Chief Learning Officer - August 2007 - (Page 36)

tactics in practice: Governing Associate Development at Luxottica Retail Mike Brennan the federated and centralized model. Strong governance experience and leadership are needed to institute this model effectively. Although no organization will fit neatly into a ready-made governance model, most organizations begin at the federated end of the spectrum and gradually move toward a more centralized approach over time. Within the broader governance models listed above are specific roles and structures with decision-making responsibilities. Luxottica Retail has more than 35,000 employees across its 5,000 North American retail locations. You probably haven’t heard of Luxottica Retail, but there is a very good chance you have been in a Luxottica retail store, which include LensCrafters, Pearle Vision, Sears Optical, Target Optical, BJ’s Optical and Sunglass Hut. These brands are autonomous by design, but they share Luxottica Retail’s collective mission of being the best at helping the world see through the distribution of high-quality prescription glasses and sunglasses. XXX They also share corporate resources and services, including learning and development. The learning and development organization (which reports to HR) employs a blended governance model, and design and development resources reside at Luxottica Retail headquarters in Mason, Ohio. The company’s field training organization, which reports to the associate vice president of learning and talent management, is made up of trainers who are spread across the country. Some are embedded in a single brand, and others are responsible for delivering enterprisewide programs to associates in all brands. Luxottica Retail invests in a wide variety of learning and development opportunities that support both its business initiatives and the associates involved in their execution. These investments include front-line, experiential programs and a collaborative, intensive curriculum specifically designed to help leaders make Luxottica Retail a better place to work and shop. Although successful in the past, the sheer size, geographic distribution and diversity of Luxottica Retail’s workforce has pushed the company’s current training capacity to its limits. Therefore, the company plans to centralize some of its learning functions through standardized processes that will be enabled by several technology components, including a learning management system. Luxottica Retail will realize several benefits from centralization and technology enablement: • A standard access point for associates to learning and development. • Greater transparency through reporting. • Role-based distribution of the most up-to-date materials. • Increasing Web-based delivery of self-paced modules and virtual communities to better address the growing digital native contingent of its workforce. • Greater operational efficiency for the learning and development function. Learning and development is not considered in a vacuum at Luxottica Retail — it is regarded as a single, critical function integrated with other talent management functions designed to enrich associates professionally and make them more productive. Therefore, the company’s LMS implementation will be guided by a single director of talent management working under a newly formed executive talent board. This board is made up of both HR and non-HR executives to ensure alignment with business objectives. In addition, the director of talent management will administer a talent management steering committee responsible for ensuring unified, collective efforts and decision making of all the HR functional owners. The learning and development organization will be represented on the committee by a senior manager from both the field and corporate headquarters. Moving forward, Luxottica Retail anticipates the automated administration and blended-learning delivery its LMS enables will result in more shared services. Responsibilities for both developing e-learning and generating reports that matter to the business will reside in the Jim Haudan is company’s corporate headquarters. president and CEO of Much of the Root Learning. content and reports, however, will come from Luxottica Retail’s field design input for Rich Berens is trainers. The LMS will automate many administrative tasks for these trainers, which will allow vice president of them to consult business leaders across brands and provide hands-on coaching to associates. client services at Root Learning. Mike Brennan is a principal consultant for Knowledge Infusion. They reached at editor@clomedia.com. He can becan be reached at editor@clomedia.com. Structures to Consider Some roles and structures that organizations have used effectively include: 1. Executive Sponsor (CLO, vice president of learning) Key governance responsibilities: • Primary spokesperson for learning and development initiatives. • Represents the perspective and interests of executive management. • Inherently understands the needs and challenges of each line of business. • Provides leadership and guidance to the director of learning and development. • Develops business plans for learning and development initiatives. 2. Learning Council Key governance responsibilities: • Includes executive sponsor as a member. • Foremost strategic resource for all enterprise learning initiatives, processes, standards and budgets. • Represents a cross-section of stakeholder organizations to align with enterprise goals. • Responsible for defining and measuring the success of learning practices throughout the organization. • Provides strategic oversight for tools, technology and business processes offered to lines of business. • Defines policies, procedures and action plans to achieve learning success and repeatable best practices. August 2007 I www.clomedia.com I Chief Learning Officer 36 http://www.clomedia.com

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Chief Learning Officer - August 2007

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