Canadian Organizations Need to Strengthen Their Commitment to Employee Learning

OTTAWA, Sept. 7, 2016 /CNW/ - With kids heading back to school and refocusing on learning, Canadian employers should do the same. Organizations that are committed to learning and development report better organizational performance than their competitors. However, a new Conference Board of Canada report finds that only 34 per cent of Canadian organizations say that they have a strong learning environment while the remaining believe it is either moderate (51 per cent) or weak (16 per cent).

"Canadian organizations have room to improve when it comes to making workplace learning a priority," said Donna Burnett-Vachon, Director, Leadership and Organizational Development Research, The Conference Board of Canada. "The key to doing so is for organizations to regularly evaluate the effectiveness of their learning practices and programs. Only then can they identify strengths and opportunities for improvement."

Highlights

• Only 34 per cent of Canadian organizations say that they have a strong learning environment.
• The remaining organizations believe their learning environment is either moderate (51 per cent) or weak (16 per cent).
• Organizations with strong LPI results are among the most prepared to fill vacancies left by retirements with qualified internal candidates over the next five years.

Regular assessment of learning and development programs, allow organizations to better prioritize spending and resources to ensure strategies are working effectively. However, the percentage of Canadian organizations conducting evaluations of their learning practices has dropped by 25 per cent in the last 15 years.

The report highlights the Learning Performance Index (LPI), a proprietary assessment framework that can assist organizations in evaluating the quality and effectiveness of their learning environments. The report applies the LPI to a sample of 350 Canadian organizations and finds a strong positive link between learning performance and competitive organizational performance. Overall, organizations with strong LPI scores tended to have:

• lower voluntary employee turnover rates;
• enhanced employee performance and engagement;
• more effective organizational leadership;
• effective succession management strategies; and
• alignment of their employee development and HR strategies.

The report, Learning Performance Index: Profiling Strong and Dynamic Learning Environments, is available from The Conference Board's e–Library. 

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SOURCE Conference Board of Canada

Sean Burgess, Media Relations, The Conference Board of Canada, Tel.: [phone] ext. 294, E-mail: [email protected]; or Juline Ranger, Director of Communications, The Conference Board of Canada, Tel.: [phone] ext. 431, E-mail: [email protected]