Building an enabling environment

Employee demand for human skills training is growing. More than half of employees indicate that they would actively seek out and pay for the human skills training they feel they need, according to research by KEPAGA published in June. Here, Sam Screpis, Emma Scinaldi and Debbie Clifford from easyJet’s Learning & Talent Development team share their thoughts about how organisations can respond to this growing demand.

55% of those surveyed by KEPAGA, indicated that they would actively seek out and pay for opportunities to help them develop their human skills.

The World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Future of Jobs Report 2020 listed 10 skills that employees of the future will need, ranging from empathy and making connections with others to creativity and resilience. Since then, there has been growing research that reinforces WEF’s conclusions about the skills that are needed. What is changing is the demand from employees at all levels to develop those skills.

In fact, 55% of those surveyed by KEPAGA, indicated that they would actively seek out and pay for opportunities to help them develop their human skills. People do not always act in the way they indicate in surveys, so we have no idea of the scale of the intention-action gap. However, it is increasingly clear that employees are motivated to seek out development opportunities.

There is ‘unequivocally’ a rise in demand for human skills training within easyJet, Sam Screpis tells KEPAGA. ‘People are screaming out for these sorts of skills.’ That includes training on resilience, creativity and empathy, but also techniques to build and retain credibility and gravitas as employees take on more senior roles within the organisation.

As the war on talent deepens, then this clamour for training will only increase. Organisations need to build and upskill their people to retain employees and ensure that they are an employer of choice for potential candidates.

Dual impact

The growing attention given to human skills development has a dual impact, Debbie Clifford notes. It deepens the conversation around the individual’s development needs, but it can also lead to improved self-awareness on the part of their manager. Managers are starting to have ‘little lightbulb moments’ during development conversations and become more alert to their own abilities and need for training.

Employees could be doing their boss a favour by talking about human skills development as part of their professional development review.

What is learning?

It also gives rise to another question around the nature of learning. There is a tendency among many employees to believe that learning is only about receiving new information in a classroom setting. If an employee has not attended a formal course over the previous six months, then they have not learnt anything.

“We learn and we grow all the time. I can’t say every day, but in the course of a month, we have grown and stretched. I don’t know if people actually recognise that as learning”

- Sam Screpis

‘We learn and we grow all the time. I can’t say every day, but in the course of a month, we have grown and stretched. I don’t know if people actually recognise that as learning,’ Sam Screpis comments.

That informal and ongoing learning is something that is critical when it comes to developing and honing human skills.

It is also the foundation of the coaching culture and style of management that the team is trying to foster at easyJet. Managers are not expected to be expert coaches, but are given ‘the basic skills of listening, questioning, empowering, motivating, agility and so on,’ Emma Scinaldi tells KEPAGA.

The coaching culture is supplemented by external coaches where possible, because sometimes we all need an independent or dispassionate view on a challenge we are grappling with. It can also be easier to show one’s vulnerable side to a stranger that does not have a personal stake in the issue and open up without fear of judgement.

Enabling environment

Organisations have a responsibility to create an environment that enables employees to learn. Part of it is to reinforce the message that learning can occur wherever and whenever. KEPAGA’s research also provides a timely reminder of the need for a smorgasbord of opportunities for formal learning, according to Sam.

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, almost all training would be delivered face to face and e-learning was reserved for technical subjects and mandatory training, such as information security or compliance. Post-pandemic, there is a reluctance to return to the office; employees will only attend in-person training that they believe will have real impact for them, their careers and the organisation.

It is not as simple as technical subjects should be delivered online or human skills training face to face.

It is not as simple as technical subjects should be delivered online or human skills training face to face. Both need the hybrid approach. It may be that some of the core content could be delivered online, e.g. what resilience is, how to develop it and how to notice when resilience levels are flagging. The online modules then conclude with a task for those on the course to apply what they have learnt. Finally, employees could be encouraged to share how they have got on after a few weeks trying out their new skills in a call or face-to-face workshop.

Or similarly, it could be that employees take part in a challenge or volunteering project, again sharing what they learnt in a follow-up session.

This means working out how to ‘maximise impactful learning and create an environment where we have got relevant content for everybody in a very busy environment,’ Sam Screpis commented, adding that easyJet – like most organisations – have to do that within the capacity of a very lean team.

Skills frameworks

With growing consensus around the types of human skills that employees will need in the future, now is the time for organisations to look at skills frameworks. While all of the skills will be important to a greater or lesser degree, it is important to think about which will be the most important for the individual organisation. For example, the move to a more sustainable way of doing business may require the creativity to drive business model innovation or greater resilience to navigate the transformation.

“If we can hone in on the human skills that people bring to work and how that’s going to make a difference to our people and our customers, it gives our leaders and then our individuals agility.”

- Debbie Clifford

With a framework in place, employees can start to see what is important, what they are good at and where they need to develop. This helps them to better manage their development.

It also helps to ensure everyone is on the same page and create a common understanding of those skills and what good looks like. For example, how do individuals define empathy? Is it simply about putting yourself in other people’s shoes or does it also encompass curiosity, emotional connection and active listening seeking to understand not to respond?

All this is part of the organisation helping employees to thrive. ‘People are starting to get a bit fearful of what the future is going to look like. We hear a lot that AI is going to take a percentage of our jobs,’ Debbie Clifford notes. ‘If we can hone in on the human skills that people bring to work and how that’s going to make a difference to our people and our customers, it gives our leaders and then our individuals agility.’ It puts them in a position where they think, ‘Change is happening, but I can roll with it. I've got the skills and the ability within me somewhere; I just might not know what that looks like today… or tomorrow.’

Written by Purplefully on behalf of KEPAGA Ltd