Hacking HR to Build an Adaptability Advantage

As the public sector slowly recovers and re-assesses its purpose as ‘public enablers’ rather than ‘public servants’ (In Shape for Success, June 2009), there is a real need to look more carefully at how to encourage organisations to place more value on informal learning as it is a more cost-effective and sustainable solution.

While it is fully respected that the reduction of cost is an understandable pull in the current climate, I feel other equally important reasons should pull organisations to use more informal learning practices.

Historically in organisations, qualification routes have been rewarded in a number of ways – acknowledgement as a paper certificate means the learning is made ‘visible’, easy to measure, it is recognised across organisations and in some cases a pay rise or more opportunities for promotion. Informal learning practices in comparison are difficult to make ‘visible’, quantify and/or measure.

So far the benefits are stacked towards more formal learning routes, however a closer look at the impact of formal and informal learning highlights significant differences in risk behaviours and flexible working practices.

Qualification routes lead to the ‘professionalisation’ of (sometimes everyday) activities and encourage specialist and expert thinking. This ‘professionalisation’ however brings with it some rigorous risk management practices, often leading to risk averse thinking. In organisations, only staff with certain qualifications are ‘allowed’ to perform certain tasks, while major assumption are made about how the person with the qualification performs those tasks using their ‘expert’ knowledge. At the same time, unqualified staff may feel disempowered to learn and act as their knowledge based on more informal learning is perceived never to match that of the ‘specialist’.

The truth about qualification routes is that apart from being very expensive, it does not produce ‘experts’ as the knowledge taught on any course is soon outdated and needs commitment and responsibility from the individual learner to ‘top it up’ through further learning. On the one hand, ‘expert’ thinking can lead to ‘I know it all/I have seen it all’ attitudes. On the other, the ‘top up’ commitment and responsibility may be perceived as that of the organisation rather than that of the individual learner.

Also during times of major change, staff who have a topic-specific qualification may understandably be less comfortable with changes to their job roles as changes may insist on less focus on their specialist area of knowledge and more on transferable skills.

In contrast, while informal learning is difficult to quantify or measure, it is more cost effective alongside with a wider range of benefits. 80% of our learning in everyday life is through informal learning, which includes mirroring, copying, reading, observing, asking questions, play etc. Because many of these are based on our natural curiosity and relevance of the topic at that given time, the retention of the knowledge is longer-term. As children, we do this naturally.

More focus on informal learning practices in an organisation empowers staff to remain curious and use their passion for their work to learn more on a day-to-day basis. As a result more flexible, creative and quality services and solutions that are bespoke to individual circumstances are offered the customer.

FURTHER READING:

What you (think you) know can hurt you - http://www.forbes.com/sites/samanthaettus/2012/12/12/9-ways-you-should-be-using-twitter/?utm_campaign=forbestwittersf&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social