Chief Learning Officer - December 2007 - (Page 79) This year’s Division 2 Gold Award winner in the Vanguard category is Shawne Angelle, vice president of global learning and development for Verizon Business. Since joining the company in 1984, Angelle has held leadership positions in sales, marketing, product management and operations. She began her career in finance. She has overseen learning at Verizon Business for approximately two years now, providing global learning and development for 32,000 employees. Gold, Division 2 Shawne Angelle, Vice President, Global Learning and Development, Verizon Business It also meant reorganizing from 15 separate departments to a global organization. With a workforce that spanned the globe, this meant a change in how training was delivered throughout the enterprise. The learning organization was among the first in the company to support the company’s strategy and reorganize globally. Under Angelle’s leadership, the organization went from 15 separate training departments to one global organization focused on enterprisewide challenges versus region-specific issues. In doing so, the global learning and development organization was able to focus on functional business areas such as sales and service to ensure that all customers, no matter where they were, received the same high level customer service and solutions. In addition to managing the performance development process, Angelle’s organization delivers supporting programs with a blended learning approach that incorporates instructor-led and technology-based solutions to quickly address the needs of a global workforce. Angelle was quick to share credit for having won. “I believe it’s not an individual award but a team award on behalf of my organization,” Angelle said. “It’s good to get industry recognition for the tremendous amount of work that we’ve done over the last two years. When I came home and told the team about it, they were very excited.” Verizon Business plans to use the award as a tool in drawing new talent. “Learning is important and a reason why people join companies, because the opportunities they have to develop their careers are key.” — Shawne Angelle, Verizon Business “We will be using this as we market our organization to prospective employees,” Angelle said. “Learning is important and a reason why people join companies, because the opportunities they have to develop their careers are key.” In 2006, Verizon acquired MCI and merged with its existing Enterprise Service Group to form Verizon Business. Prior to the merger, the companies were organized to address local or regional issues and, as such, learning and development comprised multiple organizations addressing the individual needs of each regional unit. To meet its business strategy, the new company, Verizon Business, needed to change the way it approached its customers as well as achieve operational efficiencies. So, it shifted its focus from a regional approach to one that services its customers as a single global services provider. This meant creating a global organization structure; developing a global solutions portfolio; adopting a standardized sales approach; and providing a consistent customer experience for all customers worldwide. The blended global learning strategy was implemented from the company’s beginning in January 2006. Training all sales and service employees on new products and services was the first priority for the learning organization. As a result, more than 200 e-learning programs were internally developed and delivered in less than three months to over 10,000 Verizon Business employees in time for the January 2006 launch of the new company. The global learning and development organization has made significant contributions to the success of Verizon Business. As a result of the company’s global training activities, the company has been able to improve overall efficiencies, including a 9.8 percent increase in revenue per employee; a 33 percent increase in training hours per employee; a 33 percent decrease in cost per training hour; an 18 percent increase in use of technology to support employee development; and a 44 percent year-to-date employee participation in Verizon Business eLearn (SkillSoft) programs. – Daniel Margolis, dmargolis@clomedia.com 79 December 2007 I www.clomedia.com I Chief Learning Officer http://www.clomedia.com
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