According to a survey of almost 11k employees, opportunity for professional growth and learning has dropped from being the 3rd most important reason for employees to stay in an organisation, to 8th.

Job security, flexibility to work from home, pay, reward, time off, and other benefits are way above the traditional development activities which LnD used to sell. In relative terms, it’s understandable to see why more wellbeing needs are higher in the list as people crave a different relationship with their employers. Some organisations are recognising this but the demand to work flexibly is impacting organisations’ strategic workforce planning.

I think the shift in attitude to how people feel their organisations supporting learning may also be a change in absolute terms.

During lockdown, people found a way to learn outside of the organisational constraints. Like in this story of nature ‘invading’ a gated community, people seized the opportunity to undertake rhizomatic learning. They had permission to learn for themselves since many people were alone and had to work things out for themselves.

If you work in a corporate learning function, you need to work with the other People functions – HR, Talent, Reward, and OD – much more closely. Your previous offer won’t be good enough any more and being able to respond to the workforce need as much as the organisational, will be a critical element of your success ot failure.