Ben Shao, Head of L&D, Wallem Group
With over 8,000 staff and 49 offices in 22 countries, Ben Shao, Head of L&D, Wallem Group has a huge responsibility undertaking and setting up L&D programmes. In 2015, Shao ran 360 programmes for 800 employees, so it is fair to say that he knows what challenges L&D trainers are facing.
One of the issues Shao wants to address is why do we do talent management? According to Shao, it is all about having the experience to lead. “In the old days, organisations would simply select the next most senior person to succeed without ever assessing their capabilities and aspiration to lead. Today we work in a more complex environment—we’re dealing with a lot of different challenges. In the more competitive market we’re in today, businesses are expected to grow faster. As such, talent management is now one of the key priorities on a CEOs' agenda and poor talent management is seen as one of the threats to business.”
Organisations acknowledge that they need to develop talent but it is the very complexities involved in this undertaking that cause problems for L&D. As Shao explained, “We know it’s a must and we know that we have to do it but we don’t get it right.” The research on talent management backs this up—73% of HIPO programmes show no ROI, 64% of the HIPOs had a negative experience going through the training programmes and 94% of organisations said their HIPO programmes are ineffective. Shao clarified, “I think it’s lacking a central governance. Ownership does not rely on the HIPO’s manager but the whole firm. All the stakeholders must understand the organisation's vision and strategies on talent management and carry out their practices to contribute to the success of that vision. ”According to Shao it is his opinion that many organisations are relying on classroom training to create leaders, but this does not work—“There are just some things which you can’t learn in a classroom.”
The Wallem strategy is to start with engagement before the programme begins. “We started with engagement a month before by getting the CEO involved. Throughout the programme we asked the C-suite to drop in and engage the trainees.” Shao points out that a lot of this engagement happened outside the classroom. With this strategy, there is sustained learning beyond the classroom which turns results into business outcomes. “There are engagement programmes every month. At the end of the learning programme, we gave the trainees burning business issues within Wallem, identified by the C-suite and senior leaders, to tackle and resolve. Based on the deliverables the trainees bring to the table, we then measure the ROI.”
He added, “One of the ways we use to accelerate the trainees' learning before and during a classroom training is to assign them eLearning as pre-course work. The benefits of this approach are that the trainees will be ready to go when they enter the classroom.” This, according to Shao, means that everyone is starting at the same benchmark.
Most L&D trainers grapple with the conundrum of how to build motivation and that is also true with Wallem. Shao explains, “It’s about engagement and programme design. We want them to learn and to make a difference—not just for them but for our clients, our industry and the society.” Along with motivation, finding the most appropriate time to measure training is also important for L&D trainers. “It depends on the individual and their needs,” Shao pointed out.
Paul Arkwright
Publisher
