If your people are your most important asset, then you need to provide them with opportunities to grow professionally, develop their skills, and make a positive contribution to your company’s success.

Studies have shown that lack of learning and development opportunities contributes to up to 25% of staff turnover, and that companies that deliver high impact learning opportunities have 37% greater productivity than those that don’t.

You’re not limited to formal courses. Take advantage of learning technology and offer a range of training opportunities; make learning endemic to your culture and encourage everyone to take the time to grow within and beyond their roles.

Try a couple of these ideas for building your learning culture

Make learning continuous, social and engaging

Training isn’t just about instructor-led courses. Explore informal and social learning environments, collaborative problem solving, experiential (and experimental) learning, coaching and mentorship. Give your people a chance to truly interact and engage with learning

Let your learners learn (even when you’re not training them)

There’s a wealth of training and learning experiences beyond those your HR department can provide. Conferences and meetups, online courses, communities, forums, videos and tutorials are all great (often free) resources for employee development, and can support, reinforce and even inspire the training you offer.

Start with your handbook

Start at the very beginning: use your learning system for employee induction and onboarding. What better way to demonstrate your learning culture than by making it part of life from day one?

Always Be Communicating

Learning is not only about role- and skillbased training. Use your learning systems to teach people about the company, communicate news and developments, showcase new products and ideas (and courses), and promote networking. Increase engagement while showing your dedication to training - and showcasing your tools!

Give learners a voice & use their insights strategically

Encourage people to communicate their learning journey: in meetings, through personal blogs, social media, even course recommendations and ratings. Then make use of their feedback and your training data to produce varied, relevant and timely material that helps your people develop strategically and stay engaged.

Make the most of technology

If you’re using a system for e-learning, don’t stop at putting PDFs and Word documents online; experiment with interactivity and a range of media to make content come alive. Then let people access training material where and when they need it - even if that’s away from the office - and complete tasks at their own pace.

Link learning & performance

Make learning and development a focal point in performance reviews; less ‘where did you go wrong’, more ‘how will you grow from here?’ Reinforce the importance of ongoing development - as your people improve, so does your company!