Be A Good Learner and Your Employees Will be too

If you want your business to be flexible enough to change and grow with turbulent market conditions, you’ll need to encourage an atmosphere in which learning is (or becomes) appreciated. The best way to do that is to lead by exampleโ€ฆin other words, demonstrate to your employees that you’re actually interested in learning yourself.

There are three secrets to being a good learner. You must:

1. be excited, not threatened, by new ideas. Managers who see innovation as just another threat that will diminish their power make a grave mistake. Of course if you’re dedicated to your company’s growth and willing to work hard to achieve it, any change will only make your position stronger.

2. recognise your personal prejudices and admit them to others. Biases in business are often suffocating. By the same token they can make you blind to good ideas, and cause you to spend time and money on farfetched or risky concepts.

3. remain humble. Remember that even the most important business knowledge is, at best, temporaryโ€ฆand today’s best ideas sometimes won’t be effective tomorrow. By remaining modest about your accomplishments, you’ll build a foundation of support in your organization that’ll help you later.

A thriving learning cultureโ€”one where employees are empowered to take time to learn skills that will help them succeed in the roles of today and tomorrowโ€”doesnโ€™t happen overnight. It requires persistent cultivation, strategic learner engagement initiatives, and a learning platform thatโ€™s available wherever and whenever your employees need it.ย  Itโ€™s unlikely one single strategy will get you to your engagement goals. Mix and match these strategies, and build on them over time to edge you closer to your ideal learning culture.
Help employees understand what they should be learning to be successful at your company by creating and assigning learning content. Encourage managers to assign learning content unique to their teams.