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Jack Stucko

Future of the Profession

We know why employees leave. Billions are spent each year on reports, whitepapers, and top-level strategies all to better understand phenomenon like the great resignation or quiet quitting. But the truth is this: we should be asking the opposite.What makes employees stay? And more than that, what makes some companies so attractive that employees stay with them for decades?What Makes Employees StayGone are the days when an employee would stay with one company for the best part of their career. Today, the average is just under three years for employees in the 25–34 age bracket.According to research by the Work Institute, 22 percent of resignations are due to a lack of opportunities for growth, promotion, achievement, or training. This trend is only growing with new opportunities to work remotely and higher employee turnover than ever before.What’s clear is that the next generation of employees want to know that the work they do has a meaningful impact. They want real opportunities for development. And they want to feel that they can grow in their role. So, what sets organizations with high employee retention apart?1. Never finding yourself stuckTop organizations understand that career stagnation is a surefire way to lose talented employees. They foster an environment where advancement is fully supported, and moving into different teams or departments is seen as an advantage, not a taboo.It’s not all about promotions, though. By investing in ongoing training and development programs, these companies ensure that employees are always on a path to enrichment. Ultimately, the outcome is a workforce that’s supported, motivated, and always evolving.2. Having an open dialogue about developmentWe now know that 33 percent of employees quit within the first 90 days. This critical point comes down to frustration and mismatches between the expectations of a given role—and the reality. But not every organization sees this 90-day spike. Organizations that start conversations early around job satisfaction, development, and feedback retain talent even in cases where there’s been a rocky first start.When companies talk early and often about performance and development opportunities, HR are in the loop on situational changes, goals, and aspirations, so they (and the employee) always know where they’re going next.3. Getting real recognition for your workWhen did you last get acknowledged for a job well done? Recognition is a powerful motivator. Employees who feel appreciated for their contributions are more likely to stay committed. When employees are recognized as individuals, not just as cogs in a machine, we see them take on new challenges, innovate, and invest their energy in the company’s success.But beyond this, recognition builds trust and allows employees to take on new responsibilities, empowering them to grow in their role rather than placing a limit on potential. Trust and recognition are a fundamental part of the company culture in organizations where employees stay the longest.Why Investing in Talent Pays Off in the Long TermInvesting in your employees is a long-term strategy to strengthen your organization. The cost of high turnover—recruitment, training, lost productivity—far outweighs the expense of developing the talent you already have.Companies that focus on employee growth benefit from the accumulated knowledge, experience, and loyalty of long-term employees, leading to a stronger organization. So, the next time you are asked how you can reduce employee churn, ask yourself the opposite. What can we all do to help employees stay?

What Would Make You Stay With a Company for 10 Years?

Hey, ATD Change-Makers! Feeling stuck trying to drive organizational change? Don’t let misaligned teams or knowledge bottlenecks hold anyone back. Join this interactive demo from Tigerhall to see how enterprise teams transform into proactive change agents, accelerating change and implementing strategic initiatives that stick.
We’ll cover everything from global insights tailored to an organization’s specific context to real-time tracking of internal change initiatives. Plus, get a sneak peek at a new Microsoft Teams integration, aimed at keeping employees and team collaboration in the typical flow of work without missing a strategic beat. Remember, speed of execution is everything!
What’s in store during this demo:

Global insights for local impact: Learn how Tigerhall’s curated content from more than 1,500 global experts is customized to fit your unique organizational contexts.
Scaling internal knowledge, sans hassle: Discover how legacy employees and subject matter experts within an organization can create and share internal expertise as effortlessly as uploading a social media story.
Meeting employees where they are: Identify how Tigerhall’s multilingual and diverse content formats align an entire global workforce with a corporate strategy—available for both internal and external content.


DEMO: How to Activate Organizational Change Through Strategic Enablement

December 2022 - TD Magazine

Reduce the friction that is preventing learners from engaging with your learning.Businesses spend billions of dollars trying to understand consumer behavior, resulting in marketing strategies that aim to get consumers to buy their products. However, in those companies, many L&D functions are not leveraging the same insights and strategies to reach their learners. Treat your learning solutions like products, and minimize the friction between the solutions and learners. One way to do so is using BJ Fogg's behavior model to evaluate your learning initiatives.Identify the frictionThe Fogg behavior model looks at three conditions that must be present for someone to engage in a behavior: motivation, ability, and a prompt. When one of them is absent or diminished, so is the likelihood that the desired behavior will occur.For example, let's say you have a missed call on your cell phone. Why didn't you answer the phone? Maybe you heard it ring, looked down and saw who was calling, and decided you didn't want to talk to that person right now. You heard the ring—that was the prompt. Nothing was keeping your from answering the call (that is to say, you had the ability). You just didn't want to—you didn't have the motivation to engage in the behavior.Now let's say the phone rings, and you're expecting the call and want to take it. But you can't find your phone, or it's in another room and you can't get there in time. Again, you heard the ring (the prompt), and this time you wanted to take the call (motivation), but you weren't able to get to the phone in time (ability).Finally, let's say you're expecting the call, and your phone is right next to you. However, the ringer is set to silent. The phone rings, you want to answer and are able to do so, but you never hear the ring—you received no prompt to answer it.That's how Fogg's behavior model works. The presence or absence of any of the variables can contribute directly to the likelihood that you'll engage in a given behavior.What if we look at learner behavior through that lens? You've created a great learning initiative and spent a lot of time and money on the learning ecosystem. However, you don't seem to be getting the traction you're hoping for. Here are some questions to consider:Are learners aware of the learning solution? Are there prompts that alert learners to its availability?Are learners motivated? Do they want to engage in learning?Are they able to engage with the learning solution?Is there anything preventing them or making it more difficult for them to access it?If you have opportunities in any of those areas, then you have friction between learners and the learning solution. Friction, in this context, is the absence of prompts or is anything that impedes motivation or ability when it comes to a learning initiative.PromptsIf learners don't know about your learning initiative, it may as well not exist. These days, people are inundated with prompts—pop-ups on smartphones, ads on social media, digital billboards, and the like. How can we ensure that learners are prompted to our initiatives? The traditional methods are static and push prompts.A static prompt is one that is in a fixed physical location, such as a poster in a breakroom. It works fine when your audience tends to be isolated in one particular location. But if someone is not in that exact location, they won't see it.A push prompt is much more targeted. It entails identifying your audience members and sending a prompt to them, such as an email reminder that a course is available. However, you often can't customize that prompt by audience member—everyone gets the same message. And you can't time the prompt so that it reaches an individual right when they need it most. Thus, there are some limitations to what we have traditionally used as prompts in our learning ecosystems.This is an area we should pay close attention to because it has the potential to change rapidly. Imagine if we could activate a prompt for a specific learner at a specific time and in a specific location with a learning solution that is designed precisely for the activity that they are engaging in in that moment? It would be similar to finding an exclusive offer from Starbucks popping up on your phone whenever you're within 50 yards of a store.MotivationMotivation should be the easiest variable in this equation. If your initiative meets a learning need, learners should be inherently motivated to engage with it. However, that isn't always the case. In my experience, there are two major reasons. The first is that the solution does not meet a learning need (which is a subject for another article). The second, and more egregious, reason is that learning solutions get bogged down with demotivators that dilute learners' eagerness.Given the massive increase in video use for learning, there are some lessons to be learned from how people engage with YouTube and how we think about the videos and other learning initiatives we create.I often use the example of having a hole in my drywall and turning to YouTube to see how to fix it. Not surprisingly, there are numerous options from which to choose. We've all become accustomed to using filters to narrow down internet search results, although we often do our own visual filtering first. For example, I can take a quick look at a results list on YouTube for drywall repair and immediately rule out, or at least deprioritize, some of the videos. The first thing I'll look at is time. I expect that this should be a relatively simple task, so I'm not looking for a long video. The shorter the better.Likewise, learners have an expectation of how simple or complex a task is and at least some sense of how long it should take to learn. If they see that a video is 30 minutes long, and their perception of the task doesn't line up with that amount of time, you may lose them right away.I start playing a six-minute video from the list. After a lengthy introduction, a bio of the host, and several examples that don't apply to what I'm looking for, the host eventually starts the process of explaining how to execute the repair. It took over one minute to get there. That is an informal measurement I call "time to learning"—or how long it takes before I get to the actual learning. Time to learning is especially important when considering whether our goal is knowledge retention or knowledge acquisition. In other words, are learners in this for the long haul, or do they just need a quick one-off fix that they will rarely if ever need again?When looking at learning from a knowledge retention standpoint, time to learning is slightly less important. We know we're going to get deep, and participants learning about the instructor's credibility can be helpful to set the tone. But if we seek knowledge acquisition, or disposable knowledge, time to learning matters a lot—especially if there are several options from which to choose.For example, imagine I need to generate a report for my manager, who is out sick. I've never done the task before, and it's highly unlikely that I'll ever have to do it again. After some digging, I find a few videos that will help me figure out what to do. However, the videos don't cover only the report I need to generate; they cover all the reports in the entire program and explain where the data from those reports comes from and why they're important to the business.Are those bad things for me to know? Of course not. But they're not relevant to what I need to do right now. Getting what I need is like searching for that how-to needle in a haystack of video instruction. I may resort to other options, such as trial and error (risky) or asking a colleague (now two of us are wasting time trying to figure this out).Going back to the drywall video: I stuck with it for more than a minute only to see how long it would take for the purposes of this example. If I had a real need, I doubt I would have held out for more than 10–15 seconds.We can and should apply the same lessons to our video content libraries and consider where we are adding friction that we should remove. In most cases, those are demotivators that don't reflect the quality of our instructional design yet may deter learners from ever finding that out.AbilityAnother go-to source for information in people's nonwork lives is Google. Here's what happens if I search for "how to repair drywall"—let's count the clicks: I open the browser to Google and type the search term, then click Search. One click. What I see first are a few links to associated terms like "water damage" and "peeling" that enable me to refine my search. Below that is a frame from a video already queued to a specific timecode that is likely to address my need. Below that are links to a few more videos, all with descriptions and timecodes of key moments in the videos. Next up is the "People also ask" section, which displays several ways that others have posed their question that may be more in alignment with my need. And finally, I get a list of results that I would normally expect to see on Google. All from one click.Now think about your learners and, more importantly, your learning ecosystem. Most likely your version of Google is some sort of learning management system or learning experience platform. How many clicks does it take learners to get there? Once someone arrives at your version of Google, how many of the features described above does it have? How easy is it for learners to find what they need?Many of us are presumably still in a situation where learners must go through six, eight, or even 10-plus clicks to find what they need. Number of clicks and speed to solution are ways we can assess learners' ability to engage in the desired behavior.Nobody wants to click through a never-ending menu. Individuals have been conditioned that they shouldn't have to, and they are far more likely to give up somewhere along the way than they are to reach the end.Other ability barriers include bandwidth and hardware. Sometimes our instructional design comes with ability barriers. If you have motivated learners who know about your initiatives, make it as easy as possible for them to access and engage with learning.Enhance learning's impactThis article has numerous questions you can ask about any given learning solution. It's going to be difficult to get satisfactory answers to all of them. But what you can do is identify an area that you believe may be causing friction for your learners and is something that you can influence.In other words, we all want better bandwidth, but you probably have an extremely limited ability to influence that yourself. You may have a better chance implementing some prompts for learners that can move the needle. Or you may be able to reduce the number of clicks required to access content with some adjustments to your internal websites or portals. Start small by looking for areas to reduce friction with existing learning solutions, and then incorporate the ideas into the design phase of future ones.If you treat your learning program like a product and view your learning ecosystem as a mechanism for reaching your audience and providing that product, it may change your perspective.

Are You Driving Learners Away!

According to a Bersin by Deloitte report, the typical employee devotes only about 1% of his time to professional development. What this means is that in a 40-hour work week, we devote less than 24 minutes to anything resembling learning. This is the small space of time we must work with, and this is where microlearning has your back.
Use Microlearning as Your Training Disrupter
Using microlearning as performance support and learning reinforcement to scaffold learning after a training event takes place, helps strengthen the learning connections. Microlearning can help you take training that is stuck in the mud and disrupt the training process—in a good way.
What this Means for L&D
Today's modern workforce has grown up with knowledge at their fingertips, and the need for structured training is diminishing. This rapid learning demand requires L&D to become more flexible and sharply focused on delivering short bursts of right-sized scaffolded support. It's the smart L&D practitioner who will take advantage of microlearning to disrupt learning in their organizations.
Join our webinar on May 14 where we will: 

Identify the traits of effective microlearning content.
Discover how to deconstruct current macro content into micro-sized nuggets.
Debunk microlearning myths.
Share examples of microlearning tools and application.


Microlearning as Learning Reinforcement

As a learning leader, nothing is scarier for you than an e-learning program that doesn't support your business goals. If you find yourself haunted by unengaged learners or frighteningly high dropout rates, you need a magic potion to lead your learners and your organization to success.
The key ingredients to conjure an effective e-learning program are data and learning science. Data will tell you where learners get stuck and where you should focus your attention. Then, you can leverage learning design strategies to course-correct behaviors and improve engagement.
In this webinar, BenchPrep's learning content expert Janine Loechel will share five steps that will help you use data and learning design principles to create an engaging training program.
During this event, you will learn:

Why it's important to keep your learning program objectives in mind while designing and developing content that caters to modern learners needs
How to use data and learning design principles to course-correct your learning programs to increase engagement and keep your learners coming back for more
A five-step framework to help create an impactful learning program and leave with actionable next steps to implement in your training programs today


Data and Learning Science: The Magic Potion to Engage Your Learners

L&D professionals center many of their efforts on solving problems for organizations. But where do they turn when they get stuck while developing those learning solutions?They now can turn to Troubleshooting for Trainers. Author, coach, and consultant Sophie Oberstein has written this new book as a resource dedicated to helping talent development professionals emerge unscathed from the tight spots they encounter on the job. The book’s thematic sections address issues that can cause L&D pros the most angst:Lack of credibilityTraining that isn’t well regardedLack of resourcesLimited learning design experienceUncertainty around measurementLive training surprisesChallenging participantsMost talent development professionals can identify with one or more of the aforementioned trouble spots. “Like a troubleshooting guide that’s part of the operating manual for a new appliance that has started acting up, this book will provide you with in-the-moment fixes and longer-term solutions for some of the common challenges faced by new trainers at every stage in the L&D process,” Oberstein writes in the introduction. However, she extends her advice to address challenges that are relevant and relatable to training pros at all stages of their careers.The section on lack of credibility, for example, may appeal to those early in their careers. Oberstein speaks to challenges that arise because of a lack of experience and provides advice for those managing their first project. In other sections—such as the one on limited learning design experience—she presents more complex situations, such as how to develop a training course on an unfamiliar topic or how to produce asynchronous e-learning.The book’s methodical layout establishes its intended use as a resource. A typical section begins with possible issues trainers may face on that particular topic. Oberstein often shares her own experience as well, which enables readers to relate to her.Next, in a case study format, Oberstein addresses the challenges. Each is numbered, and the main idea is written in big, bold letters—for example, “I’ve been asked to provide training, but I don’t think it’s going to help.” Oberstein describes the challenge, dives into possible solutions, concludes with a bottom-line statement, and suggests additional resources for readers to delve deeper.In all, Oberstein addresses 45 challenges in the book using what she calls a “problem-solving focus.” Accordingly, the book is not just narrative—it features helpful charts, lists, and practical resources to help trainers. Whether you’re faced with confused learners, complaining participants, or concerns about technology, chances are Troubleshooting for Trainers can point you in the right direction.Share your ATD Virtual Conference experience on social media. #ATDVirtualConference

A Resource for Overcoming Training Trouble Spots

What kind of year will 2019 be for your career? Will you make progress, mark time, or fall behind?
Do you feel stuck in a dead-end job with limited opportunities to advance? Are you waiting for your boss or HR to manage your career? Have you interviewed for a promotion a few times, but haven’t gotten selected? Do you love your job, but know it’s time to move on? Are you already on the high-potential track, but need to stand out in the pile?
Vivian Blade has seen many professionals get caught up in being so busy with their work that they don’t give much attention to their careers. Then, months pass, and they’re not making the progress they’d hoped and are frustrated by the lack of career opportunities.
You have more control than you think over the outcomes in your career. Don’t look back with disappointment. Make the most of 2019, starting now.
The right focus and a shift in mindset can give you the power to make change happen.
Join Vivian for this interactive webcast as she equips you to:

Apply five often overlooked, highly effective strategies to ensure career success.
Know the right questions to ask yourself to get on the right track.
Shift your mental power to hit the ground running and ensure 2019 is a banner year for you.


Hit the Ground Running: 5 Often Overlooked Strategies to Ensure Career Success in 2019

Discover many common reasons performers get stuck and how to coach them to get back on track.

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