Driving Business Performance
Executing On Business Strategy
Numerous studies on corporate performance consistently indicate that executing on business strategies is one of the biggest challenges facing CEOs today. A survey of 307 CEOs of some of America's largest corporations, commissioned by the Foundation for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, revealed that by almost a three-to-one majority (72 percent to 26 percent), most CEOs believe that a company's execution of their chosen strategies is more challenging than developing appropriate strategies.
The inability of businesses to align individual and departmental objectives with the overall goals of the corporation is one of the most commonly cited roadblocks to strategic execution. Often the problem is rooted in a lack of communication of company objectives across all levels of the organization. In order to ensure that all individuals understand how their own objectives relate to those of the company, a feedback loop is needed to validate that information has been received, that the objectives are understood, and that they are being acted upon in accordance with the established plan. It is equally important to have consistent mechanisms in place to enable continuous measurement of business performance by individual contributors, managers, and executives.
Another frequently cited challenge is the inability to maximize overall workforce performance. Many organizations find it difficult to maintain a consistent approach to identifying and promoting top performers across multiple departments and lines of business. Companies must increasingly redeploy existing staff in new areas, and ensure that the skills are in place to match those new assignments. The challenge is compounded in industries characterized by high employee turnover, such as retail and service-related industries. The global regulatory climate imposes an added burden on corporations to be able to validate that employee performance is in compliance with multinational statutes and regulations. The Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA), the Food and Drug Administration 21 CFR Part 11, the Health Insurance Portability Protection Act (HIPPA), and recent added scrutiny by the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) on corporate accounting practices are just a few examples of the growing impact on business of the cross-industry regulatory environment in the United States.
A third major roadblock to organizational effectiveness is the inability of large organizations to rapidly adapt to change. In virtually all industries, the pace of change has increased dramatically, with technology innovation and globalization being major drivers. In order to bring more products to market faster and respond to new competitive threats, businesses need to rapidly introduce new skills and exchange critical knowledge among diverse parts of the organization.
E-learning has aided many of the world's leading corporations in dealing with organizational effectiveness. Learning management systems are helping companies track employee learning activities and certifications, automate learning processes, and leverage the Internet for delivery of learning content. The most visible gains from e-learning have been reflected in compelling cost reduction and greater efficiency.
However, to a large extent several limitations have prevented organizations from realizing the full potential of these initiatives. The lack of metrics that link learning activities to business outcomes make it difficult to ensure that training is being applied in an effective manner. Furthermore, a majority of essential knowledge and skill development within an organization comes from informal channels of communication and collaboration that are not bound to the structured training environment. For businesses to elevate their e-learning programs to a more strategic level, it is imperative that they seek opportunities to more directly support top line business goals.
Business Performance Management
A growing number of business journals, academic institutions, and technology industry analyst firms are ascribing the term "business performance management" to the applied use of software to manage and measure activities that support strategic business goals. As e-learning evolves, many pioneering corporations have moved beyond traditional learning management to a set of initiatives that more closely line up with the concept of business performance management.
One example of this is Wachovia, a leading provider of financial services throughout the East Coast and the United States. The company operates full-service banking offices under the First Union and Wachovia names in 11 East Coast states and Washington, D.C., and offers full-service brokerage with offices in 49 states and global services through more than 30 international offices. Operating in an intensely competitive and heavily regulated market, the ability to quickly introduce innovative new products and services, and the ability to demonstrate compliance with complex regulations is essential. The Patriot Act, which was enacted in October of 2001 to help combat international terrorism, has added an additional set of compliance requirements to the core set of financial service requirements that are already in place. Wachovia is deploying Docent to ensure its employees have the knowledge and skills to meet these strategic imperatives.
"The Holy Grail of the training world is to develop a model that extends beyond merely cost avoidance, cost savings, and ramp-up speed to truly identify the impact of training across all business functions." |
Docent recently completed an extensive survey of its global customer base and identified over 125 unique business applications that support and track to the key strategic goals of the corporations in which they are deployed. Several of the most prevalent applications include:
- Customer and Channel Education — Self-service training to improve customer satisfaction, deliver incremental revenue, and reduce support costs
- Product Launch — Cross functional and multichannel education to accelerate go-to- market readiness, provide real-time feedback between field sales personnel and corporate marketing staff, and shorten "time to revenue" when rolling out new products
- Sales Force Readiness — Designed to shorten the time it takes to bring new sales representatives up to full productivity levels, accelerate ramp up time associated with new product education, ensure up to the minute global competitive intelligence, and improve sales force retention.
- Regulatory Compliance — Driven by regulatory and statutory guidelines for purposes of protecting customers and employees from hazards and liabilities, minimizing corporate liability risk, accelerating product lifecycles, and promoting a safe and effective working environment.
- Corporate University — Often the central point for education on business skills (e.g., program management, selling, team building), company policies and processes, and IT training.
Many of these horizontal solutions are applied to problems that are unique to specific vertical industries. For example, in the pharmaceutical industry where the competitive position of a new drug is governed by its patent life, sales force readiness has a profound impact on revenue streams and profitability.
Consumer safety is also paramount, and educating doctors, pharmacists, and consumers on the appropriate use of new drugs is of vital importance. In order to protect consumers, the pharmaceutical industry is one of the most heavily regulated in the world. While the cost of compliance is high, the cost of noncompliance is an order of magnitude higher.
From Point Products to Integrated Suites
Companies that are leading the trend toward implementing performance-oriented solutions are recognizing the value of integrated solution suites that address the needs of different constituencies across the extended enterprise. Industry analysts have noted this emerging need as well.
"When it comes to e-learning, enterprises increasingly want to do business with one primary supplier Vendors are packaging and integrating (to varying degrees) four categories of e-learning support: learning management systems (LMSs), virtual classrooms/delivery capabilities, content and learning content management systems (LCMSs), and professional services."
Gartner, March 2002
Docent is the first vendor to aggressively move toward delivering a suite of solutions that help global businesses improve performance by increasing the productivity and effectiveness of individuals and aligning them with the goals and objectives of the corporation.
Case Study: Accenture Chooses Docent to Create a Multifaceted Just-in-Time Training Solution
As a world leader in management and technology consulting, Accenture trains thousands of new and veteran employees each year. But although their training program has been the envy of the industry, market demand for an ever-broadening range of skills meant they needed to shift that program into an even higher gear.
The integration of the Docent LMS product into Accenture's e-learning solution will enable Accenture to cut costs substantially, while giving the organization's professionals the precise skills they need to provide maximum value for their clients.
The Company
Accenture is a leading global management and technology consulting organization. The firm is reinventing itself to become the market maker, architect, and builder of the new economy, bringing innovations to improve the way the world works and lives. More than 70,000 people in 46 countries deliver a wide range of specialized capabilities and solutions to clients across all industries. Under its strategy, the firm is building a network of businesses to meet the full range of client needs: consulting, technology, outsourcing, alliances, and venture capital.
The Challenge
To deliver the services its customers demand, Accenture needs a highly trained professional staff. According to Jill Smart, a partner with the company, "Accenture is known for its commitment to learning. We believe it is a life-long endeavor." Accenture takes that belief seriously, investing a significant amount on training on an annual basis.
Even with such generous funding, it's a huge task. The company's shift from a few core businesses to many distributed businesses has resulted in an increase in the number of required skill and knowledge areas, which overlap across organizational entities.
In addition to training 10,000-14,000 new hires each year, Accenture must provide its existing people with instant access to performance assets that are market driven, as well as to those that are specific to individual clients. As a result, the thousands of offerings in the Accenture training catalog are in frequent flux. "Our world is complex and ever-changing," notes Smart, "and our learning content has a shorter life cycle than ever before. Content that used to last a decade now lasts a couple of years at most."
The Docent Solution
To meet the varied and ever-increasing demands placed upon its training program, Accenture chose to accelerate its move toward a unified, firm-wide, consumer-centric e-learning infrastructure. The company's goal: an intuitive, personalized, comprehensive information resource that would enable the firm's professionals to be even more effective information consumers.
Although Accenture has no intention of eliminating its highly regarded classroom instruction program, the company is transforming more of its training to a self-service, just-in-time function that lets professionals determine the training they need and when to take it. Accenture's ultimate goal is a balanced program of 30 percent classroom training and 70 percent e-learning and other distributed forms of education.
The backbone of the new system is myLearning.accenture.com, which aggregates everything dealing with learning into a customized portal that fronts the learning management system and provides links to other information as well. Smart explains: "Entry will be personalized; we will know who the person is, what skills they have, and what jobs theyve been on."
Accenture chose the Docent Enterprise Learning Management Server to power this vital link. One of the main reasons for the choice was the extensive customization the Docent system allows. With Docent, Accenture can offer not only traditional classroom training, but also asynchronous computer-based courses and (using a collaborative technology product) live, synchronous learning events.
Docent permits Accenture to integrate both its own knowledge assets and content from several outside vendors. And, Docent's streamlined registration, curriculum management, and reporting processes all serve to support both the new e-learning models and nimble classroom course deployment. Accenture plans to further extend the use of the Docent system by interfacing it with a number of external systems, including their own HR and finance operations.
Smart was pleased by the speed and ease of the Docent implementation: "We installed the Docent system in less than three weeks. We started in mid-August 2000 and by Labor Day had 800 users. Now were working on system customization unique to us, but by later this year, all 71,000 of our people will be up and running."
Smart expects the new system will increase speed to market, enhance training access and usability, and significantly improve capability building. Entire teams will be able to develop a common set of client-specific skills, yet spend more time with clients.
