An L&D (learning and development) strategy is a plan that ties employee development to the organisation’s goals. It sets out which capabilities the business needs, how it will build them and how it will know the effort has worked. Without one, training turns into a string of one-off purchases that nobody can link to business results.
Quick Overview
What you will learn:
- How the training cycle gives structure to an employee development strategy
- Where to start with a training needs analysis
- How to choose development formats and evaluate their results
- Who in the organisation owns each part of the strategy
Who this article is for:
- People responsible for training and development
- HR business partners
- Managers planning their teams’ development
Reading time: 7 minutes
The Training Cycle as the Backbone of a Strategy
Gould and colleagues (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) describe training needs analysis as the first step in a cycle that feeds an organisation’s overall training and education strategy. The cycle opens with a systematic consultation to identify what learners need, followed by course planning, delivery and evaluation; what you learn from evaluation then feeds the next round of needs analysis.
In their review, which looked at nursing education, the analyses that came out best were those run within a single, specific organisation. They were methodologically more rigorous, more likely to take stakeholders’ views into account and more likely to produce findings that could improve the rest of the cycle than analyses spanning several organisations at once. The lesson for an L&D strategy is to start from your own company’s needs, not from generic trend reports.
Needs Analysis: Where to Start
- Business goals. List the organisation’s goals for the next year or two and ask which skills they require.
- Key roles. Identify the jobs on which those goals depend and describe the capabilities each one needs.
- The gap. Compare the capabilities you need with the ones you have, drawing on development conversations, performance reviews and managers’ observations.
- Stakeholders. Talk to the board, to managers and to employees themselves; their buy-in decides whether the findings get used.
- Priorities. Rank needs by impact on the goals and by urgency, and only then build the training plan from that list.
Choosing Development Formats
Classroom training is not the only tool. A strategy should provide for a range of formats and match them to the need: workshops for practising skills, e-learning for knowledge people need to have at hand, mentoring and coaching for growth in a role, and stretch projects for trying out new capabilities in practice. Learning at the point of need calls for different preparation from up-front training, and blended programmes need a coherent design for the whole journey.
The format should follow from the gap, not from what a vendor happens to sell. If the problem is a lack of practice, another lecture will not fix it.
Evaluation: How You Will Know It Worked
Frye and Hemmer (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) review several models for evaluating educational programmes: experimental and quasi-experimental designs, Kirkpatrick’s four-level model, the Logic Model and the CIPP model (context, input, process, product). They advise choosing a model in light of the programme’s complexity and what the organisation actually needs to find out.
The Kirkpatrick model covers reaction, learning, behaviour and results. A review by Jefnee and colleagues (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) shows a typical gap: across 8 studies of online training for school staff, all reported participant satisfaction and gains in knowledge, yet none looked at changes in behaviour or organisational outcomes. A scoping review by Lee and Song (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov), which sorted the outcomes of accelerated nursing programmes into the same four levels, likewise found no study of the programmes’ long-term impact on clinical practice or patient outcomes. An L&D strategy should therefore plan measurement at the behaviour and results levels from day one, not stop at the post-course survey.
What the Strategy Document Should Contain
- the organisation’s goals and the development priorities that follow from them;
- the roles and capabilities the strategy covers;
- development formats mapped to specific needs;
- budget and timeline;
- how you will measure behaviour and results;
- who is accountable and when the strategy will be reviewed.
Review the document alongside the business plan: when the company’s goals change, so do its development priorities.
Who Is Responsible for What
- The L&D strategy owner (for example, a board member or the HR director) approves priorities and budget.
- The corporate training manager, as ESCO (
esco.ec.europa.eu) describes the role, coordinates training activities and development programmes across the company, designs new training modules and oversees how they are planned and delivered. - The HR business partner connects the needs analysis to each department’s goals.
- The line manager points out gaps in the team and gives people the chance to use new skills.
- The instructional designer produces the learning content, including e-learning.
Read Also
- Measuring training effectiveness: the Kirkpatrick model in practice — evaluating results
- Designing a blended learning training programme — combining development formats
- Just-in-Time Learning: Knowledge Exactly When It’s Needed — learning at the point of need
Build Your Skills
Two courses take the topic further: Strategic planning for talent development and Train the Trainer Academy - Train the Trainer. The first covers aligning talent development with the organisation’s strategic goals; the second, designing training and evaluating how well it works. Get in touch and we will tailor the scope to your organisation.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
How do you put together a company training plan?
Start with a needs analysis covering business goals, key roles and capability gaps. Gould and colleagues (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) treat that analysis as the first step in a cycle that continues with planning, delivery and evaluation. The plan should set out priorities, formats, dates, budget and how results will be measured.
What tools can you use to develop employees?
They include courses and workshops, e-learning, mentoring and coaching, stretch projects, development conversations and individual development plans. Pick the tool to fit the gap: knowledge is easier to pass on through materials, while a skill needs practice and feedback.
What does a company’s training function do?
It coordinates training activities and development programmes, plans them and oversees how they are delivered; that is how ESCO (esco.ec.europa.eu) describes the corporate training manager’s job. In a mature organisation, the function also runs needs analysis and evaluation and sets priorities together with the board and line managers.
What does employee development mean?
It covers everything that helps people gain the knowledge and skills they need in their current and future roles: courses, learning on the job, mentoring or new assignments. In an L&D strategy, employee development is tied to the organisation’s goals rather than to individual wish lists alone.