Chief Learning Officer - January 2009 - (Page 48) CASE STUDY: KAISER PERMANENTE Small Changes Result in Big Improvements BY SUSAN CHAI Health care company Kaiser Permanente needed to come up with a more standardized, cost-effective approach to learning and follow-through across the enterprise. How did they do it? By thinking small. If the viability and sustainability of today’s training organization rest on its ability to deliver results in terms of Kirkpatrick levels 3 and 4, plus Phillip’s return on investment (ROI) — sometimes referred to as a Level 5 evaluation — how does a company with more than 160,000 employees and 300 training departments adopt a common approach, ensure learning transfer and gather meaningful data to sustain and enhance training programs? Those were the questions Robert H. Sachs, Ph.D., vice president of learning and development at Kaiser Permanente (KP), pondered throughout 2007. Working in conjunction with Kaiser Permanente’s National Learning Leaders (NLL), the group concluded that two things were needed: a common terminology and approach across the large number of decentralized learning organizations and a scalable method for managing the post-program follow-through period. Creating a Common Language and Approach For a common language and a consistent approach to learning development, KP adopted The Six Disciplines of Breakthrough Learning by authors Calhoun “Cal” Wick, Roy Pollock, Andrew Jefferson and Richard Flanagan. The book’s focus is the six disciplines that may be applied to increase the impact of any learning and development program: 1. Define business outcomes. 2. Design the complete experience. 3. Deliver for application. 4. Drive follow-through. 5. Deploy active support. 6. Document results. Since 2006, NLL has been leading the effort to embed these six disciplines to increase learning’s impact on busi48 Chief Learning Officer • January 2009 • www.clomedia.com DID YOU KNOW? Kaiser Permanente began as a set of internal industrial health care programs for construction, shipyard and steel workers for the Kaiser industrial companies during the late 1930s and 1940s. It was opened to public enrollment in October 1945. Source: www.kaiserpermanente.org ness results. Decentralization of the approach throughout KP is the key factor for widespread adoption of the Six Disciplines as a common learning solution. NLL adopted them through the process of reading and discussing the book, inviting Wick to KP to speak with NLL, creating tools and templates for all regional learning councils to use throughout KP and holding internal training sessions. Alan Jang, senior manager of the learning solutions team, said, “In order for learning solutions in KP to be successful, meaning achieving measurable results that impact the business, we had to create a new finish line for training. Training doesn’t end at the end of the course; it should also include follow-through and support. The [six disciplines] give us the framework to do that.” The concepts are taking hold and paying dividends in terms of greater information; best-practice sharing across departments; and better overall program design, execution and evaluation. Strengthening Follow-Through In 2007, review of KP’s programs against the six disciplines criteria revealed Kaiser Permanente, like most learning organizations, was strong on the design and delivery of learning programs, but weak on support for follow-through, transfer and application. While Level 1 http://www.kaiserpermanente.org http://www.clomedia.com
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