When Paul Matthews joined a recent podcast conversation on workplace learning, he didn’t hold back. The traditional L&D approach, he argued, is backwards. He continued to explain the issue in more detail and suggested how learning transfer should be part of any development programme and technology can support this at scale.
“The problem with most L&D initiatives,” Paul said, “is they focus on learning delivery instead of performance improvement. The business doesn’t want people to learn, it wants them to do.”
It’s a bold but necessary truth. Training budgets are often invested in courses, events and eLearning content that are easy to roll out, but don’t actually lead to changed behaviour. Learning transfer is what matters: how we ensure that learning sticks, gets used, and leads to improved results in the workplace.
Moving beyond content
Too often, L&D efforts center around providing knowledge. But Paul urges L&D teams to consider a more important question: “What do we want people to do differently as a result of this training?”
When you have figured out what you want people to do, the next question becomes: How do we ‘deliver’ that new behaviour?
This reframing leads to a sharper focus on workflows, habits, and environmental factors that support behaviour change. Real development happens not in the training room, but in the workplace, through practice, feedback, and reflection.
Learning is a process, not an event
Paul highlighted the need to think of learning as a continuous journey, not a one-off occurrence. “It’s not just about attending a course,” he said. “It’s about what happens before, during and after the course that makes learning effective.”
He talked about a workflow of activities or a sequence of tasks that would be needed for someone to reliably change their behaviour and then sustain that new behaviour over time.
He used a Satnav analogy to illustrate this point. A Satnav needs to know where you are now, and where you want to go. Then it can create a list of turn-by-turn instructions for the journey and gently guide you back on track if you stray from the route.
For a learning initiative, you need to know how people are doing their jobs now, and how you want them to do their jobs in the future. You can then create a list of step-by-step instructions to make that change, and you need some way to hold people accountable for taking those steps so you can nudge them back onto the journey if they stray.
Useful tools
Following on from the concept or a learning workflow of activities, Paul made the point that this could be many activities over several months being undertaken by many people. The numbers get large when a learning workflow is scaled up to ensure learning transfer.
To ‘deliver’ these activities and monitor if they are getting done, a digital system is essential. A platform that gives real time visibility of progress along the learning workflow which has been designed to achieve the desired behaviour change.
People call these systems by different names like ‘learning transfer platform’. We also call it a ‘learning workflow platform’. And this type of functionality is also present in some ePortfolio systems.
Managers make or break learning
Another key insight from Paul was the role of line managers. “You can almost predict whether someone will apply their learning based on the interest their manager shows before and after training.”
Engaged managers who have regular conversations about learning goals, expectations and application can dramatically boost learning transfer. That’s why it’s vital to include them in the learning process.
Managers affect the mindset of the learner towards the course, and this learner mindset is a critical success factor.
Rethinking success in L&D
Paul’s final takeaway was a challenge to redefine success. It’s not about how many people completed a course or ticked a compliance box. Success is about people doing their jobs better.
At People Alchemy, we believe in learning that leads to action. That’s why our platform is built to support learning in the flow of work, ensuring that development is embedded, applied, and measured, not just delivered.
Curious how this could work in your organisation?
Explore how our ePortfolio and learning workflow tools can help you shift from delivery to transfer and see the difference in performance.
