Chief Learning Officer - June 2008 - (Page 48) wide variety of commercial and personal insurance programs, has a centralized learning methodology, but Cherie Mullen, the director of learning, is considering incorporating some decentralized elements. With 10 regional offices, Mullen is looking at having a parttime training resource in each location. This change would not require any additional hiring. Instead, Mullen would find employees in each office with the necessary expertise and split their time between their “If there are small deviations here and there, you’ve got to have that. You can’t run your business and dictate everything about it.” – Steve Gordon, Cisco current job roles and training. “There are seven of us on our team, and we look at how difficult it is to reach out to some of our regional locations,” she explained. “We have some expertise in those regional locations that could be utilized throughout the organization for a multitude of topics. I’ve just started to think about how we take advantage of the knowledge that’s out there.” Mullen believes in the strength of Utica’s centralized system, but having these pockets of decentralization would provide its 1,400 employees with an immediate resource in their respective offices. “We would be able to have somebody physically there, [who] understands the environment and the market in that specific location, so they could address issues more effectively,” Mullen said. But she has some reservations about this change, as some training already lies in the hands of the regional offices, and that hasn’t gone particularly well. Each office is currently responsible for its own newemployee orientation. “We’re finding out that some employees aren’t getting the information that they need,” Mullen said. “Some of the offices are not as committed to it as the others. We’re hearing weeks later: ‘Is someone going to show them how to do this?’ So that’s one of the challenges that we’ve been trying to work through for the past several months, and [we’re] looking [to see if] it makes sense to have that in their hands any longer.” 48 Chief Learning Officer • June 2008 • www.clomedia.com With this fresh in her mind, the decision to place training employees in each office becomes even more difficult. A thorough strategy would have to be developed so history does not repeat itself, and at the foundation would be communication. Mullen’s communication strategy would include a kickoff meeting, at which the vision and goals of the new strategy would be discussed. Roles, responsibilities, expectations and a reporting structure would be clearly defined. There would be guidelines for communication and regular meetings with all training employees. Additionally, a community-of-practice bulletin board would be established to avoid duplication and provide a forum for all trainers to discuss ideas and challenges. But all of this is still a big if, as a lot more thought, research and discussion needs to happen before a decision is approved. “Right now, we’re taking the baby steps,” Mullen said. “I need to think through how [this] would work before I can seriously be ready to make some type of proposal. There are a lot of benefits that we could take advantage of. But again, [with] the challenges that we’ve seen, we need to make sure that we have the right people in place, there’s specific expectations that are laid out and that there’s a lot of communication. And I think that’s what we’re seeing is lacking today.” Decentralization in the 21st Century While the technical definition of decentralization may mean dispersing learning through different business units, a more liberal view can mean delivering learning initiatives across different platforms. Cisco Systems, a leader in networking, has a centralized learning platform but decentralized delivery. “When I first joined Cisco many years ago, it was centralized,” said Steve Gordon, vice president of learning. “It was a command-and-control structure for training. But over the past 12 years, we’ve been moving more toward a decentralized delivery model, [which means] video on demand, audio on demand and podcasts.” Cisco’s central learning function works closely with an entity called the Learning Council that is composed of senior executives from the company’s major functions. The council itself embodies aspects of centralization and decentralization. “Their job is to drive those efficiencies and economies for the centralized function, but also then to bring to bear what their particular organization’s requirements are,” Gordon said. “That way you gain the best of the centralized organization because now CENTRALIZATION continued on page 64 http://www.clomedia.com
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