachers had tackled similar challenges.
The new onboarding process using the Udemy GO app kept employees more engaged with content compared to the previous passive format.
Companies should integrate learning into the natural flow of work by empowering employees to take ownership of their own learning and pursue it on their own terms through easy access to tools and resources.
Learning comes in many modalities like online courses, peer learning, social learning, etc. and companies should encourage various types of continuous learning.
Identifying “explainers” - knowledgeable employees who enjoy teaching others - can help fuel a culture of learning through peer-to-peer interactions.
Learning management systems can track learning activities to get insights on learning paths and behaviors to guide recommendations, but employees should have autonomy in their learning without strict gatekeeping.
The goal is to bake continuous learning into everyday workflows and company functions so it’s not seen as an interruption, but rather an empowering part of each person’s role and development.

Here are the key points:

A direct report struggling with SQL skills could be paired with a more experienced colleague to serve as a mentor. The mentor can share discoveries, help overcome hurdles, demonstrate lessons, and recommend next trainings.
Learning is more effective when linked to doing, not just formal settings. The mentor can help apply lessons in real work.
Incorporating learning as a discussion topic in regular manager/team meetings keeps it a focus. It motivates employees to hear peers’ learning and provides insights for managers on skills.
Employees should be given discretionary budgets to pursue approved external learning like conferences, bootcamps, or online courses to expand beyond internal options. This demonstrates commitment to development.
Adequate time and space need to be provided for learning to not be crowded out by “urgent” work. A fundamental shift is needed in organizations and managers to truly prioritize learning.

The passage discusses the importance of signaling that learning is a valued and prioritized part of the organizational culture. Leadership plays a key role in this through their authentic support and engagement in learning themselves. Leaders must consistently communicate that learning agility is an enabler for tackling business priorities, not a separate initiative.

Successful companies like PCL have recognized the value of learning since their early years by establishing formal training programs and integrating learning philosophies throughout their culture and operations. Even established learning cultures still require efforts to celebrate learning and recognize achievements to keep people engaged.

The language leaders use when talking about performance and outcomes sends a signal about whether learning from mistakes and course corrections is accepted. Performance should be viewed through a learning lens that accounts for inevitable setbacks from fallible people. An organizational focus on continuous learning helps build resilience and ability to adapt to changes.

Individuals and organizations can build a learning culture where continuous learning is woven into daily work conversations and is supported by leadership.
Regular goal check-ins, transparent sharing of wins and lessons learned, and employee surveys help organizations understand how to improve the learning culture and support employee growth.
Framing discussions around lessons learned rather than failures makes it safer for people to take risks, try new things, and learn from mistakes.
Managers play a pivotal role by proactively looking for learning opportunities aligned with employees’ goals and interests to encourage lifelong learning.
Providing tools like workshops on self-advocacy and feedback helps empower employees to advocate for their own learning needs and have productive career discussions.
An organization’s values and behaviors must genuinely support learning and growth for the culture to take hold at all levels.

So in summary, individuals and organizations can build a strong learning culture through leadership commitment, transparent sharing of experiences, empowering employee self-advocacy, and proactive manager support of learning goals.

Darren, the president of Udemy for Business, believes in fostering a strong learning culture through recognition and incentives.
As the company grew, it became harder for Darren to form close relationships with every employee, so he relies on people managers to have career conversations and connect employees to learning opportunities.
Udemy offers manager training and development programs to help managers foster engagement and learning. They also offer public speaking clubs for employees.
Darren believes meaningful recognition is important to motivate learning. At his prior company, they had an informal “hot sauce bottle” award chosen by peers. At Udemy, they offer substantial prizes like travel vouchers for learning achievements.
Darren signals the value of learning through his own transparency about what he still needs to learn and stories about pivotal learning experiences in his life and career. He advocates a growth mindset of embracing challenges and sees leaders’ vulnerability as important to motivate learning.

Here are the key points of the summary:

Leaders play a crucial role in signaling the importance of learning in an organization through open discussion of learning topics and sharing learning stories. This trickle-down effect encourages continuous learning.
The post emphasizes the value of continuous learning, especially in fast-moving organizations and changing environments. It argues leaders must get employees asking “why” and “how” to promote innovation and business results.
Creating rewards and recognition for learning helps build a learning culture. The example company puts on an elaborate annual awards show to celebrate learning achievements. It also provides employees a stipend to fund their own learning through courses, conferences, books etc.
Not all employees immediately embrace continuous learning. Gentle coaching conversations can help understand reluctant learners’ perspectives and address concerns without punishment. The goal is inclusion, not exclusion.
In summary, leadership commitment and actions are important to establish learning as a cultural priority and enable its diffusion throughout the organization. Transparency, authenticity and tangible support can help build trust in the learning mission.
Presenting learning and development to senior leadership can be challenging due to difficulties measuring outcomes. Hard metrics are preferred over vague assurances.
Continuous learning is critical to keeping up with rapid workplace transformations like automation and digital skills. Learning needs to be integrated into daily work to stay relevant.
Upskilling the current workforce is more efficient than constantly recruiting to fill skills gaps. A learning culture helps attract and retain talent.
Fostering innovation requires technical skills for new technologies as well as soft skills. A learning culture encourages experimentation. Cross-functional learning sparks new ideas.
Advances in technologies like VR, AI, and microlearning platforms make just-in-time, performance-based learning more feasible and allow better measurement of impact on business outcomes.

The key message is that continuous learning has become essential for companies to adapt, innovate and fill skills gaps in a rapidly changing workplace. New technologies enable learning to be integrated into daily work with minimal disruption. This helps demonstrate return on investment to senior leaders.

Sapient needed to balance the need for employees to spend the majority of their time on billable client work, while also providing opportunities for ongoing learning and skills development.
Initially, Sapient’s learning and development (L&D) function focused mainly on onboarding and soft skills training, but was not well-aligned with the company’s business strategy.
Ian Stevens, who led L&D, developed a targeted training program in artificial intelligence (AI) for a group of relevant employees. This addressed immediate client needs as well as future-proofing skills.
To gain support, Stevens negotiated with client partners on the hours employees could spend training each week in addition to self-directed learning. The first cohort had issues, but Stevens worked collaboratively rather than escalating problems.
Subsequent programs expanded in scope, first to single accounts then across industries. This strengthened Sapient’s learning culture and skills.
Key benefits included cost savings by upskilling existing employees versus hiring contractors, improved employee engagement and motivation, and support for business development.
Stevens continued refining programs based on metrics and learner feedback to better meet needs and maximize benefits for both employees and the company.
Effective licensing of training content allows companies to provide high-quality, relevant training to more employees globally in a cost-effective way. It extends the reach of learning and development (L&D) efforts.
Targeted training content taught by experts improves employee performance and helps them achieve productivity faster when included in onboarding.
Access to proprietary and skills development courses empowers employees to take on new responsibilities and earn certifications, supporting business metrics like revenue generation.
While Udemy is one part of an effective L&D strategy, its data shows significant staff time savings from online training versus traditional methods.
It is important for L&D to demonstrate both quantifiable results and also expertise that can’t be measured, to convince leadership to invest in learning. Analytics should inform strategy but not replace experience.
Continuous evaluation and integration of learnings is needed to maintain a vibrant learning culture over time as needs, employees, and technologies change. Accountability is also important to harmonize informal learning activities with the overall L&D strategy.

Here are the key points I would make in addressing the team’s reputation issue:

Acknowledge the feedback about being seen as saying no and standing in the way. Validate employees’ experiences without getting defensive.
Explain that the L&D team’s goal is to enable learning, not constrain it. Sometimes getting involved is necessary to ensure alignment and effectiveness, not impose control.
Focus on partnership, not policing. The team’s role is to support employee initiatives, not stifle them. Give examples of successful collaborations.
Recognize that employee-led learning is a positive sign of culture. Reach out proactively to satellite offices to strengthen relationships and involvement.
Commit to being more thoughtful about communicating priorities and providing guidance upfront. Respect employees’ autonomy while ensuring strategic alignment.
Solicit feedback regularly on how to improve. Adopt a continuous learning mindset like using agile principles. The goal is satisfying learners’ needs as they evolve.

The key is acknowledging issues, focusing on support rather than saying no, strengthening relationships, and committing to ongoing improvement based on feedback. This builds trust that the L&D team wants to enable learning across the organization.

If an organization has defined goals and key performance indicators (KPIs) for employee learning and development, it can design surveys to get feedback on how well those goals and KPIs are being achieved. Surveying employees helps understand where performance is strong and where there are opportunities for improvement.
When hiring new employees, organizations should look for “agile, adaptable learners” who will fit into and contribute to the company’s learning culture. Interviews should focus on identifying growth mindset through behavioral questions about handling challenges, openness to feedback, and examples of skills development.
Good behavioral interview questions ask candidates to provide concrete examples and dig deeper than past accomplishments to understand attitudes like how they respond to obstacles and criticism. Sample questions focus on continuous learning, skill development, handling unfamiliar tasks, and implementing feedback.
Diversity and inclusion initiatives need to be integrated throughout organizational learning and development efforts. Beyond specific diversity training, instructional design should consider inclusion, and learning programs should be accessible to all employees.
Access to learning opportunities should be broad within organizations to support an inclusive culture and help the business adapt to unpredictable changes through a foundation of continuous learning.

Here is a summary of the key sources cited in the provided overview:

Center for the New Economy and Society at the World Economic Forum - Report on the future of jobs.
Modern Elder Academy - Organization providing learning programs for older adults.
Dana Alan Koch and Allison M. Horn - Leaders of the Modern Elder Academy who were interviewed.
Accenture - Consulting firm cited as an example of agile learning. Interviews conducted with their employees.
Udemy - Online learning platform. Provided data on learning trends and was interviewed about their workshops.
PCL - Construction company. Mike Olsson, VP of HR and Learning, was interviewed about their learning programs.
DDI - Global HR consulting firm. Provided data from their leadership reports.
Publicis Sapient - Consulting firm cited as an example of calculating ROI for learning programs. Interviews conducted.
Udemy for Business - Provided data on calculating ROI for corporate learning programs. President Darren Shimkus was interviewed.
Various research reports and surveys - Cited for providing additional data on learning trends, skills gaps, motivation, etc.

Let me know if you need any clarification or have additional questions!

Activities for continuous learning included auditing the state of learning, promoting an environment conducive to learning, facilitating performance conversations that emphasize learning, and providing time and space for learning.
Change agility benefits both employees and organizations. Building a learning culture can help foster change agility.
Components of an effective learning culture include things like feedback, empowering employees as learners, establishing norms around learning, and signaling the value of learning.
Creating a learning culture requires investment from organizations in things like L&D programs, providing time/space for learning, and accountability for learning.
Research on learning highlighted factors like the impact of fear vs trust on learning, the importance of context, individualization, instructional design, prioritizing content/technology, and reinforcement. This research can help inform a sustainable learning culture.
Building a business case for a learning culture requires demonstrating returns like engagement, retention, core metrics, cost effectiveness, and growth mindset. Data analysis of cultural changes also strengthens the case.
Sustaining a learning culture long-term involves continuously updating approaches using latest research, empowering employees as leaders of learning, and cultivating expertise in L&D professionals. Embedding a growth mindset organization-wide also helps.

The passage discusses key aspects of building and sustaining an agile learning culture. It touches on:

The importance of promoting creativity, fresh program content, and agility in learning.
Techniques for effectively marketing L&D programs, like leveraging senior leader involvement and marketing with agility.
How to signal the value of learning through performance reviews, prizes/incentives, self-advocacy workshops, and visible support from managers/leaders.
Strategies for engaging reluctant learners and maintaining the culture, such as continuous improvement, addressing stagnation, diversity initiatives, and hiring to support the culture.
The role of L&D professionals in activities like relationship building, employee-led initiatives, and satellite location programs to sustain the culture long-term.

In summary, it provides an overview of best practices for establishing an agile learning culture and maintaining it through employee engagement, leadership support, and continuous evolution of the culture over time. The focus is on creativity, marketing, incentives, and diverse initiatives.

Shelley had a successful career as a classroom teacher in Canada for almost a decade. She now teaches on the Udemy platform and has over 15,000 students enrolled in her courses covering topics like feedback, managing, and more.

Shelley speaks regularly at industry events such as TEDWomen, ATD International Conference, DevLearn, and Unleash. She also contributes to publications including Entrepreneur, Fast Company, and U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation. Shelley provides expert commentary for outlets like The Wall Street Journal, CNBC, Cheddar TV, and Inc.

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The Upskilling Imperative 5 Ways to Make Learning Core to the Way We Work - Shelley Osborne