Improve the desire to learn with low qualified workers (research + case study)

Last Thursday I organized with VOV and HUB a conference on how to create a learning climate where people are more eager to learn. We had a special focus on some specific target groups like elder employees and low qualified workers.

In this blogpost I will share a best practice and a PhD Study on how to make low qualified employees more eager to learn. The best practice was presented by Peter Tavernier (Colruyt group) and the Study was done by Dr Eva Kyndt (University Leuven and University Antwerp). I will add some of my personal insights on the topic as well.

What are low qualified workers ?
Low qualified workers are people without any higher education. They often quit school at the age of 18 with or without any degree. Since many of these people struggled hard in highschool they are not always very eager to learn. They often developed a low self-esteem, because they were confronted by remarks like "that is too difficult for you", "you will never be able to learn this", ... When I'm working with these groups often they start turning around on their seats after half an hour, because they are simply not used to sit down in a classroom, they want action.

Despite all this, many of these people have enough potential in them to become a good professional, if they receive the right support and if the organization uses the right approach.

After all, organizations have all interest to invest in the development of this group of employees as well so they acquire the necessary technical skills, safety skills and perhaps over time even people management skills.

What does research tell us ?
Low qualified workers often don't have any experiences in discussing their personal strengths. Too often their surroundings always focused on their weaknesses instead of the opposite. Because of this, they have a low self esteem as learners and there is few or no learning intention.

The research of dr Eva Kyndt indicated a number of success factors to improve the learning intentions of this group :

1. the way we look at this group - believe in their potential
2. put learning as fast as possible into action - action oriented learning
3. give people autonomy to shape their professional ambition and their learning and support them on these ambitions
4. open the learning techniques, there is more than classroom trainings. 

The research indicated that positive experiences with learning activities are a good indicator for future willingsness to learn more.

These finding are in line with my own believe (and previous blogpost) on the K5F model that I developed (see below). 

The K5F model says we need more than just knowledge to put learnings into action. The 5F's that help you from knowing to showing are :

1. Focus : don't learn 10 things at a time, go step by step. You can only eat an elephant piece by piece. Low qualified workers learn easier if you give them smaller pieces and go step by step. Don't forget to tell them regularly that they are eating an elephant, so they keep the big picture in mind and know what's still to come.
2. Faith : help people to grow their faith. "oh no, that is too difficult for me" shouldn't be an excuse. Help people to grow in their stretch zone by giving them the necessary faith.
3. Fire : once people have enough fait, the fire to keep on using these new skills are present and you can start with a new focus to grow.
4. Feedback from a coach is important during the learning process to make sure you do the right things right.
5. Fun - make sure people injoy the learning moment. We all remember how easy it was to learn things we enjoyed and how hard it was when we were not interested or willing to learn a new skill.

Case Colruyt distribution center 
The Colruyt distribution center employs a large group of blue collar workers, often low qualified workers. Colruyt group developed a solid program to train and develop this group.

The Colruyt vision on people development :
They start from a strong believe where they believe in the potential of each and every individual who enters the organization. Everybody has certain qualities (perhaps not discovered yet). Next they make sure everybody is supported by a teamleader / manager / coach with whom they frequently meet to discuss their professional development.  They create a strong feeling of coherence between all employees (although there are a lot of ethnic differences on the same work floor. These are only the 2 first blocks in a value system of 10 blocks in total that are all focused on delivery to the customer.

Strong values
Colruyt defined 4 values for their learning culture :

1. Miztakes ar alawed (mistakes are allowed) - they are considered learning opportunities
2. We start from strenghts not from weaknesses
3. We don't put people under pressure all the time
4. We look together what's important for me

From new employee to strong professional worker
Since communication is important to succeed with this program and there are many different nationalities in the organization, Colruyts demands everybody has at least a minimum skill of Dutch or French.
Everybody starts in the same job (warehouse worker), and once you can do this job well, people can apply to learn a new side-task (handling on computer, procedure, safety handlings, ...). Based on the willingness to acquire new side-tasks they can keep on moving up in the organization.

It is clear they put the responsability to learn new skills with the employee. Through this approach, they encourage peoples will to learn, instead of having to learn. (Inside out learning instead of outside in learning)

Development interview
All employees have an annual meeting with their teamleader to further develop their professional skills. Colruyt developed a easy to use document that helps employees to discuss their personal development and ambition.
The doccument contains the following topics :

1. people at work or outside work say I have great qualities in the following domain :
2. Concerning my job :
1. where can I use these qualities ?
2. What tasks make me feel less comfortable ?
3. What can I do to be less comfortable ?
3. Concerning my future
1. How do I see my personal development ?
2. What can I learn to make this happen ?
4. Development plan : putting things into action

The greatest asset of this document is that they open the discussion between employee and his manager and make sure personal ambitions are taken into account. 

To conclude :

Colruyt defined 6 succes factors for developing low qualified employees and turning them into strong professionals :

1. Believe in the potential of all employees
2. Be clear in your goals
3. Create opportunities for professional growth
4. Put the focus on training on the job
5. Support these workers through good team-leaders
6. Create moments to discuss personal "maintenance"

What can we learn from this