Tying employee learning and development to the bottom line

Training and upskilling is often seen as a nice to have – something that’s easy to cut when times get tough. But in the hands of a skilled employee communicator, L&D can be seen as a vital aspect of the employee experience and the business’ overall success.

“Learning and development is absolutely a business investment,” said DeLonzo Rhodes, VP of talent management and DEI at Dotdash Meredith, during Ragan’s Employee Communications and Culture Conference. “When you can tie the learning and development program to business results, and employee satisfaction and engagement, then you have something there.”

Read on for specific ways to make that connection in your organization.

How to track employee learning

Measuring employee learning – both who is participating and what they get out of it – can be tricky.  A simple comprehension quiz at the end of a module isn’t enough to prove ROI. But Rhodes said that  comprehensive tracking, from training to annual reviews to an employee’s eventual departure of the company can all paint a powerful picture.

Here’s what Rhodes recommends:

• Look at low, middle and high performers during annual reviews. This is easier with quantitative skillsets, like sales, but can also be carried over into all professionals.
• Look at who participated in which learnings. Are there patterns? Is there a correlation?
• How much did the trainings cost? Was there a correlation between those trainings and employee success?

“We actually take all of that data and present it to the leadership team so they can see a direct correlation between the investment that we made in learning and development and the results that employees put out,” Rhodes said.

An employee survey also helps understand from the individual’s perspective which programs and modules were most helpful. And that doesn’t end when an employee moves on to another organization.

“There are sites where employees can leave reviews, and so we want to be really keen on how people are feeling as they’re leaving as well. So it’s a continuous circle and really tracking what’s happening in all these different touch points and how learning and development has influenced those ranges,” Rhodes said.

And this doesn’t apply just to rank-and-file employees. Dotdash Meredith also tracks upskilling for managers – albeit in a different way. This includes how well the manager is innovating, the sentiment of their overall team and more.

“We really reward innovation, new ideas, new ways to expand the audience that we have and expand upon our reach, and ways in which we can connect with more larger audiences, but also larger advertisers,” Rhodes said. “So I think managers come into our organization and understand that innovation and business development will be a part of their mandate.”

The most important KPIs

Rhodes said that retention is a key metric for whether or not those learning and development plans are working.

“It is thinking about tenure. It’s thinking about the employer branding, what is the reputation of the company? So I think you can look at all of those things around and really think, are these things leaning towards something that’s positive? Are the numbers increasing?”

“We want to make sure that we’re infusing as much empathy as possible in our corporate communications storytelling. If there’s an opportunity to craft a compelling story, to talk more about the why of what you’re doing and the way forward, that definitely lands more for employees, and they feel like they’re brought into this decision with you and they understand.”

Allison Carter is editorial director of PR Daily and Ragan.com. Follow her on LinkedIn.

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