Chief Learning Officer - December 2007 - (Page 66) INNOVATION Gold, Division 1 Alysa Parks, Director, Learning and Development, and Maureen McDermott, Manager, Learning and Development, CDW As director of learning and development for a technology company, Alysa Parks says it’s critical that innovation be a part of what her company does every day. “We have to be attuned to innovative and cutting-edge solutions,” she said. “If we’re going to be the leading provider of technology and technology services, innovation has to be a part of everything we do at CDW.” That innovation needs to happen across the company and filter down into how the enterprise operates, not just in the technology they use. “It’s really important that we look at innovation in a more complete way,” Parks said. “It’s not just innovation about what emerging technologies we can use, but how we really drive an innovative workplace. This is part of our DNA that we have to live by every day.” CDW is a provider of technology products and services for business, government and education, with more than 5,880 employees across North America. As part of their development initiatives, the company analyzed the performance of more than 1,000 account managers who interact with CDW’s customers regarding their technology products and services. December 2007 chronous Webinar roundtables for more complex follow-up, instructor-led classrooms for experiential learning and synchronous distance learning for account managers in the field. Parks said the program’s success was attributable to that blended approach as well as a strong partnership with the sales team. “The key was that we partnered very closely with sales and sales executives to define and develop the program and map out the critical success factors to make this happen,” she said. “Bringing in the e-learning, the distance learning, the classroom — the idea that we were going to take advantage of the whole variety of emerging technologies — that was critical to our success as a way to achieve our objectives. “And then packaging all that together so people knew they had choices and options to achieve their objectives, whereas in the past maybe it was focused on one particular path,” she continued. “Here, we have this complete set of options to develop skills, and that’s where we’re getting a lot of positive feedback.” Participants in the Wired Program indicated a high level of satisfaction with the program, but Parks said the results go beyond employee satisfaction. “There are a few things we’re seeing,” Parks said. “One is our sales co-workers who are going through the program are demonstrating stronger confidence to be able to sell within multiple categories. That’s also translating into additional sales within those categories. We’re also seeing the ability to sell more complete solutions.” Another key feature of the Wired Program is that the learning is embedded into the sales performance management process. “It’s fully integrated within what they do on a daily basis,” Parks said. “It’s not an event. Participating in the complete program is part of their development plan. Sales executives fully support it and are looking to make sure that people are participating because they know that the outcome is significant. “It’s really about preparing co-workers to be proactively responsive to customers’ needs. The only way to do that is to institutionalize the learning within their whole structure versus it being a one-time event.” – Mike Prokopeak, mikep@clomedia.com The analysis showed an opportunity to meet business goals and support individual success by closing gaps in technology knowledge. Parks and her team identified three main objectives: increasing account manager knowledge across product categories, increasing account manager confidence in conversations with customers involving the technologies and enabling account managers to identify opportunities during conversations that result in additional sales. To meet these goals, CDW developed the Wired Program. The program blended online assessments to identify individual skills gaps, asynchronous e-learning for baseline skills, syn- I www.clomedia.com I Chief Learning Officer 66 http://www.clomedia.com
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