Chief Learning Officer - July 2008 - (Page 27)

JEFF TRITT Executive Vice President, Leo Burnett/Arc Worldwide SUCCESSES • Changed learning delivery model from one of passive consumption to active engagement. • Fused organizational development practices with individual development programs at the company. • Helped merge the organizational cultures of Leo Burnett and Arc Worldwide. LEARNING PHILOSOPHY “I think learning plays a vital role in the success of the agency. Ultimately, we’re in the ideas and innovation business. While a lot of our learning programs have the traditional objectives that one might expect, for us, I really view learning as a key ingredient in shaping our organization and its culture.” ocrates. Descartes. Hegel. Wittgenstein. Tritt? Perhaps not. But Jeff Tritt, executive vice president of learning and organizational development, talent management, employee relations and internal communications at Leo Burnett and Arc Worldwide, has spent his career asking deep questions about the nature of organizational and individual development. Along the way, he’s gained some insights into how the two are connected to each other, as well as the entire enterprise. “An organization learns its way into the future,” he explained. “We can’t expect our organization to grow if our people aren’t growing themselves. As resources across the entire business landscape are condensed more and more, and we have to do more things with fewer people, the idea of having learning integrated in organizational transformation is critical. The days of siloed learning that’s disconnected from not only the competencies you want to build, but also the direction in which you want to head, are numbered.” Tritt’s philosophical approach to learning and organizational development is not too surprising, given the fact that he majored in philosophy as an undergraduate. After he got his degree, he worked for ﬁve years at Leo Burnett — in advertising. S “I think for the ﬁrst couple of years of my career, that philosophy background was a hindrance,” he said. “I was always asking another, deeper question, and I had to learn to get those questions under control. As time has progressed, though, I think that my philosophy background has allowed me to think systemically about cause and effect and think deeper. It built a lot of curiosity in my approach.” After this stint at Leo Burnett, he left the company to become the head of consumer communications at Sherwin-Williams. Working on the client side of marketing, he gained an appreciation for organizational development. “Really, the agency side is only 20 percent of what marketing people do,” Tritt said. “On the client side, you get into the operational, people and product-development issues. In the midst of doing all of this, I noticed that the things that would keep me awake at night often had to do with people and the structure of their interactions. I would wonder about things like how a meeting could have been organized to be more successful.” With this intense interest in organizational development forming, Tritt began to voraciously explore the formal concepts and issues of the ﬁeld. He read books and attended industry conferences in a quest for more knowledge in this area. Chief Learning Ofﬁcer • July 2008 • www.clomedia.com 27 http://www.clomedia.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Chief Learning Officer - July 2008

Chief Learning Officer - July 2008 Contents Imperatives Selling Up, Selling Down Strategies Take Five A Customer-Driven Approach to Molding Tomorrow’s Leaders The Home Depot: Accelerated Leadership CLO Profile Birth of a Salesman: Selling Learning to Solve Business Issues Selling Learning’s Potential at Siemens Transform Corporate Learning With a User Network Wiki Training Increases Productivity for RMC Vanguard Mortgage Lessons From the Feds: Mapping Learning to Strategic Initiatives Department of Labor Centralizes Content Synchronous and Asynchronous: What’s in a Name? Coping With Cultural Barriers to E-Learning The Manager’s Responsibility for Employee Learning Case Study Business Intelligence In Conclusion

Chief Learning Officer - July 2008

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