Introduction
An individual workshop is great for learning specific skills, policies, and tools. While workshops can support organizational goals, stand-alone workshops aren’t designed to produce organizational transformation on their own. They can offer an introduction, inspiration, and some progress, but if organizational or cultural transformation is the goal, learning journeys offer an effective pathway to create value and shift cultural norms across teams.
A learning journey is a cohort-based, curated series of workshops and training combined with practice projects and coaching delivered by external, internal, or a combination of facilitators and coaches. Learning journeys are ideal for achieving business or organizational goals that require complex skills, new ways of working, and leaders who are prepared to drive organizational change.
Learning journeys deliver something standalone workshops can’t. With a cohort-based, time-bound, experiential learning, learning journeys provide more than strengthening specific skills, learning a new tool, or communicating a new policy. Learning journeys create vulnerability in learning, increase trust on teams, offer an opportunity for mastery and skill development, as well as building a foundation for a shift in mindset – all which result in the potential for organizational and cultural transformation.
In 2015 alone, companies spent $160 billion on training in the United States and close to $356 billion globally[1]. With the same investment in training hours but approaching learning as a journey for employees, companies can get more impact for the investments they make.
The most impactful learning journeys bridge the gap between individual and team performance by developing leadership, strengthening relationships, and integrating professional development into day-to-day work.
[1] Schrader, M. B., Kotter, J. P., & Buckingham, M. (2016, September 09). Why Leadership Training Fails-and What to Do About It. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2016/10/why-leadership-training-fails-and-what-to-do-about-it
Originally written in February 2019
Revised in July 2020