Learning is most effective when it takes place ‘at work’ and within context.
The ’70:20:10′ Learning Model (McCall et al.) suggested that 10% of learning happens in a classroom (either face to face or virtual) with 20% involving others such as discussion groups and buddying. Collective drawing of conclusions leads to personal change and reinvention.
Real learning (70%) happens within contextual situations, dealing with actual issues and business challenges. These, of course, need to be managed to avoid risk whilst design-thinking frameworks, including prototyping, helps significantly.
Line Management conversations, in relation to learning, must be ongoing, alongside identifying challenging assignments. Regular dialogue, coaching, feedback, mentoring, problem-solving, and testing is also essential.
As a coaching line manager, we must embrace complexity and ambiguity in service of personal and organisational sustainability and growth. Learning and reinvention are such an important part of the personal development toolkit.
It’s an integrated process linking business results and leadership experiences, with aggregated insights to determine ongoing organisational capability needs.
Many organisations are moving from competencies to leadership brand building. They ask themselves, ‘what is the leadership we need now and over the next few years?’ They also consider how to differentiate and deliver purpose and mission through leaders at all levels.
The world continues to change at speed, and the skills needed over the next decade are probably unknown today. That’s why the ’70:20:10′ learning model is so relevant now, more than ever before.
John Moran
I agree to a certain extent with John’s argument that the now-classic ’70-20-10′ learning model remains as relevant today as ever, if not more so, with respect to workplace L&D. However, the exponential growth in remote/flexible working (in its myriad forms) raises significant challenges around how to enable and nurture effective learning – be it the 70, 20 or 10% – within organisations where ‘workplace’ context is now highly fragmented and atomized and line-management is more remote. This is not to to say the ’70-20-10′ model is impossible, Yet our rapidly changing world of work suggests that we need to be more creative in how we leverage digital learning, support digital literacy and resources to ensure equal accessibility, and upgrade line-manager capability.
I totally agree Amy and perhaps the key question is how do we make it relevant within an ever-changing and ambiguous context. Thank you for your comments, and I’ll consider that for my next whitepaper. With my very kind regards, John
Absolutely John. Anecdotal experience is that many people often feel overwhelmed by the amount of learning content available (especially digital). The risk is that this just exponentially grows as organisations spew out more ‘blanket content’ in a (misguided) attempt to keep pace with rapid change and turbulence. So indeed, the key question as you rightly suggest is how best to deliver targeted, relevant, and manageable learning solutions for individuals. Perhaps one option could be to adopt a more task-based approach to designing L&D content, focusing on current and future anticipated tasks?