The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

            Human Resource Development is used for referring to strategic activities and processes that organizations develop for making their employees enhance their capabilities and skills. The most important thing for an organization in terms of its workers is that every employee is working towards the organizational objectives (Sheehan, et al., 2014). A common issue in the way is that sometimes goals of the company are not clear and line managers can play a significant role in clarifying them. When the goals of a company are clear, a better and more effective training and development program can be created. One of the best approaches to talent development is the one that focuses more on individual requirements of employees (Werner & DeSimone, 2011).

HRD Key Practices for Organizational Sustainability and Competitive Advantage

Definition

HRD or Human Resource Development is a term used for strategic processes which companies create for nurturing their employees and providing them with the up-to-date skillset that they can utilize for fulfilling their responsibilities (Garrick, 2012).

VUCA Environment of 21st Century of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

        VUCA stands for ambiguous, complex, uncertain, and volatile which are four important factors characterizing nature of environments in organizations in the 21st century. Working in a VUCA globe actually presents an issue for leaders: professionals of HR have to realize the reality of this environment and the role of micro sustainable competitive advantages as an important aspect for achieving success in such a globe. An agreement must be forged by them with senior management regarding a culture that is needed for flourishing in the VUCA globe. HR practices and tools have to be created for reflecting the mandate of business in terms of speed, collaboration of adaptability cross-boundary, and flexibility (Lawrence, 2013).

Key Practices

Learning needs identification:

Every organization has some specific requirements and developing the skills of workers according to organizational requirements is very significant. In the process of determining the learning needs, it is important learning and developments managers to realize the objectives of a company (Mone, et al., 2011).

Learning design:

Learning design refers to a systematic connection between activities that must be utilized for enhancing the capabilities of workers.

Delivery:

This term is used for determining just what type of activities are being used by an organization for increasing skillset of workers.

Evaluation:

The purpose of HRD activities is to nurture workers and this requires the evaluation of their learning. It helps in understanding the magnitude of current learning activity on workers (Noe, et al., 2017).

L&D Technology of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

        L&D experts create a training design in order to obtain the optimal benefits and evaluate the outcomes of present training regime as well. Learning and development experts collaborate with line managers to promote the active learning of workers. With a proper feedback from line managers, L&D experts can modify training program to focus more on the weak areas of workers (Sung & Choi, 2014).

        Efficient HRD practice: For instance, Amazon hires potential workers and offers a training and development program on a monthly basis for enhancing their skills. This allows Amazon to make sure that employees from the very beginning (Hameed & Waheed, 2011) are prepared for the duties that they would be fulfilling. It helps the organization in maintaining a competitive edge in the market.

Key Practices of Learning and Development of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

Role of Line Manager in Workplace Learning of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

Supporting an agile approach of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

        The most important thing for an organization in terms of its workers is that every employee is working towards the organizational objectives. A common issue in the way is that sometimes goals of the company are not clear and line managers can play a significant role in clarifying them. When the goals of a company are clear, a better and more effective training and development program can be created by line managers with the assistance of L&D professionals. This way, not only time is saved but the organization is able to achieve a better edge in training the workers. With the support of these experts, line managers can make the objectives of a company clear to every worker in the firm which means that now they have a direction towards which they can work. From the perspective of L&D experts, they are able to gain insights into the future plans of an organization, enabling them to create development programs using a structured network for deriving positive outcomes. Line managers can be the role models for workers by being committed to their work and showing them the right way. They can also reward the deserving workers for increasing employee motivation and work engagement.

        Line managers with the assistance of learning and development experts can analyse the capabilities of all the workers and adjust the training regime which is suitable for them. It can make the HRD activities more efficient as a flexible plan for helping workers is better than creating one which doesn’t suit the individual requirements of workers. Line managers can even promote collaboration among workers by making them understand the importance of communicating and sharing ideas among teams. This can help employees in achieving outcomes sooner than later. It can be said that line managers have a significant role to play in the development of workers as they can be a pillar to support workers (Anantatmula, 2010).

Potential impact of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

        From the above discussion, it is easy to realize that learning and development managers seem to depend a lot on the assistance of line managers. Line managers help L&D experts in setting the goals of their plans. If the goals of learning plans are not clear, workers will not be benefitted from them. It means than an organization will suffer from having used up valuable time and resources to obtain nothing in the end. For the survival of a company in the market, goals must be achieved by it and if incorrect objectives are pursued by the company, it will lost its competitive edge. Line managers, therefore, keeps a company stay competitive. When line managers provide influential feedback, it develops a positive workplace environment. As this environment develops, an organization is able to maintain its sustainability. If they stop providing pointers and feedback to workers, they will not know about their mistakes and might not be able to correct them ever again. Therefore, a part of employees’ learning is dedicated to line managers and their inefficient behaviour can negatively impact both the organization and the workers in it. Employees are the assets of an organization and if the company is unable to utilize these resources properly, the company will start losing not only in the market but also in the way how it is gaining profits. Therefore, it is crucial for line managers to have a pro-active mind set. If line managers stop supporting learning and development experts, it might cause an organization to lose its competitive standing in the market.

Ethical Issues of Sky Media’s Approach of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

        User Centricity: User centricity actually refers to considering the requirements and necessities of the end-user as the utmost priority. It means that an organization does its best to ensure that the requirements of the end-user are fulfilled regardless of the efforts. Even if the user wishes to purchase a product at a cheaper rate, the organization works towards fulfilling this requirement (Aldini & Bogliolo, 2014).

Data-Driven Decisions:

Data-driven decisions are the ones which are supported by hard data instead of just observation and imaginary factors. Such type of decisions tend to be more authentic and valid than the decisions which are made on the basis of just assumptions or facts. Organizations that rely on decisions formulated on the basis of data are more precise in their approach and tend to increase their goals as measured. With the advancement of business technology, the process of data-driven decision making has become even more significant for organizations in the recent years in almost all types of industries.

Iterative development: 

Iterative development actually is a way of distributing of a process or a development of a software into smaller chunks. The methodology behind it is that every large process can be distributed and divided into smaller parts so that it becomes easier to complete and achieve success in the task. The main objective of iterative development is to achieve success in a collaborative way so that even complex tasks can be accomplished with efficiency. Whenever a process becomes very difficult to complete, companies can use this methodology for ensuring that effectiveness is obtain throughout the process.

  Point of need:

In distribution functions, a location that is physical within a required operational area designated by the subordinate commander or the combatant commander as a receiving point for materiel or forces for a subsequent consumption or use is referred as the point of need.

        Inclusive approach vs. Exclusive approach: Inclusive approach to the development of talent suggests that the development of talent should be applied to almost every employee in the organization. Every worker in the company is seen as a strength that the company possesses that can create value for the organization if given a chance to nurture skills and develop talent. In contrast, exclusive approach to the development of talent suggests that subset of workers as creating a disproportionate value. It means that only a chosen number of workers should be given the chance to develop their talents by including them in training and development sessions. Inclusive approach to the development of talent is more ethically correct and seems to deliver equal opportunity to every worker in the organization. It doesn’t promote an unhealthy environment in the organization (Thunnissen, et al., 2013).

Sky Media’s Approach and its Impact of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

        Sky Media actually has selected the inclusive approach to the development of talent as it seems to encourage the skill nourishment of every worker in the company. It also plays a significant role in the development of a positive environment in the company that automatically causes employees to engage with each other in terms of work. This approach positively influences job performance and work engagement. With an encouraging environment in the company, work engagement is enhanced which, in turn, improves job performance. Therefore, inclusive approach to the development of talent in Sky Media helps the company is driving positive outcomes which are both beneficial for the company and the workers. It means that if organizations wish to promote both job performance and work engagement then inclusive approach to talent development is very important because it plays an integral role in creating a positive workplace environment (Downs & Swailes, 2013).

Sky Media Approach Acceptance to Line Managers

        In Salesforce, there is an ethical business environment that seems to maintain a balance in the company. The organization intensely focuses on maintaining and ethical workplace environment that encourages the development of workers. All the ethical guidelines are taken seriously by workers in the company and they are not exploited. Furthermore, if someone goes against the ethical considerations, a stance is taken against that person. For instance, if an employee were to discriminate against the other, the employee would be taken to the human resource department that is where his punishment would be announced. Such an environment allows Salesforce to strike a balance among workers and its own performance. It encourages workers to follow all the ethical considerations in terms of each and every organizational process. When ethics are prioritized, the company is able to achieve success in the market. Line managers of Salesforce will be satisfied with the approach that is being used by Sky Media. It is utilizing the inclusive approach towards the development of talent which ensures that every worker has the same opportunity as every other worker in the company. However, there are some issues which are not controlled by the organization like the lack of communication which might not be perceived as effective by the line managers of an ethical business environment. This is the only issue that might be identified by the line managers which is not being resolved by Sky Media since all the issues are controlled and properly managed in an ethical business environment.

Adopting Agile Approach to Talent Development of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

        Inclusive approach to the development of talent suggests that the development of talent should be applied to almost every employee in the organization. Every worker in Salesforce is seen as a strength that the company possesses that can create value for the organization if given a chance to nurture skills and develop talent. This approach with a constant feedback by line managers to employees allow the workers to be more precise about their weak areas and where they can focus more. This approach is more suitable to the individual requirements of workers as it helps them in identifying all the areas where they can invest more of their time to improve better. Organizations can adopt this approach to focus more on the individual requirements of the workers to make sure that workers are capable enough to meet the organizational requirements. Furthermore, this approach is better than most of the approaches that focus less on the individual requirements of employees.

Conclusion on The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

        Overall, it can be said that sky Media has selected the inclusive approach to the development of talent as it seems to encourage the skill nourishment of every worker in the company. It also plays a significant role in the development of a positive environment in the company that automatically causes employees to engage with each other in terms of work. When ethics are prioritized, the company is able to achieve success in the market. Line managers accustomed to work in such an environment will be satisfied with the approach that is being used by Sky Media. It is utilizing the inclusive approach towards the development of talent which ensures that every worker has the same opportunity as every other worker in the company. Organizations can utilize inclusive approach for developing talents of workers effectively.

References of The Line Manager’s Role in Supporting Workplace Learning

Aldini, A. & Bogliolo, A., 2014. User-Centric Networking: Future Perspectives. s.l.:Springer.

Anantatmula, V. S., 2010. Project manager leadership role in improving project performance. Engineering Management Journal , 22(1), pp. 13-22.

Downs, Y. & Swailes, S., 2013. A capability approach to organizational talent management. Human Resource Development International , 16(3), pp. 267-281.

Garrick, J., 2012. Informal learning in the workplace: Unmasking human resource development. s.l.:Routledge.

Hameed, A. & Waheed, A., 2011. Employee development and its affect on employee performance a conceptual framework. International journal of business and social science , 2(11).

Lawrence, K., 2013. Developing leaders in a VUCA environment. UNC Exec Dev , pp. 1-15.

Mone, E. et al., 2011. Performance management at the wheel: Driving employee engagement in organizations. Journal of Business and Psychology , 26(2), pp. 205-212.

Noe, R. A., Hollenbeck, J. R., Gerhart, B. & Wright, P. M., 2017. Human resource management: Gaining a competitive advantage. s.l.:New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Education.

Sheehan, M., Garavan, T. N. & Carbery, R., 2014. Innovation and human resource development (HRD). European Journal of Training and Development , 38(1/2), pp. 2-14.

Sung, S. Y. & Choi, J. N., 2014. Do organizations spend wisely on employees? Effects of training and development investments on learning and innovation in organizations. Journal of organizational behavior , 35(3), pp. 393-412.

Thunnissen, M., Boselie, P. & Fruytier, B., 2013. Talent management and the relevance of context: Towards a pluralistic approach. Human Resource Management Review, 23(4), pp. 326-336.

Werner, J. M. & DeSimone, R. L., 2011. Human resource development. s.l.:Cengage Learning.