In last year’s Hot or Not breakdown, we highlighted the rise of skills-based learning and AI-driven personalization. This year, AI in particular is accelerating—and we also take a look at leadership development and tracking comprehensive metrics that capture the positive business impacts of workforce development.

In 2025, savvy learning leaders are doubling down on AI-powered upskilling, business-aligned learning strategies, and human-centric development. At the same time, an over reliance on more-is-better thinking—which often leads to random learning content dumps—is fading further and further.

Which trends should you embrace—and which should you leave behind? Let’s dive into what’s hot (and what’s not).

What’s hot? AI-enhanced L&D

AI is revolutionizing L&D through and through—from big-picture workforce planning to individual learning experiences for frontline employees. Why? The promise of more efficient upskilling, greater engagement, and a workforce that’s continuously evolving in alignment with business needs.

Innovative organizations are using AI to:

• Identify skills gaps and optimize talent strategies to bridge them. 
• Design business-aligned L&D programs using AI-driven skill data, workforce analytics, and talent forecasting.
• Implement learning strategies across an entire workforce for faster content creation, smarter content recommendations, personalized employee coaching, and more.

“After 20 years of revolution in how knowledge and skills are developed, everything in learning is changing again,” said Max Wessel, Degreed Co-CEO. “With gains in artificial intelligence, for the first time we can imagine putting the world’s greatest tutor in the pocket of every learner. . . For every industry, for every corporation, and for every individual, the possibilities are seemingly endless.”

With employee development enhanced by AI, individual employees learn exactly what they need according to their existing skills, goals, and company’s priorities. Organizations are realizing that curation, not just accumulation, is the key to effective learning. And they’re using AI to surface content, create skill-aligned learning paths, and coach employees individually, ensuring learners find high-quality, relevant materials without the frustration of endless searching.

What’s not hot? Ignoring the human side of work

AI is no longer a futuristic concept. It’s actively reshaping workforce planning and learning. However, it’s not replacing the workforce. Forward-thinking CLOs are leveraging AI and human expertise to ensure their workforces have the skills they need to drive business.

Human-centric Technology

Companies are moving beyond learning management systems (LMSs) to create holistic learning ecosystems that not only meet employees where they are, but also encourage continuous development. Instead of isolated training events and information dumps, organizations are investing in solutions that reinforce learning over time, prioritizing engagement, skills tracking, and real-world application over completion rates.

Modern learning strategies emphasize human connection through microlearning, coaching, and peer-to-peer knowledge sharing. Leaders are fostering engagement with structured programs like Degreed Academies, mentorship circles, and peer-led discussions—proving that social learning is key to skill retention and long-term growth.

Group- and Cohort-based Learning

Collaborative learning fosters accountability, deeper discussions, and real-world application of knowledge. Employees retain more when they learn from each other. Cohort-based learning promotes problem solving, knowledge sharing, and networking, making it an outstanding component of any innovative and comprehensive L&D strategy.

Bringing Soft Skills into Focus

As workers use AI to perform more complex tasks, soft skills—those that only humans can possess—are more valuable than ever. Sharp learning leaders are investing in soft skills like adaptability, emotional intelligence, critical thinking, communication, and developing a growth mindset.

What’s hot? Skills-based learning for impact

College degrees may open doors, but skills keep businesses running. More and more, organizations are shifting from traditional credentials to a skills-based learning approach, ensuring employees develop the competencies needed for real-world success. Instead of checking boxes, companies are investing in upskilling programs that align with business goals, making learning more relevant, personalized, and impactful.

This approach benefits both employees and employers—workers can showcase their abilities beyond a résumé, and businesses can make smarter hiring and development decisions. With AI-powered skills tracking and with dynamic learning pathways, L&D teams are moving from outdated qualification models to agile, skills-first strategies that prepare the workforce for what’s next.

What’s not hot? Ignoring leadership development

Leadership isn’t a fixed trait. It’s a skill set that must be continuously refined. Future leaders need real-world experience, decision-making practice, and soft skills training—not just a crash course in management.

Yet too many organizations treat leadership development as a one-time event, offering a management training course or a leadership retreat and expecting long-term results. Instead of relying solely on formal courses, high-impact organizations provide current and aspiring and current leaders with a wide range of enrichment opportunities.

Like any other skill, good leadership requires ongoing learning, coaching, and mentoring. It requires real-world experience, and real-time feedback that helps people adapt to evolving business challenges. 

What’s hot? Closely tying budget to success

Learning leaders who tie L&D investments to business results are securing their budgets—and their influence. Those who don’t will forever be seen as a cost center.

If you’re trying to show how learning contributes to productivity, innovation, employee retention, and overall company growth, traditional L&D metrics fall short. Smart organizations are investing in skill analytics and performance tracking, prioritizing clear data that links learning initiatives to key business outcomes.

What’s not hot? Random learning content dumps

Not all learning experiences are created equal. Random learning content dumps—massive, unorganized collections of articles, videos, PDFs, notes, and more—are often more overwhelming than helpful. While they might at first seem like a goldmine of knowledge, their lack of structure, curation, and context can make meaningful insights elusive.

Devoid of guidance or logical progression, these collections inspire frustrating scavenger hunts rather than effective learning experiences.

Are you ready for what’s next?

Today’s most innovative learning is skills-first—for employees and leaders. It’s human powered and AI enabled. And it’s measured more comprehensively than ever, to ensure it drives business success.

Is your business ready? Let’s find out together. Schedule a personalized one-on-one call with a Degreed expert today.

The post Hot or Not? What’s In and Out for Learning Leaders in 2025 appeared first on Degreed.

This is the second post in a series on building skills for Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion (DEI). See the first.

DEI skills—such as critical thinking, cultural intelligence, and psychological safety—are no longer optional; they’re essential to a thriving, resilient organization that can adapt to rapid change.

By developing DEI skills, leaders and employees can create inclusive environments where diverse perspectives thrive, fostering a culture of belonging that boosts resilience, engagement, and innovation. Key DEI skills bridge the gap between rapid technological advancements and the human connection needed for collaboration—and they might just prove essential in helping your organization meet its most important objectives. 

Organizations looking to navigate periods of significant change need DEI skills to remain agile and resilient. Navigating change means more than responding to technology shifts; it’s about ensuring your people are equipped to thrive in an inclusive, fast-paced environment.

As periods of change become the norm, prioritizing DEI skills is key for organizations to stay competitive and agile. Whether it’s enhancing knowledge sharing or building resilient teams, focusing on DEI skills is the path to a truly adaptive, inclusive, and thriving workplace.

The Leader’s Role in DEI Skill Development

Leaders in particular play a crucial role in championing DEI skills. Why? Leaders empower individuals and managers to support inclusive practices and create a culture of belonging that drives engagement, grit, and resilience at a time when people need it most. Executive Leaders can prioritize DEI skills to foster an environment where psychological safety and diverse perspectives drive growth.

Engaging managers and leaders in DEI skill conversations begins with equipping them to act as skill coaches, fostering open dialogue and modeling inclusive behaviors. This process involves providing targeted training and tools to help leaders recognize and mitigate bias, facilitate psychological safety, and encourage diverse perspectives within their teams.

By embedding DEI into regular performance discussions and aligning it with business goals, managers can actively support their teams’ growth while driving a culture of inclusion and belonging.

Choosing DEI Skills to Prioritize at Your Organization

As you assess which DEI skills need attention at your organization, let’s explore a few examples to get you started.

Remember that skills should be measurable and developable.

You might be tempted to choose skills like compassion or empathy. These are important, but under scrutiny they’re revealed as inherent human traits. In other words, how can an employee get better at empathy? On the contrary, DEI skills allow for the evaluation of proficiency and improvement over time. To find out more on this, take a deeper dive into skills vs. competencies.  

Key DEI skills and the benefits they offer include:

• Critical Thinking. This helps employees recognize and address biases, question assumptions, and make fair, reasoned decisions that align with inclusive values. It helps them understand how best to utilize and evaluate AI tools. It’s not only about problem-solving; it’s essential for uncovering and addressing unconscious biases in decision-making and enabling fairer, more inclusive practices.

• Psychological Safety. This is about creating an environment where individuals feel secure sharing ideas without fear of judgment, and it’s vital to inclusion. Psychological safety builds trust and encourages diverse perspectives, allowing innovation to flourish while creating a foundation of trust and respect. Psychological safety is pertinent to all levels of an organization.

• Resilience. This is the ability to adapt to challenges and recover from setbacks. It supports employees as they navigate change, including shifts toward greater equity and inclusion. Resilience is about equipping teams to thrive even during difficult times, which is essential for fostering a workforce that remains engaged and supportive.

• Cross-Cultural Agility.  This is about understanding and adapting to diverse perspectives in a way that drives better team collaboration. It helps individuals work productively across different backgrounds, enhancing communication and collaboration.

• Inclusive Communication. This involves learning techniques to actively listen, mitigate biases, and foster open dialogue. Inclusive communication allows for better understanding among team members and creates an environment where all voices are heard and valued.

• Equitable Decision-Making. This involves systematically ensuring fairness in processes like hiring or promotions through choices that are both inclusive and unbiased. Equitable decision-making lays the groundwork for fair practices that help attract and retain a diverse workforce.

Each of these skills is developable, actionable, and measurable. The important action is identifying skills to develop that are essential to DEI  as well as accomplishing your company’s goals.

How to Develop DEI Skills Aligned with Company Goals

Rather than viewing DEI as a standalone initiative, savvy organizations will recognize that DEI skills are directly tied to broader business objectives—for example, boosting innovation, increasing employee engagement, or improving customer satisfaction.

Step No. 1: Identify DEI skills that align with business goals.

Start by identifying a few essential DEI skills that align with your company’s strategic objectives. For example, if your goal is to foster innovation, focus on skills like creativity and cultural awareness, which support diverse thinking and collaboration. If the goal is to improve team resilience during times of change, prioritize skills like psychological safety and adaptability.

Step No. 2: Define clear outcomes for skill development.

It’s essential to clearly define what success looks like. Do you need employees to gain deep proficiency in one area, or is a broader understanding of multiple skills more valuable? Asking for both breadth and depth can lead to burnout, so keep the focus on a few key skills and make sure progress is measurable. This specificity will also help you track progress and make adjustments as needed.

Step No. 3: Take action with small, scalable steps.

Don’t wait for perfect data or a lengthy approval process to get started. Quick wins like engaging employees in discussions about skills or launching targeted training programs can build momentum. Analyzing employee skill profiles, for instance—to identify gaps in psychological safety or cultural awareness—might quickly help you pinpoint where to start. This in turn could help make your overall implementation process more responsive and agile.

Step No. 4: Provide targeted resources and training.

Asking employees to develop DEI skills without adequate resources is a recipe for failure. Ensure they have access to workshops, peer-to-peer learning groups, stretch assignments, and learning content that supports their growth. Be wary of blanket training programs, as these often lack the focus necessary to address specific skill gaps. Instead, opt for tailored learning experiences that address your organization’s unique needs.

A Note About Creating Lasting, Measurable Mentorship Programs

A mentorship program is a wonderful tool in the DEI toolbox. But if it’s your only tool, you’ve made a mistake. While many mentorship programs created during the DEI push of 2020 had good intentions, they often lacked long-term sustainability. To create lasting impact, mentorship initiatives must have clear goals and ongoing support. 

Leaders should be accountable for fostering inclusive cultures and providing mentorship aligned with measurable outcomes. Specific skills tied to a program can help define clear goals. By establishing structured, goal-oriented mentorship that complements other DEI initiatives, organizations can sustain DEI momentum and build a stronger, more inclusive talent pipeline.

The Measurable Impact of DEI Skills

Organizations that invest in DEI skills are building a foundation for sustained performance and adaptability, creating a workforce that’s not only more diverse but also more agile, innovative, and resilient. Integrating DEI skills into company strategy isn’t just about “checking a box.” It’s about making an investment in the long-term health and competitiveness of your organization. 

With the right DEI skills in place, your organization is better equipped to navigate change, embrace diverse perspectives, and drive lasting progress.

Degreed Professional Services

Hali Linn is a Learning Strategy Consultant on the Degreed Professional Services team.

Degreed Professional Services partners with business leaders and learning pros to explore learning strategies, technology goals, and questions. Book a free and private consultation.

The post DEI Skills in Action: A Step-by-Step Guide to Driving Change appeared first on Degreed.

Watching the Olympics every four years was a big event in my family. But it wasn’t until 2023 that I even considered I’d have a chance to participate in anything remotely related to an Olympic event. That’s when I learned organizers of the 2024 games in Paris had created opportunities not only for elite athletes, but also for the rest of us—including amateur long distance runners like me.

The Marathon Pour Tous, or Marathon for All, sounded incredible. Amateur athletes could run the same course as the elites on an original and historic 26.2-mile loop linking Paris and Versailles—winding from the Hôtel de Ville through nine city districts to the Esplanade des Invalides—a path traveled by Parisian mothers during the French Revolution who marched for food amid famine. 

But there was one big catch. I literally had to win a lottery to get into the race. The chance to participate came down to a series of lucky draws—and winning a spot took me dozens of tries over several months.

After I crossed the finish line early Sunday morning with more than 20,000 other runners from around the world, clocking in with a respectable time of 5 hours and 32 minutes, I reflected on this journey and kept coming back to one simple yet powerful concept—being persistent and showing up.

Is being persistent a skill?

“Keep showing up” were the words two-time Olympian Des Linden said after winning the 2018 Boston marathon, when she was asked how she stayed motivated after years of narrowly missing a chance to ascend to the top of the podium. “Every day I make the choice to show up and see what I’ve got and to try and be better. Keep showing up.”

Winston Churchill said that “Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.”

Hellen Keller said that “A bend in the road is not the end of the road, unless you fail to make the turn.”

While the notion of being persistent as a buildable capability might seem a bit fuzzy, research suggests it’s a skill people can develop—in their work and in their personal lives—by shifting their attitudes and dialing in their points of view. 

Writing in Inc., author and motivation expert Jeff Haden cites a wealth of research explaining that persistence derives from decision-making. Data came from who else but long distance runners, specifically 200 participants in 155-mile multistage desert ultra-marathons.

Evidence emerged showing a causal relationship between the participants’ coping strategies and whether they finished their races. As Haden notes, some of the runners “used what the researchers called ‘adaptive coping strategies.’ Instead of seeing suffering as happening to them, they decided to see their extreme discomfort as a challenge: As something they chose. (Which, of course, they had.) Or finding ways to ignore or distract themselves from the pain.”

On the flip side, Haden notes, “some participants fell prey to ‘maladaptive coping strategies.’ Like feeling scared by the discomfort and pain they experienced. Or seeing a certain level of pain as a clear signal to stop. (Which, to be fair, seems a reasonable response.) 

“The bottom line? A single occurrence of a maladaptive coping strategy tripled the chances a participant would drop out of a race.”

Persistence: My Ticket to France

I couldn’t just sign up for the Marathon Pour Tous and get a race bib. Nobody could. Would-be participants had to complete running challenges tracked by an official app that entered them into the selection lotteries.

I downloaded the app, synced it to my Garmin watch, and began participating in as many challenges as I could. Over the span of 20 months, I completed a whopping 55 challenges.

All that effort got me into 55 lotteries—and I didn’t win any of them. But I never gave up. What I didn’t know was each completed challenge gave me another entry into one final draw.

Finally, in April, at the last possible moment, I received the email I’d been hoping for—and it was time to start training for THE marathon.

The Rigors of Getting Ready

My training regimen included five days of running each week, with a mix of long runs, hill tempos, track sprints, and easy runs based on heart rate. As marathon prep demands, my training at times got rigorous, pushing my weekly cumulative distance to 50 miles during peak weeks. I paid close attention to my overall health, weight training twice a week and monitoring my body composition.

One of the more challenging aspects was adjusting to the time zone and preparing for a night race. My group’s start time was 10:10 p.m., meaning I would be running until around 3 a.m. This required careful planning around sleep, nutrition, and hydration, especially considering the physical toll of long-distance travel and jet lag.

Crossing the Finish Line

I was blown away by the crowds and spectators! In some places, they were eight to ten people thick, and their cheers felt deafening. There were definitely places along the route where I struggled, but hearing people shout “Allez, Lynn!” (French for “Go, Lynn!”) helped me stay excited, and I forget how much it hurt to run a hilly, 26-mile race. 

Finishing the race, my fifth marathon since I began running 14 years ago, reaffirmed my strong belief that the key to training for and running a long distance event—like so many things in life—is being persistent.

With dedication and the support of my loved ones, I worked to meet a goal that sometimes seemed out of reach.

The road to this marathon was not straightforward. It was filled with setbacks and moments of doubt. Some days, I didn’t feel like running, but I reminded myself of my objective.

Being persistent is a skill that has not only made me a better runner but also a more resilient person. 

Persistence can turn your dreams into reality.

The post Being Persistent: How I Crossed an Olympic Finish Line appeared first on Degreed.

Whatever work you do to get leaders behind skill development, whatever resources you secure for learning, and whatever successes you see with retention or innovation—everything eventually falls apart if your efforts lack skill coaching.

To lean into skill coaching, you’ll need to prioritize skill-building opportunities and lean on the managers who oversee employee learning. Unfortunately, our research shows that 26% of employees say their managers don’t support their professional growth, and nearly half of employees aren’t connected to work that stretches their skills.

“Most managers want to help their employees develop skills, but many managers have not received great coaching themselves,” said Ben Cowan, Director of Skills Strategy at Degreed. “They need training on how best to drive skill success, time and resources to do it right, and recognition that their skill coaching efforts are critical to the success of the business.”

Here’s why—and how—L&D can help managers be better skill coaches to help achieve critical company skill goals.

Why Managers Should be Skill Coaches

Ideally, managers have a profound and positive effect on employees in all aspects of their work, especially in learning. In a positive learning culture, people are 92% more likely to say their manager supported their development.

Our research also shows that 18% of employees say one of their favorite ways to learn is directly from their managers. Furthermore, 70% of employees learn from managers frequently, and 28% learn from managers daily.

And can you imagine implementing experiential learning like special projects, mentorships, and internal internship programs without manager support? We can’t. In fact, we’ve found that the most successful learning happens at companies where managers are excellent skills coaches.

“Managers are critical, not just because they find and connect learning to the members of their teams, but because they also contextualize and reinforce it within the workflow,” said Hali Linn, Learning Strategy Consultant at Degreed.

“By serving as both mentors and coaches, managers help bridge the gap between formal learning and the application of skill development. This is how managers foster an environment where continuous learning is part of the organizational culture.”

Managers are also critical to everything else in your company—operations, productivity, employee engagement, and more. And that’s a problem. Why? Because managers are time-starved, caught between competing priorities, and missing critical guidance. They need support too, and that’s where L&D comes in. Here’s how you can help.

No 1. Save managers time: prioritize critical skills.

Research shows the average manager already spends 30 minutes with each direct report every three weeks, and great managers spend even more. If your organization is anything like those studied, it means managers are some of the busiest people in your company.

So if you ask a manager to add more skills development to their plate, don’t be surprised if you get the corporate equivalent of a shrug. 

Also consider that the number of tasks skill coaches could add to their plates—from discussing career goals and giving feedback to finding and assigning stretch projects—can quickly become overwhelming. Now multiply that by the number of direct reports and the number of skills each direct report needs to develop. 

It becomes clear that this is going to be a lot of work. This means that, if you want skills coaching to succeed, you’ll need to remove as many multipliers that you can and shorten the list of skills.

3 Ways to Help Managers Prioritize Critical Skills

To keep managers (and employees) from feeling overwhelmed, help them narrow their focus to the most important skills.

Which skills will have the most impact? Your managers may not know or have time to find out. But you can help them prioritize in one of three ways:

1. Top-down: Translate business objectives into high-priority skills using the first part of our workbook How to Win Learning and Influence the C-Suite.
2. Bottom-up: Democratize skill prioritization by asking individual contributors which skills would help them in their daily work.
3. Combination: Give managers and employees a list of high-priority skills from the business—then let them decide what to learn first.

“A combination approach has worked well for many of our clients,” said Stephanie Lyras, Director, Change Management, Engagement & Adoption. “It allows us to be clear about the skills most important at an organizational level, while respecting the need for flexibility and autonomy to focus on the aspects of the global strategy that are most critical for different business areas.” 

No 2. Incentivize managers: connect skills to successes.

Executives need to drive profit. Managers need to show impact. Employees need to provide quality work. Everyone wants your company to succeed. It’s your job in L&D to bring them together.

If you’ve prioritized skills using a top-down or combination approach, you’ve already aligned with the C-suite on skills. When you share these priorities with skill coaches, connect those coaches to available resources, pathways, and tools. Give them ready-made learning packages.

If you’ve taken more of a democratized approach to skill prioritization, coordinate efforts across teams. Pool resources to share among multiple teams—and provide the social learning that 75% of workers crave.

Celebrate the wins.

However you help managers prioritize skills, keep the focus dialed and the energy high by celebrating wins. Simply pointing out skills and expecting managers to take it from there won’t cut it. Prove to them that the skills highlighted will help them succeed.

Celebrate team members who complete stretch assignments related to high-priority skills. Track progress like increases in productivity, quality improvements, and skills assessments—and share them often. You’ll help reinforce that skills development is part of success, not incidental to it.

No 3. Build habits: give managers a manual.

Coaching is a skill like any other, and even the most seasoned managers need help leveling up their workers. L&D can help by infusing more conversations with skills terminology, creating new guidance, and leveraging learning tools.

Add skills conversations to existing guidance.

There are already existing processes in place at your company:

• Most managers address employee development and performance with evaluations, career development conversations, and annual reviews.
• Most executives likely already schedule recurring company events like strategy rollouts and quarterly kick-offs.

Your job is to ensure that these practices address skill-building. Work with HR and Talent executives to make discussions about skills a part of performance evaluations and raises. Provide skills talking points for career development conversations.

For example, you could add a task at the end of existing coaching or performance evaluation forms to align two priority skills to work on—and outline how progress in those skills will be measured at the next evaluation.

Create new guidance.

After incorporating more skill coaching language in existing processes, start outlining the specifics of new processes that help managers get the most out of the time they spend on skill coaching.

For example, managers coaching each direct report can: 

1. Schedule a 1:1 with the employee to identify one or two skills to focus on.
2. Set developmental goals with a clear timeline and measure of success.
3. Schedule regular 15-minute check-ins to discuss progress and challenges.
4. Reach out to L&D for support as needed.

Help managers leverage learning tools.

With the rise of learning technologies, AI, and vast content libraries, employees have more ways than ever to develop their skills. But without manager guidance, even the most advanced technologies are reduced to tools that sit on a shelf.

Letting learning tools sit on the shelf is a mistake. Gartner research shows that managers who connect employees to the right resources at the right time see 26% more performance and 3x the likelihood their employees will be high performers.

Managers need to be empowered to become skill coaches and be the connectors between those technologies and employee skill development. Help managers understand how L&D resources make skill coaching easier.

Focus on tools like these if you have them:

Degreed Skill Coach

Managers use Degreed Skill Coach to help track and analyze the skills their team members have—and to understand the gaps. Managers see employee skills ratings and set developmental goals. 

“Managers don’t often know where to start when it comes to facilitating coaching conversations,” Linn said. “But Degreed Skill Coach is designed for just that, a place to start. Skill Coach gives managers the view of their team member’s skills, where they want to focus their development, and how to help them achieve their goals.” 

Degreed Focus Skills

Degreed Focus Skills presents employees with learning and skill-building content based on relevance to their work, company, and manager goals.

“So often we, as L&D admins, get a bit too excited about selecting a bunch of skills for employees to focus on,” Linn said. “But the truth is that often leads to overwhelm, and employees tune out. Managers helping their teams choose just a few skills to intentionally work on is what yields results. Too many and employees will disengage.”

Degreed Button

Degreed Button is a plug-in managers use to share learning content on the fly.

Everybody needs a coach.

Turning managers into skill coaches is critical for skills development. With coaching, employees are 93% more likely to use career planning tools, 67% more likely to use skills, and 379% more likely to have opportunities to stretch their skills on the job.

Coaching itself is a skill, and it’s one L&D can cultivate by giving managers the support they need to succeed. And if you find yourself in need of a little coaching, Degreed can help with that. Our Professional Services team partners with L&D professionals like you to explore your learning strategy, technology goals, and questions about coaching managers. Book a free, private consultation.

Contributors

Ben Cowan

Director of Skills Strategy at Degreed

Hali Linn

Skills & Talent Expert at Degreed

Stephanie Lyras

Director of Change Management, Engagement, and Adoption at Degreed

The post How to Turn Managers into Skill Coaches appeared first on Degreed.

From obtaining stakeholder buy-in and boosting end-user adoption to realizing the revolutionary skills-first business model of the future, the success of L&D programs swings hugely on the ability of learning leaders to understand and embrace today’s shifts, trends, and advancements.

“Begin with trends that feel more relevant to your organization’s mission and business goals,” advises Janice Burns, Degreed Chief Transformation Officer. “Become knowledgeable about them—and don’t be tempted to boil the ocean.”

With a finger to the wind and our eyes on the tides, let’s explore what’s hot and what’s not in L&D as 2024 barrels forward. While by no means is ours an exhaustive list, it’s certainly a helpful primer on ideas you can hold near and dear (or not!) as you swipe left or right on upcoming L&D strategy decisions.

What’s hot? Artificial intelligence.

To the surprise of probably no one, generative AI has been a consistently massive tech and business topic since ChatGPT burst into the zeitgeist in late 2022. You might be tempted to think AI will mostly impact computer programming, visual arts, or the act of writing an email. But there’s an argument that L&D will experience outsized change. 

“Of all the domains to be impacted by AI, perhaps the biggest transformation is taking place in corporate learning,” according to analyst Josh Bersin, Founder and CEO of The Josh Bersin Company. “It’s now clear that AI will revolutionize this space.”

How? By generating content (and dramatically reducing the time and complexity involved), by personalizing the learner experience ( understanding the details of content, tailoring learning paths to individual needs, and improving their delivery), by identifying and developing skills (inferring the capabilities of individuals and delivering the right training), and by replacing training with knowledge tools (creating and deploying  intelligent agents or chatbots that provide information and solve problems), according to Bersin.

What’s not hot? Carelessly embracing AI.

In a recent survey, AI dominated the list of hot trends impacting L&D, capturing an unprecedented 21.5% of the vote. That study, the 2024 Learning and Development Global Sentiment Survey, polled more than 3,200 L&D professionals in 97 countries.

While AI topped the Global Sentiment hot trends list, it also topped the survey’s list of L&D challenges in 2024.

“You read that right,” noted Donald H. Taylor, survey lead researcher. “AI is both respondents’ hottest trend and their greatest concern for the coming year.”

Attitudes vary from company to company, of course. Concerned business leaders are particularly wary about a lack of regulation, the costs of AI, ethical questions linked to the technology, and the challenge of building the skills needed to use AI effectively.Savvy learning leaders will likely view that last item as an opportunity as they look to drive business impact by upskilling workers in critical areas. At the same time, those learning leaders increasingly will be tasked with understanding how to ethically, securely, and cost-effectively incorporate AI into L&D platforms. 

What’s hot? Building skills, skills, skills through collaborative experiences.

You recently might have heard the terms cohort learning experience or learning academies. Maybe you’re already deep into building one. Academies, according to Bersin, are the “next big step in corporate learning.” Why? They promise a solution to a problem that billions of dollars spent so far haven’t solved: managing and closing the ever-widening global skills gap. 

A learning academy is a collaborative place where employees develop deep skills that align with business needs, often in groups or cohorts. Champions of academies think big, and they understand that deep upskilling is a different critical learning need than training or everyday learning. Deep upskilling requires a richer, longer, and more intensive learning experience.

In addition to providing employees with a social dynamic of learning from peers and subject matter experts lends context, sparks discussions, and offers coaching and feedback, academies can help organizations reduce costs, boost retention and engagement, and provide dexterity for a future in which people will be continually upskilling and re-skilling.

What’s not hot? Top-down learning.

People embrace relevant, custom learning experiences that will set them up for success. The likelihood of this happening increases when people are engaged with learning options and content they’re free to manage and consume on their own versus centralized, mandated training cascaded down from on high.

Forces fueling interest in decentralized alternatives to traditional higher education are also hard at work influencing businesses. The premise? Workforce development is more effective and impactful when employees are engaged with learning that’s important to not only their specific roles but also their immediate individual needs as well as their long-term personal goals.

As Degreed President Maxwell Wessel recently noted, “People have faster career growth when you can ensure that the learnings they need are at their fingertips. . .  In a skills-based organization, it’s a lot easier to target individuals with relevant content and keep them up to speed than to ask them to learn everything the average person in their role needs.”

What’s hot? Democratized learning focused on front-line populations.

The global market for training frontline workers will likely double to more than $46 billion by 2028, according to a recent report by the management consulting firm MarketsandMarkets.

Benefits of engaging deskless employees include fewer accidents and injuries, higher customer satisfaction, reduced turnover, operational agility, and higher morale, according to the report. 

Accounting for 70% of the U.S. workforce, frontline employees—such as retail, hospitality, and healthcare workers—more often than not value career growth above compensation, according to industry analysts at McKinsey & Co.

Deskless workers tend to be highly skilled, often work with their hands, and typically need to adhere to strict compliance regulations. And because they’re not at a computer all day, it’s sometimes harder for them to be trained in traditional ways.

Access to learning is key. It’s important that frontline workers feel part of the team, even if they’re not in contact with their deskbound coworkers on a daily basis. To democratize frontline worker learning and reap its benefits, ensure employees have easy access to learning resources across all career stages.

What’s not hot? Learning programs focused only on desk- or knowledge-workers.

If democratized learning is key to reaching frontline workers, then naturally that means moving beyond pervasive L&D strategies and programs focused on office workers. But how? Let’s take a closer look.

Start with online and mobile learning options; video courses, podcasts, and in general any type of bite-size content can make learning easier for workers in the field or on the go. 

When Ecopetrol, a Colombian national oil and gas company, implemented new learning experiences, a new learning mindset was instilled in all levels of workers. During a six-month stretch, people completed 440,000 learning items. Learning leaders were surprised to find some of the biggest early adopters were people in operations and maintenance roles, not desk jobs. This engagement outpaced anything L&D had expected.

Encouraging workers to learn on their own is as important as democratizing access to available tools and resources. When people can learn in ways that work for them and set their own goals, they become the protagonists of their own development stories.

Ready to learn more?

Are your 2024 L&D programs inspired and wired or tired? See our report How the Workforce Learns to find out how you can use learning to drive business impact.

The post Hot or Not? What’s In and What’s Out for L&D in 2024 appeared first on Degreed.

It’s the kind of story L&D pros live for. And the kind of story any employee can use for inspiration—and as a roadmap for getting ahead.

“I’m very strategic, and I’m a lifelong learner,” Mattison told us when we first met her in 2023 at Degreed LENS, our annual flagship conference.

Mattison had just won our inaugural David Blake Learner of the Year Award, and we listened somewhat awestruck as she explained how using our platform propelled her from a Ford manufacturing IT role she’d held for years to a new job as a Product Owner in Connected Vehicle Enterprise Analytics. That new role focused on providing enhanced keyword search capabilities to Ford technicians poring through documentation they rely on to complete repairs.

As learning leaders at the auto giant noted, “the interviewing team was extremely impressed with the drive, determination, and passion she demonstrated in her efforts to prepare for the position. Her clear understanding of the role, responsibilities, and expectations, as well as the skills she developed through learning in Degreed, sealed the deal.”

Mattison’s skill-building journey even caught the attention of Ford CEO Jim Farley, who celebrated her on social media, linking to a video the company made about her determined investment in herself. “It’s never too late to learn something new, and I love seeing our employees hold themselves to the highest standard in the pursuit for excellence.”

Returning to LENS to Pass the Torch

Following last year’s LENS, Mattison earned yet another promotion—to Generative AI Specialist & Product Owner in the company’s Customer Service Division. In this new role, she’s developing even more advanced technology tools for repairing vehicles.

Join us to explore this and more with Mattison below in our new Q&A.

And join us for LENS on March 5 and 6 in Houston or online. We’re thrilled to be welcoming Mattison to the event once again as she presents this year’s Learner of the Year Award to a still-unannounced recipient. If our Q&A here is any indication, LENS attendees better get ready for some serious inspiration. 

Degreed: Your upskilling journey has been remarkable. How did it get started?

Mattison: I had worked for years at Ford in manufacturing IT, in a role that was largely focused on systems that support production processes—essentially getting vehicles built efficiently. I wanted to do something different. I had been in the same job for quite some time. 

I wanted to get out of my comfort zone. I wanted to go someplace that took technology to the next level. I was fascinated with artificial intelligence, data insights, and analytics. I knew that I needed to make myself more marketable.

I set my sights on becoming a product owner in data analytics, a role in which I could oversee the development of new systems and processes for the larger business, beyond the manufacturing plant. But to get there, I needed to upskill. 

Degreed: What happened next? 

Mattison: I started researching roles in the Ford database, and I found a SharePoint site that outlined the product owner role. That site directed me to curated learning resources in Degreed. I found everything I could possibly need to learn all of the skills and proficiencies I needed to become a successful product owner.

One big element was I didn’t have much hands-on experience working with agile processes. I was familiar with the agile project management tool used by Ford, and I had some understanding of user stories, but I definitely needed to expand my knowledge of agile practices.

Using Degreed, I was able to gauge my current skills and identify gaps, which allowed me to prioritize my development to match what I needed for the role I was pursuing. I worked my way through each pathway in the plan, building a strong foundation in power skills needed by product owners at Ford. I also used the search function in Degreed to locate more content—on topics like artificial intelligence—to supplement my knowledge and explore other skills and principles that could boost my qualifications.

Degreed: Your efforts paid off. You got the product owner job. But the story doesn’t end there, does it?

Mattison: It doesn’t, I’m happy to say. Shortly after receiving the award from Degreed last year, I got promoted to my current role in AI. If a Ford vehicle technician can’t find what’s needed to fix a vehicle, the job goes up a level to a Ford field service engineer. These engineers have access to a broader database of information the technicians aren’t privy to. And they need to go through several disjointed systems to figure out how to repair vehicles. So, the question becomes, how can we use large language models to give those engineers search capability in one spot, so that they’re not going to different systems to look for what they need? It basically helps make processes faster. 

Degreed: You’ve obviously enjoyed using Degreed. What do you especially appreciate about it?

Mattison: Degreed met me where I was at. It was very accessible, and I could use it just about anywhere. I didn’t have to be at work to do it. I could use it on my phone. I even used it in my car, using the app on my phone to listen to recordings and content as I was traveling back and forth to work.

I love the assessments—to help me identify where I am, identify where I want to go, and then how I can get there.

Degreed is powerful. It is a powerful tool. When I went to school, I used to have to go to the library to find learning materials. I love that Degreed meets me where I’m at.

Degreed: Ford did more than connect you with the learning content you used to build new skills. What other ways does the company support learning?

Mattison: I’m very grateful to Ford. We’ve been trained by our L&D team on how to use Degreed. And Ford gives us Friday afternoons as a “power up” time. I use that opportunity specifically for learning.

Degreed: You’ll be presenting our 2024 David Blake Learner of the Year Award at LENS soon. What do you plan to say? Any thoughts for the next recipient?

Mattison: This year has been such an amazing journey. I want to stress how important it is to invest in yourself by upskilling.

I want to tell the person who’s going to be the new Learner of the Year that it’s going to be a whirlwind, so enjoy the ride. But then there’s also a responsibility on your part to share your story. It was nice to be recognized but, once I was, it opened the door for so many people to reach out to me. It was hard at first because, you know, I have work, but I still felt like I had a responsibility to talk to those people and share how I did it, because they wanted to know. It’s about who you can help.

People are going to want to know you. Be open to that. It’s part of the journey.

Degreed: What’s your advice to learners? What can they take away from your story?

Mattison: Reach out to Learning & Development to get help. And you have to have a passion. I have a passion for learning, and I say go for what motivates you. You have to have motivation. Try to put that motivation in front of you and just keep working toward it. Work towards it every single day.

In addition, I’ve embraced an ecosystem of people—HR, Learning & Development, my team—to help me through anything in my career.

Learning is a marathon. It really is a lifelong journey. You have to embrace that seriously. If you want to evolve, if you want to grow in your career, you have to embrace that lifelong learning mindset because things change. They change a lot, and if you want to grow, you’ve got to be willing to learn something new, come out of your comfort zone, and take the next step.

Degreed: What about L&D professionals? What can they take away from your story?

Mattison: Making time for your employees to invest in themselves is very important. It will benefit your company.

I’m a busy person. Being able to have learning at my fingertips was so important. It makes it a lot easier for people to want to learn and then do it. Give people the opportunity and make it flexible so that they can fit it into their lives. That’s most important. A lot of people want to learn but don’t have the time to do it. They don’t see how they can do it.

I’ve had a lot of questions about that. How did you do it? How were you able to do it?

Learning is not one-size-fits-all. Giving people the flexibility to learn at their own pace, to learn when they can, wherever they can, is helping them to be successful.

The post Insights on Upskilling: How Degreed Learner of the Year Landed Two Dream Jobs appeared first on Degreed.

With no margin for error, we kept calm, evaluated our options, and chose the least awful exit plan. I slowly backed over the unexploded mine, steering in reverse along my original tire tracks while paying the utmost attention to every minutiae. We got lucky that day.

Years later, after I’d left Iraq and Kuwait and transitioned out of the military, I worked in instructional design. Our team was hosting a highly visible internal training webinar. We had senior leaders watching, presenting, and attending. But shortly after the event began, technical difficulties brought the whole thing to a halt.

A sense of panic spread. But I fell back on my training and went into troubleshooting mode. I knew how to stay calm under fire, a skill I’d honed on the battlefield.

We got that webinar back online. Getting myself to a point in my career where I could succeed in the private sector wasn’t so easy, however. For former service members like myself, the path to civilian employment is often fraught with uncertainty at nearly every step.

We all can do more to help veterans—business and L&D leaders alike.

Transitioning from military work and life to civilian work and life is a challenge faced by 200,000 military personnel who leave the U.S. armed services annually. That equates to nearly 550 people every day.

An alphabet soup of federal agencies including The Department of Veterans Affairs, and The Department of Defense provide a wealth of support through 45 government programs.

“Helping veterans overcome challenges to transitioning to civilian life—such as unemployment, homelessness, mental health issues, and disability-related issues—is essential,” according to the U.S. Government Accounting Office (GAO). “However, agencies could improve some of these supports and services.”

In some cases, lackluster outreach, stifled collaboration, deficient monitoring and data, and ambiguous goals hamper the success of the federal assistance programs, according to the GAO.

In addition, a wide range of state programs and nonprofit groups including the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) provide similar services. For many former service members, admirable initiatives like Civilian Ready, Veterans Transition Support, and Fourblock are lifelines to a new life chapter.

Like any newly-hired employee—whether it’s someone fresh out of college or already in the civilian workforce who’s coming from another company—newly-hired, transitioning veterans need support. They’re acclimating to not only civilian sector norms but also an unfamiliar company culture as well as the unique expectations of their new workplaces. 

As company culture champions, business leaders and L&D pros are well positioned to help vets acclimate. And they’re increasingly recognizing the benefits of hiring former service members.

Still, business leaders and L&D pros can do more.

Military skills are transferable skills.

For the tens of thousands of veterans facing the uncertainty of what’s next, it’s important to understand that identifying transferable skills, and then explaining how they’re transferable, is critical to career reinvention.

If you’re in L&D, there’s a big insight for you in that statement.

For starters, L&D leaders can lend support to their HR colleagues and promote an expanded, skills-first approach to hiring veterans.

As the analysts at McKinsey & Co. recently noted, “Traditional ways of hiring make it harder for many service members to land civilian jobs.”

However, “A hiring strategy that focuses on expanding the pool of potential talent can help communities by creating more and better job opportunities for a broader, diverse pool of workers. It can also provide upward mobility for millions of workers—including veterans—at a crucial time for the U.S. economy.”

Perhaps more importantly, L&D can create focused learning experiences that help former military members refine, expand, and apply the transferable skills they bring. The more L&D works with veterans, the more businesses will realize former service members are highly trainable. Why? If there’s one thing the military does well and a lot of, it’s train. We were constantly training. In modern day civilian terms, we were constantly upskilling and reskilling.

By embracing skills-first employee learning, companies “can build skills and retrain their existing workforces to prepare people for new roles,” McKinsey said. “Retention improves when workers find more opportunities to advance internally. Skills-based practices have a greater impact when they’re implemented across the whole talent journey, including in sourcing, hiring, and career development.”

Leaving the military wasn’t the only decision I faced.

When I separated from the U.S. Air Force, Security Forces with an honorable discharge in 2008, I had obtained the rank of E-6, or Technical Sergeant. It’s part of a grouping of ranks referred to as Non-Commissioned Officers (NCOs) who are also leaders. Along the way, I attended some of the world’s best leadership academies.

During my 10 years in the service, I led teams in daily state-side operations as well as combat operations in Iraq during the 2003 U.S.-led offensive. I also completed two tours in Kuwait. All told, I completed seven overseas tours including six in the span of three years.

Air Force Security Forces are responsible for safeguarding base entry points, flightlines including runways and tarmacs, aircraft, conventional and nuclear munitions, and all the people and other physical resources on a base. During my tours, we also provided off-base buffer zone patrols, convoy escorts and security to and from Kuwait City International Airport. 

In the second half of my military career, I taught basic and advanced ground combat tactics at the U.S. Air Force Security Forces Academy in San Antonio, Texas. 

As I approached my seven-year mark, I thought about my future. Would I reenlist? If I did separate, what would I do? I considered a civilian police force or private security, but realized I was doing those things already.

My outlook evolved when someone asked me what I was passionate about. It was an easy question to answer. I’d always loved any kind of technology. And in my final years in the Air Force, I had also found a passion for teaching. That’s when I was introduced to the field of educational technology. I decided to make edtech, which married my passions, a big part of my future.

I would have loved more guidance early on.

My out-processing included a few classes on resume writing. They covered the differences between military and civilian writing, “business professional” and “business casual” dress, and common pitfalls to avoid like jargon or swearing.

While there were some good tips, those classes left a lot to be desired. I found some resume writing services in the private sector, but they were beyond my personal price range. Fortunately, I had a network of accomplished civilians around me who helped tweak my resume from military to civilian speak.

I also knew I needed formal education. That was (and all too often remains) the currency upon which talent is hired. I already had two associate degrees, one in criminal justice and another in technology and military science. But I knew those wouldn’t be enough. Indeed, I didn’t think a bachelor’s degree would even be enough, so I set my sights on a master’s degree.

Within three years I earned a bachelor’s degree in occupational education, focusing on criminal administration, and a master’s degree in educational technology. Ironically, this is where I began to learn that a degree was just a ticket to ride.

Civilian work challenges roiled me.

I quickly realized culture was the biggest difference between military and private sector employment.

In the military, I was in a position of leadership, so I was expected to speak clearly and directly to avoid misunderstandings and confusion.

After the military, I continually received feedback that I was too direct, which came off as harsh. I was shutting down conversations before they had a chance to get started, because I was quick to share my opinions when asked. My input wasn’t always well received. It was considered brash and authoritative and closed off to counterpoints. I had to soften my approach.

Then came the challenge of explaining my military experiences during civilian job interviews. Clearly connecting my ability to shoot at long ranges and clear buildings in urban environments to designing elearning and hosting webinars was unsurprisingly difficult.

I wouldn’t realize until years later that the biggest obstacle I faced during my transition was overcoming silent stereotypes of the military. Many civilian recruiters and hiring managers considered officers educated leaders and relegated enlisted personnel to less educated, less refined order takers. In my experience as an enlisted, noncommissioned officer, that equated to less desirable.

I don’t entirely blame recruiters or hiring managers for the misperception. It’s a byproduct of simply not having much if any experience with former military members. After all, less than 1% of all U.S. adults are active-duty service members and, in 2022, only about 6% of the U.S. adult population was veterans.

I had to learn to tell my transferable skills story.

On the day I drove over that mine, we headed off base in the afternoon, crossed some open desert into nearby oil fields, and traveled toward an old, abandoned police outpost. There wasn’t anything special about our Humvee. It wasn’t armored, and we probably had the doors off to counter the heat of the day.

I caught a glimpse of something dark shaped like a large dinner plate in the sand. But by the time I saw it, it was too late. We had to assume it was not random ordnance. How deep we were into the minefield was anyone’s guess. 

And so, we had a decision to make. Drive forward? Turn around? Retrace our tracks and drive over the mine again?

To be a good leader, you also have to be a good follower. You need to work with others to overcome challenges like we did that day in the desert.

As my civilian career progressed—as I made more connections, had more job interviews, and got more feedback along the way—I realized that talking about my skills in ways that highlighted how transferable they were made a huge difference.

Every advanced combat and specialty school I ever attended wasn’t really about advanced tactics. Obviously, we learned new things and practiced those new tactics, but it was more about leadership. Can you lead, whether formally or informally, under harsh and stressful conditions, with little to no sleep, food or water for days on end?

To lead and operate as part of a team requires discipline and an unwavering work ethic. To survive in an environment where anything that can go wrong can and usually will go wrong demands problem-solving and adaptability. Communication and decision-making are equally critical.

More and more, I extrapolated transferable skills from my experiences. 

Veterans, learn to tell your skills story.

Explain how your military skills translate to the civilian sector,  because they are 100% transferrable and relevant.

Part of that story will be written on a resume, and there are so many more options to help with that than there were 15 years ago, from Microsoft Word templates and generative AI tools to thought leadership posts on LinkedIn and even professional resume writers.

Just like in the military, train and get feedback. Use LinkedIn to find veteran groups and other veterans, and don’t be shy about asking for help. Connect with anyone who will listen as you practice sharing your transferable skills story out loud. Ask people to pay attention to your tone and the phrases you use. Military people like you sometimes have a way of speaking you might not always be aware of.

Hiring managers, listen below the surface.

Think more broadly about who you’re evaluating for new positions. Past experiences can serve as valuable indications of future performance. When evaluating former military personnel, or anyone for that matter, think about what people’s past experiences can tell you about their infinite potential.

I can do more than drive a vehicle in and out of a minefield. That was luck. But I can remain calm in a high-pressure situation. I can think critically and formulate a plan of action on my feet. I can consider options based on their merits, adapt, and act. I can lead.

Decipher those types of skills and you’ll find the talent you’re looking for. Remember, you can teach business practices, specific product knowledge, and PowerPoint. But you can’t teach potential, tenacity, or unwavering commitment.

Think about the value in someone capable of following orders and executing a plan. Whether the person was a commissioned officer or a noncommissioned officer, or even a lower rank, they have experiences and resilience forged in some of the toughest environments imaginable, and that doesn’t always mean hostile combat.

L&D pros, create space for trial and error.

People gain knowledge by consuming content—courses, articles, books, podcasts, lectures, and more. They’re always learning.

Workers gain skills by taking their newly-acquired knowledge and putting it into practice.

My favorite illustration of this dynamic goes like this: Who would you prefer perform your operation? The recent med school grad or the hand with 10 years surgical experience? They’re both doctors, so what’s the difference? The difference is skills acquired and honed through practice.

People build skills through practical application guided by a supervisor, a mentor, or a more knowledgeable, seasoned expert. Apply that to your instructional designs. Develop experiences alongside your instruction and create space for learners to try, make mistakes, fail, and then try again. That’s when knowledge is transferred and begins to morph into a skill.

As an instructional designer, instructor, and learning consultant, I witnessed the most significant changes when my students put knowledge into practice. Asynchronous learning opportunities can disseminate a lot of information, but it’s workshops and academies that drive meaningful behavior change and skill building.

Veterans are accustomed to upskilling and reskilling on the job. A new assignment? An entirely new career field? Unlike many businesses, the armed services makes time during work hours for people to reengineer themselves. As a result, the veterans at your workplace might be uniquely positioned to embrace upskilling—and even help you think through and design experiential learning programs at your organization.

Remember, we’re all more than just one thing.

Sometimes it’s hard to believe I’ve been out of the military for longer than I was in. While that time is firmly in my past by more than 15 years, it’s shaped who I am as a person, dad, partner, friend, and professional.

If there’s one thing my career journey has taught me, from the military to marketing, it’s that we’re all more than our degrees. We’re more than our skills. We’re more than our failures. We’re more than our successes.

We’re tenacious creatures capable of immense growth and adaptability.

When learning leaders believe this about their people, especially veterans who might need some extra support, there’s no stopping them.

Degreed Content Manager Tom Schultz contributed to this blog post.

The post Veterans in Civilian Roles: A Business Challenge and Big L&D Opportunity appeared first on Degreed.

Why? Social interaction encouraged attendance and engagement. The approach saved the Dallas-based residential management firm (a Degreed client) tens of thousands of dollars. (And earlier this year, the company’s L&D team won Learning Innovator of the Year Gold at the first annual Degreed Visionary Awards.)

How does your workforce learn?

Chances are your people are like workers across the globe, which means they embrace a wide variety of learning resources, situations, modalities, and options. It’s quite certain many of them, like the people at Associa, rank among the 75% worldwide who, we’ve found, gravitate toward some form of social engagement.

What motivates your employees to grow professionally?

Good news! More than anything else, they’re likely motivated to learn in order to perform better for your company, according to the latest Degreed research.

These are just some of the key insights bursting from the latest installment of our semi-annual How the Workforce Learns report. It’s a comprehensive, multinational look at the prevailing attitudes and behaviors compelling people to develop.

Building on those insights, the report doubles as a guide focused on how business and L&D leaders like you can use strategies and technologies to meet critical learning needs.

We’ve found L&D can drive business impact in four key ways:

• Access, by ensuring learning tools that facilitate growth in the flow of work are available to everyone.
• Motivation, so you’re inspiring people to learn in meaningful — and effective — ways.
• Variety, by providing employees with every chance to learn in their favorite ways.
• Collaboration, so learning becomes social, so comradery breaks silos.

In addition — and for the first time — we’ve included tips for how you can use generative artificial intelligence (AI) to quickly elevate your L&D initiatives.

“This is a critical time in learning and development,” the report acknowledges, noting that today’s rate of technological change is outpacing the workforce’s ability to learn and upskill, exacerbating the skills gap at an unprecedented pace. “Smart L&D leaders know their companies — in order to succeed — must strategically align employee skill building with core business objectives.”

Access: What Does the Report Say?

We want you to download the full report, of course, so we’re not going to give everything away. But suffice it to say, it explores the importance of a democratized approach to learning.

The report covers how you can:

• Assess how well your organization is democratizing learning.
• Strive to make learning 100% accessible.
• Help your people pay for learning opportunities.

Motivation: The Key to Engagement

Let’s pull back the curtain and consider this much: We found people are, first and foremost, motivated to perform and contribute.

Find out how you can:

• Use learning to connect their motivations to the big picture and your company’s key objectives.
• Use new, on-the-job learning opportunities to further inspire employees.
• Figure out how to share learning success stories.

Variety: The Grease in the Gears

For talent development to remain appealing and help meet development imperatives, it’s important learning takes many forms — classes, videos, mentorships and more. Why? People like to learn in a wide range of ways.

Find out how you can: 

• Understand your critical learning needs
• Adjust your strategy to help meet those needs
• Embrace variety

Collaboration: Social Learning People Love

When learning with others, people especially appreciate a small group or a one-on-one session with a colleague or peer.

Find out how you can:

• Promote collaboration
• Use technology to facilitate collaborative experiences
• Make managers collaborative learning champions

Find out more:

In today’s world of work, in which the demands on your company can seem endless, making L&D a strategic partner is critical. Take a deeper dive into the report and put learning at the heart of your business.

The post How the Workforce Learns: Our 2023 Report on Driving Business Impact Through L&D appeared first on Degreed.

In fact, you might not be able to wait days or weeks. Why? Lack of support is driving many people already working in DEIB enablement to look for new jobs.

“There’s an emotional toll, and that’s exacerbated when you have inadequate resources and support, or when the job is tokenizing,” Paulette Granberry Russell, president of the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education, recently told Inside Higher Ed.

The good news is L&D — starting today — can play a huge part in helping the business deliver DEIB programs that are supported, meaningful and impactful.

You can help your organization get it right by understanding, embracing and developing specific workplace skills across your organization that drive DEIB success.

Enabling DEIB in the Workplace

Getting DEIB right takes a thoughtful approach. And you can put talent development right at the core.

“Focusing on DEIB in the workplace isn’t new, but where many companies struggle is thinking that DEIB is simply about a diverse representation of employees,” according to Degreed Chief People Officer Janice Burns. “Representation is an input and a first step in inclusion. But without the practices and the conditions where people feel included, the representation falls flat.”

DEIB initiatives fail when they don’t overcome people’s fears, don’t have specific goals, lack shared accountability, and the list goes on.

And if you’re failing to retain the DEIB pros currently on your staff, “The important thing is making sure that people come into the roles adequately prepared, and that those who are developing those roles understand what it takes to not only realistically set goals, but also support that individual in pursuing them,” noted Granbery Russell.

While the Degreed LXP isn’t a DEIB training solution, we recognize the role it can play in helping L&D promote skill development and reduce bias in support of DEIB business initiatives. And DEIB is something many of us here have taken a personal interest in, by joining Business Resource Groups (BRGs), by engaging in learning and dialogue and more.

Moreover, DEIB is a topic we studied in collaboration with RedThread Research in our report Creating a DEIB Culture: The Skills Every Employee Needs.

When we started our study, we discovered there wasn’t a set standard to prioritize DEIB in the workplace. Some methods of DEIB training aren’t effective. Often, but not always, current training focuses on the legality of DEIB in the workplace, and it’s oftentimes mandatory. Yet, there aren’t any substantial results to show this positively impacts underrepresented populations.

L&D, Skills and DEIB

Embracing skills can be an effective way to create a more DEIB-focused workplace culture. Specifically, learning and applying skills critical to creating and maintaining a strong DEIB culture. 

What are these skills? Most organizations haven’t identified the skills necessary to develop a strong DEIB culture. 

Our research found:

• For senior leaders — Interpersonal skills are most important, reflecting the amount of interpersonal work required by the leaders to drive DEIB in the workplace
• For managers — Skills like curiosity and influence that allow them to remain open to new ideas, drive and monitor change, and navigate social complexity are vital.
• For individuals —  Authenticity and skills dealing with influence and pattern-recognition are key. 

When we explored what skills matter for DEIB, we knew the answer would differ for each level of responsibility across each organization. But understanding which skills are most important for all employees to have (and which are key for certain roles), can be an effective way to help drive change in your DEIB culture. 

It’s not enough to talk about DEIB in the workplace. Skills are needed to bring DEIB to life.

Want to learn more? 

By showing you the skills your organization has and needs, Degreed can help you easily build a learning strategy that connects employee development to business goals — and empower your managers to upskill teams in support of high priority goals. Find out how Degreed Intelligence can help you make smarter investments in your people.

Got questions? Contact a Degreed representative today.

# # #

The post Making Skills The Great Equalizer: L&D Enables DEIB appeared first on Degreed.

• Boost career path transparency
• Elevate role specialization
• Reward accomplishments
• Visually represent what people learn

To accomplish these goals, L&D created Level Up, a program designed to define career paths and award workers with digital badges that recognize their professional development. The idea was to “learn, earn and share” — and for the Degreed open technology ecosystem to tie it all together.

“The ability of our sellers and recruiters in particular to show up and bring credible knowledge and be looked at as trusted advisors is really critical,” said Stefanie Kuehn, Senior Program Manager, Learning Consulting Team, noting L&D sought to significantly deepen people’s understanding of the company’s services and products.

Recognizing people drives success.

Now more than ever, it’s important people leaders recognize employees to keep them engaged, which can translate to positive business outcomes, according to Forbes Human Resources Council member Thalia Rodriguez, Director of Human Resources at PAA and CEO at Tase Creative Solutions.

“Employees wear many hats and can fill many roles. With that comes the natural expectation of being recognized for doing a good job,” Rodriguez said. “If companies focus on enhancing their rewards and incentives programs, job satisfaction and employee engagement can improve.”

Democratizing Learning, Promoting Expertise & More

At TEKsystems, participants can earn a mix of three types of badges — Knowledge, Milestone and Experience. In combination, these lead to a Role badge.

Check out our full case study to see how TEKsystems uses Degreed to:

• Validate skills and democratize learning
• Support specialization and promote expertise
• Clarify career paths
• Help leaders move people onto projects or into new roles
• Differentiate the organization in the marketplace

“Earning badges sets TEKsystems workers apart from their counterparts at other organizations,” said Allison Leonard, Senior Learning Strategist. “The badges have weight. We’re not just badging everything… We’re badging items of worth, value and substance to a consultant or a customer who sits outside the four walls of TEKsystems. 

“It’s really a differentiator for our participants, who can easily share their credentials on LinkedIn or other social channels and via email. When someone outside views those badges, they’re able to learn more about our people’s expertise and verify authenticity.”

Want to learn more? 

Contact a Degreed representative to find out how you can build a positive learning culture at advance learning at your organization.

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