UPSKILL OR YOU’RE CACTUS
UPSKILLING and continual learning is important not only for workers but for their employers. The most common benefits of developing staff, as revealed by Leadership Management Australia’s L.E.A.D Survey Whitepaper, are improved productivity, a more adaptable and skilled workforce, a contribution to succession planning, and being able to meet emerging market conditions.
LMA executive director of quality and culture Grant Sexton says organisations with developed teams are more productive and profitable, and have improved morale and culture, meaning employees are more engaged and likely to stay.
“If you don’t train and develop your people, the top talent will be looking to go somewhere else,” he says.
“An investment in them, their future and their future employability is the greatest sign of appreciation that any organisation can show.”
Sexton says the best employee training is tailored to the team or individual, is multi-sensory with digital elements, and focuses on soft skills such as self-awareness.
“There is an old story where two CEOs are talking. One says, ‘My God, if I am training and developing my people to become better, what if they leave?’,” he says.
“The other looks him in the eye and says ‘If you don’t train and develop them, what if they stay?’. In todays’ fast-changing, highly competitive business world with new technology rapidly transforming the workplace on a daily basis, the only truly competitive advantage for an organisation is its people.
“Having these people well trained, focused and engaged is an absolute must for organisations who want to stay in the game.”
Catherine King and Cherie Clonan, co-directors of The Digital Picnic, run social media workshops and agree continual learning is imperative, particularly for digital workers.
“You can’t afford to become stale in your knowledge,” Clonan says.
“I don’t think I could take a role in digital marketing without committing to lifelong learning. As an employer, too, I am always looking for people willing to invest in their knowledge.”
King says it is critical to keep upskilling in areas such as social media in particular as platforms change almost daily.
“More and more businesses recognise the value of managing their own social media and not necessarily outsourcing it,” she says.
“It’s important social media is genuine and you are able to be react and move quickly and sometimes when that is outsourced to a third party it is clunky and issues arise. What works today might change in three or six or 12 months.”