How Great Leaders Build Future-Ready Teams Through Continuous Learning

How Great Leaders Build Future-Ready Teams Through Continuous Learning

In business, stagnation is death. If you’re not staying up-to-date with new technologies, processes, markets, and more, you’re losing ground to competitors who are.

The most effective leaders in professional settings are able to foster an environment of innovation, continuous learning, and excellence.

But how can you develop systems that prioritize that kind of growth? In this article, we take a detailed look at how business leaders can facilitate skill development in a supportive and sustainable way.

Gradual Integration is Key

That might sound like a contradiction to what we just said in the introduction. Stagnation is death. Being gradual is key? Momentum is important, but it doesn’t need to be rapid. People should have a solid continuity of experience at work. They should simply be slowly developing into better professionals through moderate but consistent training.

It’s important because studies have shown pretty consistently that when employees are constantly adapting to new technologies or processes, it can create a lot of stress that will often turn into turnover problems.

When you introduce a new technology, it’s important to give them lots of time to get used to it. During that period, they should be held to different expectations. It’s not fair, after all, to expect the same level of productivity as they had when they weren’t in the process of learning a new skill.

This does mean accepting periods of less significant profitability in certain cases. When you’re adopting the right technologies and skills, the payoff will manifest in the long run.

Grow Alongside Them

If you want to be an efficient business leader who earns the respect of the people they are managing, it’s important to practice what you preach, attend training seminars, use the new skill or technology yourself, and hold a dialogue reflecting your own feelings on what’s going well, where it’s difficult, or less impactful than you expect it to be.

Many people experience resistance from their teams because they feel a lack of engagement from the top down. Show them that you’re just as much a part of this as they are.

Distinguish Between What is Mandatory and What is Simply Encouraged

Not every continuous learning initiative warrants a mandate. Having optional, employer-sponsored opportunities is a great way to develop a strong internal leadership pipeline while also identifying ambitious employees who are interested in learning skills that your business requires.

Tuition assistance programs for university enrollment can be particularly impactful, though they are naturally expensive.

What Type of Skills Should Be Prioritized?

That really depends on the industry. For example, in education, good upskilling development programs might funnel people towards administrative careers through graduate degrees, which keeps really good teachers in the school system and provides an internal leadership structure. Programs that encourage educators toward EDD VS. PhD options create future leaders and provide motivation to existing staff.

On the other hand, a brokerage firm might focus on developing executive leadership skills or cybersecurity expertise.

It’s helpful to have a very clear goal for what you want the upskilling to accomplish. Do you want to reduce the cost of hiring executives by developing a strong inside-hire program? If so, focusing on those executive skills could be very necessary.

Or are you prioritizing custom in-house tech solutions, in which case coding skills or cybersecurity abilities may be more appropriate?

There’s no universally valuable skill that makes sense for every business. Rather, good education opportunities should be designed to be fulfilling for the employee while also productive toward your organizational goals.

Incentivize Through Money

Well, what better incentive is there? Now, naturally, there’s no scenario where you can force employees to upskill for free.

It will be, at the very least, something they do during business hours. But it may be beneficial, if you can afford it, to further incentivize with bonuses. Why? While this does add expense to an already costly process, it also inspires action and motivation.

Remember that there are several factors to keep in mind at all times. You want not only to encourage participation, but also to ensure that the people participating in this process are satisfied.

After all, you don’t want to spend lots and lots of money upskilling, only to have the people turn over afterwards. Then, at best, you have to do the process all over again. At worst, you lose lots and lots of time and money.

Financial incentives can keep your team in the game and help make the transition smoother. It doesn’t necessarily need to be significant. A few hundred dollars in bonus will often be all it takes. Just give them something that shows your appreciation.

Pro-tip? Make the incentive reward the outcome you are trying to achieve. For example, if you are hoping for your employees to complete a certain training module, then the reward should be tied to that timeline.

Conclusion

When it comes to continuous education or upskilling, slow and steady often wins the race. Even a modest investment in continuous learning initiatives can help keep your business future-focused while providing your staff with rewarding opportunities they can genuinely enjoy and benefit from.