Training The Smart Way Forward

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Training - The Smart Way Forward
September 25th 2009
Bernie Cullinan
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What I will cover

• The challenges for training providers today
• What role will training play in the delivery of
  the Smart Economy?
• Leadership of innovation to deliver results
• The role of trainers in the development of
  leadership skills for innovation

25 September 2009
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Challenges for trainers today

• First budget to be cut is training
• Those that are investing in training are looking
  for lower cost options
• Huge changes for organisations many do not know
  what they need to upskill for, so little
  incentive to invest in training
• Many organisations under pressure for survival

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• Yet, there have never been as many opportunities
  for building a stronger training culture as there
  are today - never before has there been so much
  pressure on the country to secure the Enterprise
  Economy and build the Innovation Economy
• That is what delivering the smart economy means
• That is where the focus of training development
  needs to be
• That is what I want to discuss today.

25 September 2009
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What does this mean?

• At an organisation level, securing the enterprise
  economy means organisations must be cost
  competitive
• Creating the innovative economy means
  organisations are able to deliver game changing
  results
• Training will play a key role in ensuring we move
  from talking about the Smart Economy to actually
  being a Smart Economy

25 September 2009
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What is Innovation?

• Organisational innovation means different things
  to different people
• Most easily defined as being the development of
  an organisation to compete more effectively in
  its existing markets or its ability to find and
  compete in new markets because of the way it
  operates
• Innovation is the route to bottom line success in
  a rapidly changing world

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A Training Focus on Innovation

• It has always been difficult to measure the
  impact of innovation but innovative companies
  tend to be more successful than those which
  operate in a steady state.
• The greatest success in driving innovation has
  come from those organisations that have focused
  on leadership development to create an innovative
  organisation. That is the training opportunity.

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Delivering game changing results

• Not just about doing the same thing better
• Key starting point is understanding the culture
  and capability of the organisation
• Role of diagnostics
• Culture of the organisation
• What does a game change look like?
• Has the company the vision to see a new way?

25 September 2009
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So what kind of leadership drives innovation?

• A culture of innovation results in all of the
  staff in an organisation focusing on doing what
  they do better, as well as doing new things
• To foster that culture, a leader must provide the
  environment to support change
• The most common characteristic of leaders of
  innovative organisations is that they are
  passionate motivators
• What is the role of the trainer in creating
  passionate motivators?

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Leading leaders of innovation

• Sometimes, it is about building confidence in the
  management team that they have the capability to
  deliver real game change in their organisation.
• How? Working with case studies frequently most
  powerful tool for knowledge transfer
• DirectTV Turning a company around when all the
  money is gone
• Veritas Re-invention when you have missed the
  market

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Dealing with the Fear

• Too often, innovation is seen as a money pit
• Doing new things costs money
• No evidence at all to support that view when
  innovation and cost competitiveness are seen as
  essential bed fellows.
• As trainers, it is vital to be able to challenge
  rigidly held views

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Increased Specialisation

• Often successful innovation means simpler
  processes despite operating in an increasingly
  complex world
• Trainers must be either deeply domain specific or
  else focus on generic skills no room for half
  way
• More opportunities for trainers as they increase
  their specialisation
• Trainers are entrpreneurs Use that ability to
  develop solutions to others challenges

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Summary Points

• Keep continuous focus on delivering the Smart
  Economy agenda All training can deliver against
  this initiative
• Focus on your measurable impact on your clients
  being increased cost competitiveness and
  increasing ability to deliver game changing
  performances
• Means unleashing vision
• Focusing on what is within control of the
  organisation, ignore what is not
• This is as relevant for working with unemployed
  individuals who are re-skilling as it is with
  organisations

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Summary Points

• Get some radical thinking going Farmleigh was
  about the integration of the diasporas input
  into the development of solutions for Ireland
  Needs to go beyond that in a tangible way.
• What role are the members of the Training
  Skillnet going to play in the development of
  solutions?
• Can the Training community facilitate some of the
  knowledge transfer from those whom we believe can
  show us the way?
• The Training community must be part of the
  dialogue around proposed solutions

25 September 2009