Doing it the best what one does depends greatly on the level of expertise s/he has. Developing self to a subject’s mastery requires theoretical and practical knowledge. The skills are learned and practiced over time until they become second nature of a person.
The Past and Present of the Learning Process
The old and typical way of learning, which is still applicable in some cases, was classroom training. It has certain limitations, from waiting for the course to be available to booking self in and attending the training. These days, with the pace of changes in technology which is impacting businesses as well, one can’t wait for the relevant training to be available at specific location to attend and learn the skill(s) in demand.
Changed Learning Needs and Tools
Just as the learning needs have changed and are changing, the related methods & tools have and are, as well. Keeping oneself up-to-date with necessary skills isn’t a dream anymore; you can access the desired trainings, from simple overviews to detailed step-by-step guides to understand the core concepts and to practice & master virtually anything, while you are on the go.
- As a learner you have lot of possibilities available to learn the skills.
- For subject matter experts also, it’s lot easier to teach the skills to global audience by developing & publishing the training courses with variety of tools.
- The organizations who are concerned about the professional development of their employees, it’s also easy to engage their people in learning activities, far easier than ever before.
The
SAP SuccessFactors Learning Management System is an answer to all (and more) of such business needs. Hosted in cloud, it’s accessible from every location wherever internet is available.
Change to Changed: Implementation and Change Management
The businesses, in particular those who have to ensure their employees achieve certain levels of knowledge in specific areas, are taking advantage of its powerful functionalities. Recently I was part of such a project where LMS was implemented & I had to support it from Change Management perspective, to help different groups of people in adopting the new tool & approach to engage in the training cycle which was quite different, prior to its implementation.
- The training administrators were required to know how they would be managing the day-to-day training activities,
- The managers needed to know the workflow aspect of the solution and associated approval mechanism, and
- The employees had to learn the process of requesting and following up on trainings of their interests.
As with all other projects where Change Management is required, the stakeholder groups were identified with the possible impact each group was expected to have and accordingly necessary actions were taken, from communicating them the procedure to assisting them in handling the new process as easily as possible.
Subject Knowledge and Communication
As a Change Manager, with some earlier experience in Training & Event Management and Learning Solution components of SAP HR applications, I supported my colleagues (from Technical and Business teams) in crafting the communication messages with utmost care to ensure that the importance of the solution and the value it provides is perceived well across the organization.
Communicating the Value of LMS, few Guidelines
If you are implementing LMS at your organization and want to communicate its value, you can use the points I used for different groups. Here are the guidelines:
- Mention how employee development is considered at your organization. The great businesses, like the one I’m working for, pay particular attention to professional development.
- Specify the current process of raising the training request to booking self in the training and attending the course and how the need of improvement was identified.
- Describe how employees will have better learning experience such as selecting the courses from built-in catalog, following the steps to complete formalities and tracking the progress.
- Explain the product features where LMS is different than existing solutions and how it simplifies jobs of individuals engaged in the learning process, from participants to administrators.
- Refer to the user manuals to guide them on the process and the technical support which you have available at your organization.
In addition to the above, you may also need to communicate separately to individual groups impacted with solution implementation. In my case I had three different variants to be used for different population and in different phases of the project.
Achieving Satisfaction, a Testimonial
The project was a success and I’ve received good feedback and asked one of my colleagues – a Learning & Talent Development Architect,
Mr. Saqib Mansoor Ahmed, to describe how LMS is helpful for the business and here’s what he says:
I was involved at an earlier stage of the project i.e. during requirements engineering. Now as the LMS is live, I can see the benefits it offers to manage the training cycles. As part of the Learning and Talent Development Team I am hoping to take advantage of all of its features in coming days, however, there are quite a few processes which have improved with the solution’s implementation and are visible, including the details it provides on the training organizers & facilitators, and the approval process. In short I evaluate it as a great MIS, supporting the complete learning process – from providing the dates of the courses being offered to its progress tracking functionalities.
Your experience
Have you supported your HR department in (or planning to) managing their learning process better with any of the SAP tools, Training & Event Management, Learning Solution or Learning Management System? If yes, what was your experience?
Comments or Questions
If you have any comments / questions on the experience I had, which was not in the capacity of a Module Consultant but as a Change Manager, I’d be happy to answer.
