Government Elearning - Spring 2009 - (Page 20)

strategicworkforcemanagement online learning as the next big thing. With these pioneers leading the way, the rush to make the LMS the killer training application began.” Since you are reading this article in a leading online learning publication, you probably know the rest of the history: The LMS has become the central tool of enterprise e-learning. Indeed, the LMS in its current form has evolved well past its original purpose of duplicating on the Internet the functions of a physical university. It has become a human capital applications platform incorporating performance management, competency management, individual development planning and other HC-related functions. Organizations bought LMSes because they worked, yes, but also because, in the first half of the decade, they were the buzz, the application du jour in training and HR. Sometimes a thoughtful business case accompanied the requisition request as it made its way up the organization’s management chain, but sometimes the LMS acquisition was a “check-the-box” exercise in funds expenditure, driven by hope (and a little bit of hype) as much as anything else. Either way, the question soon became, “I bought an LMS. Now what?” “Now what?” indeed. LMS vendors — implemented their LMS as a stand-alone, stovepipe system, owned by the training department and operated in isolation. In the same way that LMS vendors have expanded their systems from the core online delivery and tracking of training function to incorporate various human capital functions, the training department (often HR’s red-headed stepchild) has become part of their organization’s management of human capital: larger, strate- learning and performance management combine with enterprise financial, HR and other functions to create measurable increases in performance; how to integrate an LMS with the rest of the organization’s enterprise systems in a way that creates demonstrable benefit for that organization’s owners, managers and employees. The Strategic Workforce Management model takes on this challenge. THE MODEL The Strategic Workforce Management Model looks different from any other model because it tells a story. Stories can be meaningful, entertaining and memorable; just what trainers need to explain how we fit into the bigger picture. Think of the model as an illustrated story that has a strong underlying organizational structure firmly rooted in the principles of human capital, enterprise architecture and return on investment. People remember an entertaining story. When you can tell the story of how all the human capital functions work together to create value for your organization, senior management will (hopefully) remember and make investment decisions that will move your organization (hopefully) toward the ideal that the SWM model depicts. We start our story at the big diamond in the upper right center of the accompanying illustration. We start there because making diamonds is the metaphoric purpose of every organization. In a private sector organization, our diamond represents profit for the shareholders; in the public sector, it represents some other kind of measurable benefit, but every organization exists to create value for its stakeholders in one form or another. There is not much point to a model that does not somehow support and improve the organization’s central purpose of value creation, so let’s state right up front that the Strategic Workforce Management model considers the end at the beginning. It shows how to fit together all the pieces of the human capital puzzle to enhance the organization’s ability to create value (diamonds) over time. It was built specifically to show senior managers how human There has not been a comprehensive, easy-to-understand model that shows organizations the complete human capital picture. just as they did when an LMS was often little more than a course catalog and registrar’s office on a disk — would have you believe that their application is all you need. And it may be true, in some cases, that the increasing sophistication and functional integration of their all-in-one human capital platform can solve all your organization’s training — oops, I mean human capital — challenges. The problem is that most organizations gic, but still unable to explain to senior management in terms they can understand why training is so important to the bottom line (even though all of us dedicated trainers know that it is). MANAGEMENT VIEW For the most part, there has not been a comprehensive, easy-to-understand model that shows organizations the complete human capital picture: how competency, 20 Spring 2009 Government Elearning!

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Government Elearning - Spring 2009

Government Elearning - Spring 2009 Contents Publisher's Note News Stimulus News DOL Expands E-learning Government Service Rating Second Life as Art Deals People on the Move Trendlines Currency and Learning Technology, Part 1 Learning Preferences at NNSA E-learning Goes Public Case Study: Arlington Case Study: BT Group Case Study: JFS College New Products Products Exit Poll Last Word

Government Elearning - Spring 2009

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.