Why Strategic Thinking Matters
“Learning leaders need to stop being order-takers.” This memorable statement was made by Brandon Carson, Vice-President of Learning, Leadership, and Cultural Experience at Starbucks when he joined an Ingenuiti webinar on communicating the value of learning to executive leadership (https://www.ingenuiti.com/c-suite-webinar-recording/). We all know what he means. Too often, we are not part of planning the overarching strategies that direct learning. Instead, we are simply handed topics to cover as the next thing to do.
Brandon’s encouragement to learning leaders is to realize that they are not fighting for a seat at the decision-making table. Rather, according to him, we are the table. We are essential to the forward movement of the organization. We are integral to onboarding, reskilling, upskilling, productivity, compliance, and safety. Learning’s contribution to the future of the company is vital. To succeed in this role, learning leaders must be strategic thinkers.
What Is Strategic Thinking
Strategic thinking is a specific mental activity. It is a skill that needs to be honed and developed. It means being intentional rather than reactive. It is purposeful. Strategic thinkers see the big picture and have developed the desire to lift their eyes to the horizon. To think strategically requires committed time and space to entertain big thoughts.
The best strategic leaders have the ability to think about how systems in complex organizations relate to one another. They can identify opportunities, but they also carefully track common obstacles that too often stand in the way of progress.
Strategic leaders are comfortable with complexity and ambiguity. Even more challenging, they can deeply consider concepts that are at odds with one another. F. Scott Fitzgerald famously said, “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.” What he meant was that strategic thinkers can live comfortably in the middle of ideas, even when those ideas don’t easily align, until one rises to the top and the others are set aside. And even then, strategic thinkers will continue to search for better solutions and new information.
What Strategic Learning Leaders Do
1. Align learning initiatives with business goals: Strategic thinking helps learning leaders understand the overall business strategy and align learning and development initiatives to support the organization’s objectives. How familiar are you with the mission, vision, and values of your organization? If your company has an annual plan, do you know what it is? Have you determined where learning can and will contribute to achieve these goals?
2. Anticipate future skills and knowledge needs: By thinking strategically, learning leaders can foresee potential skill and knowledge gaps within the organization and develop long-term learning strategies to address them. Creating a list of anticipated skills is a good place to start, but it will be helpful to have conversations with a variety of people in your organization. Don’t limit yourself to executive leaders. Sometimes the best knowledge comes from the people who are daily involved in accomplishing the work.
3. Manage budget and resources: Strategic thinking enables learning leaders to effectively allocate resources and budget to learning initiatives that provide the most value and impact for the organization. How carefully do you track your budget? Do you know of any high expense/low impact activities where those resources could be put to a better use? How much are you spending on software that may be underutilized? Where are you looking for efficiencies? On which mission critical projects should you spend more?
4. Build a learning culture: Strategic thinking allows learning leaders to create a culture of continuous learning within the organization, which is essential for adapting to changes and staying competitive. Strong learning cultures exist when learners value and actively seek out learning opportunities. They see them as a means to improve their skills in their current role and potentially find new opportunities. Have you spent time talking to learners about what is working and what is not?
5. Embrace technology and innovation: Strategic thinking helps learning leaders identify and leverage new technologies and innovative learning methods to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of learning programs. Not every new technology solves a problem or brings improvement. As a leader, you need to investigate carefully and implement new tools in a way that will improve outcomes and not simply be the latest shiny object.
6. Demonstrate the value of learning: Strategic thinking enables learning leaders to measure the impact of learning initiatives on business outcomes and demonstrate the value of learning and development to senior management. This is one of the greatest challenges for learning leaders. It can be time consuming, costly, and frustrating because the data you seek is not always readily available. In some cases, a mountain of data is available with no ability to decipher its meaning. It is worth the time and effort to understand and communicate how learning is making a difference in the lives of people and the future of your organization.
7. Adapt to change: By thinking strategically, learning leaders can anticipate changes in the business environment and proactively adapt learning initiatives to support the organization in responding to these changes. About the time we think we have a perfect system or process established, something will challenge it. It might be changes to your core business, something that is happening in the marketplace, or new technology. Leading with your eyes wide open is essential for helping your organization move forward.
8. Benchmark competitors and peers: Seek out what others in similar organizations are doing. What is working and what is not? Devour webinars, books, and articles from people inside your industry, and people who might work in other industries but have great ideas. Constantly seek out new information.
9. Make time for strategic thinking: Perhaps this is the biggest challenge of all given the number of tasks demanding attention. How much time do you spend thinking about your learning strategy?
Conclusion
Overall, strategic thinking allows corporate learning leaders to be proactive, forward-looking, successful, and effective in driving learning and development initiatives that are closely aligned with the organization’s overall strategy and goals. It takes skill and intention to look above the daily grind to see where you are leading your organization. It is worth the effort.
