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Our guest today is Jason Windgard who's
00:00:04
the chief learning officer of Goldman
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Sachs. And Jason was earlier the vice
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dean of executive education here at
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Wharton. Jason, great to have you back
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at Wharton. Great to be here, Micole.
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Thank you for asking me. Well, uh I I
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wonder if we could start talking about
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some of the challenges that you may have
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encountered both at Goldman Sachs and at
00:00:25
Wharton Execed. that is what are some of
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the challenges that companies face in
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managing managers of different
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generations? Sure, it's a great
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question. There are, as you know,
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several generations or as organizations
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continue to expand and grow and evolve
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and become more multinational. There are
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lots of different populations of
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employees and managers within that
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organization. And so as such it becomes
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very difficult sometimes to have those
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different generations work together.
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Their values are often different. Their
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background, their experiences, their
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education is different from one another.
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So when you bring them together and ask
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them to produce work results often we
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have to think through what those
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differences are and help to educate them
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on how they can overcome those
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differences to be as effective as
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possible. Right? And so one hears a lot
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that has been said and written
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especially about the millennials. Now
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how do you define the millennials and
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what are some of the unique challenges
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in dealing with this generation?
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Millennials in general are character
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characterized as generation Y. Uh I
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think about them from a corporate work
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perspective as being of age around 18 to
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25 26. So they're the youngest probably
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most junior population in any corporate
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organization. Uh what's unique about
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them is that their parents uh who are
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the baby boomers have raised them in a
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very unique way. They have given them in
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general I'm speaking in generalities
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here but in general they have given them
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um background uh experiences support
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unlike any other generation in history.
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They have been helicopter parents to
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this generation and so they've been very
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sheltered, very entitled some may say.
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As a result, they come to work uh very
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well experienced. Their base of uh
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relationships and things that they've
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done has been really expansive. The
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problem is for some corporate leaders
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and managers is that they do feel like
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they're a little bit more entitled.
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Although they're willing to work hard,
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they also want to have access. for
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example, to strategy. They want to spend
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time in the war room of an organization
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to understand how their role, as small
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as it may be, funnels into the larger
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organizational strategy. They want to
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know a little bit more about how the
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culture is going to benefit them beyond
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just ping pong tables and beanag chairs
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and free food. They want to understand
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that coming to work is actually a great
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place to be. They want to be able to
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tout it as an effective, fun, engaging
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environment. And so that accessibility,
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that culture is very important to them.
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Also, they want to make sure that it's
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the the career orientation element is
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really important to them. They don't
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want to take a job and think about it as
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being a lifetime of employment and that
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they're going to follow through the
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ranks and go from step to step. They
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actually want to think about their time
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in this job as being able to build
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transferable skills. How can I take this
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first job of mine or this second job of
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mine and build a set of transferable
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skills that will be with me for the rest
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of my career that I'll be able to
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utilize uh to benefit me and to benefit
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the kind of work that I can use to be
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productive members of the of corporate
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society. So they want to know what those
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transferable skills are. Again, they
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want to be able to be exposed to
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clients. They want to be able to be
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exposed to strategy. They want to make
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sure that the communication that they're
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getting about the nature of the business
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is relevant to them. They want the
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culture and the work environment to be
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suitable so that they feel good about
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where they work and that they want to
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stay there and they want to dig in and
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really be a part of it. So what
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implications does this have uh when it
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comes to the millennials work ethic for
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example or their attitudes toward things
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like work life balance.
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The perception often is that millennials
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do not want to work hard. I haven't
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found that in my experience. In fact,
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they want to work very hard. The
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difference is is that they want as I
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said earlier uh to be challenged um by
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understanding the broader strategy and
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the broader organizational goals. Work
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life balance as such is a is a is an
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interesting phenomenon because although
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they're willing to work hard, they also
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want to know that they have some
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predictability and when they aren't
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working. They want to have some
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predictability and flexibility in being
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able to spend time with their family,
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with their friends, focused on their
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health or focused on other parts and
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aspects of their lives which will h help
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to make them a little bit more balanced.
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So contrary to prior generations at this
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age and at this stage in their the
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junior part of their careers where they
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may have been more willing to invest a
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higher percentage of their work time and
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their lifetime to work. This generation
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wants to have more of a balanced
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experience earlier in their careers. Now
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remember we said the generation Y the
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millennials are a product of the baby
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boomers. So they have seen their parents
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and their parents' friends work really
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hard in the 80s and they sacrificed a
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lot of time with family. They sacrificed
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a lot of time with their health. They
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sacrificed a lot of time with uh uh
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members of their friends and other
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constituents in order to spend time
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climbing the corporate ladder at work.
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So they saw that that led in some cases
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to divorce or in some cases to chronic
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illness. And this generation, the
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millennials, do not want to do that.
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They do not want to experience that
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themselves. So although they've learned
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how to work hard, they've seen that in
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action, they know what it takes to be
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successful. And of course, they want to
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be successful, they are definitely
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engaged uh and motivated to be
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successful. They also want to see that a
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corporation has the flexibility to give
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them a little bit of balance so that
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they can change their lives to be much
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more balanced than they saw their their
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parents and their and that generation
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experience. Right? So now going if we
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were to loop this back to the idea that
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we started with of uh you know how you
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manage uh millennials along with older
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generations uh such as the baby boomers.
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uh what sort of implications does this
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have for the kind of leadership programs
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that you see companies putting into
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place uh and and and what are some of
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the issues that come up uh that need to
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be resolved? That's interesting. Nicole,
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in addition to the millennials, another
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population which cuts across generations
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as well, but from a leadership
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development standpoint that we see and
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we work with exclusively is the producer
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manager. So the producer manager is a
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definition of u an employee who has
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risen through the ranks. They were an
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individual contributor. They worked at
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the lowest levels of the organization
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and they accelerated through the
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organization by doing their jobs and
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their tasks as individual contributors
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really well. As they did that work and
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as they progressed through the
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organization they became managers. Not
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necessarily because they are good
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managers but because as individual
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contributors they produced a really good
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work product. As they become managers,
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it becomes the responsibility of the
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organization. And this is what we do at
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Goldman Sachs as well. Uh as they become
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managers, it's incumbent upon us to
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teach them how to be good managers. How
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do you motivate employees? How do you
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create followership so that they are
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willing to follow you? How do you
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communicate what the strategy is so that
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there's expectations that are known and
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understood by the people who are
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following you? How do you make sure that
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you are setting a culture where people
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are having fun? As we said earlier, for
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the millennial generation, how are you
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making sure that your population of
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workers is diverse? How are you making
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sure that you are evaluating all of the
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people in the organization objectively
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and not just subjectively? These are
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skills and attributes that managers
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don't necessarily have by working their
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way up through the organization as
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producers, as commercial killers, if you
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will. And so what we need to do as
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learning and development professionals
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is to take these highly charged, highly
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impactful, largely producers in their
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career and show them the benefits of
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being a good manager, how to be
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effective effective in such a role and
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how to develop each of those skills and
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attributes so that they can lead people
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and cascade the good work that they're
00:08:42
able to do to others. Now part of being
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a good manager uh regardless of the
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level that you are at within an
00:08:49
organization uh is the ability to uh
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create effective teams and as business
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becomes more and more global uh we find
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that very often teams have to work
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across multiple geographies multiple
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time zones etc. Now, what what's some of
00:09:06
the current thinking on how you navigate
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some of the cultural differences that
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arise when when you're not not just uh
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trying to uh uh uh get strong
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performance from intergenerational teams
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but even teams that are diversified by
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geography and time zone? It's a great
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question as well. Many organizations,
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Goldman Sachs included, are faced now
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with because of growth, because of
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global expansion, having offices, having
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partners, having clients located all
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over the world. As those groups of
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professionals interact, there are a
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series of challenges whether it's time
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zone and you know, what time do you turn
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on the video conference? How can you be
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sensitive to those in Asia or those in
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New York? you know, how can you be
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sensitive to the different cultural
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styles and how you deal with uh topics
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such as gender? In some cultures, uh
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women are treated differently around the
00:10:04
boardroom or in professional executive
00:10:06
situations than in other places, how do
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you manage that? How do people of color
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in various regions uh how are they going
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to be treated, you know, in this global
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uh intergeeographical context? So as
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companies become more global and they
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are forced to deal with clients,
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employees, partners working more closely
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together and having to navigate all of
00:10:30
those cultural differences. One of the
00:10:32
key aspects of leadership development
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that becomes necessary to the
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performance and the strategy of an
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organization is making sure that the
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sensitivity is there. often people have
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no trouble working across geographic
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contexts, but it's not until they
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understand what the differences are and
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how their behavior may be perceived and
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how their actions may be received. And
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so we spend a lot of time coaching
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different leaders and organizations and
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bringing people together to to generate
00:11:00
that kind of cultural awareness and
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sensitivity. That's really interesting.
00:11:04
And now now this brings me to another
00:11:06
point that I've been meaning to ask you
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about. Uh one of the words terms that I
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have often seen bandied about quite a
00:11:13
bit is thought leadership. Uh what
00:11:17
exactly is thought leadership and how do
00:11:20
you nurture that within a company? Any
00:11:23
examples? Sure. Thought leadership
00:11:26
define is new insights, new ideas about
00:11:30
a given topic that can be shared with a
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wide range of people so that those
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insights and ideas can be applied to
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whatever their um desired need is,
00:11:39
whatever their line of work is. Thought
00:11:42
leadership in organizations can take on
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a variety of forms. In its simplest and
00:11:47
most basic form, it can be articles,
00:11:49
white papers, books, blogs, things that
00:11:54
leaders write about to share ideas with
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other people in that organization. Now,
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that can be senior leaders in the
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organization, board members, division
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heads, uh, directors, vice presidents,
00:12:06
etc. who have insights and ideas that
00:12:08
they can share broadly within the
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organization. That could also include
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external thought leaders such as
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government leaders or sports coaches or
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leaders or any of a number of people in
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the world who have leadership positions
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and who have new insights on what makes
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them successful and productive in those
00:12:28
roles and how that might be broadly
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applied to other industries to other
00:12:32
roles to other lines of work. So an
00:12:34
example is many organizations um
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particularly in the United States take
00:12:39
some of these leaders they bring them
00:12:40
onto the corporate campus and they
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expose their workers to them. So, if you
00:12:45
are a World Series baseball general
00:12:48
manager, you may have thought about five
00:12:50
reasons why you were able to lead the
00:12:52
team to victory. And they may include A,
00:12:55
B, C, and D. And you talk about what
00:12:58
those are, how you implemented those
00:13:00
leadership lessons with the
00:13:01
organization, and how they may be
00:13:03
applicable to that specific business.
00:13:05
You may have a prime minister of a given
00:13:08
country or a given government talking
00:13:10
about a crisis that they've gone through
00:13:12
from a leadership perspective and how
00:13:14
they went through and navigated that
00:13:16
crisis and came out victorious. How were
00:13:19
the lessons that were learned in that
00:13:21
exchange through that process through
00:13:23
that experience applicable to this
00:13:25
organization? And so the process of
00:13:28
sharing those ideas and having a dynamic
00:13:33
dialogue between the people who are
00:13:34
working in that organization creates an
00:13:37
atmosphere where you're really learning
00:13:38
about new themes about new experiences
00:13:41
and the takeaways become really relevant
00:13:44
to the person at the lowest level as
00:13:46
well as the highest level. So thought
00:13:47
leadership can come in all of those
00:13:48
different forms from writing from
00:13:51
interactive dialogues and interviews
00:13:53
such as this or it can come in the form
00:13:56
of much more intimate one-on-one
00:13:58
discussions with men through mentorship
00:14:00
um or through uh you know more intimate
00:14:03
Q&A exchange with outside leaders as
00:14:05
well. Got it. Well, one of the biggest
00:14:08
drivers of change in organizations these
00:14:10
days uh is technology. uh what impact
00:14:15
has technology had on the way in which
00:14:18
companies uh approach corporate
00:14:20
learning?
00:14:22
Corporate learning traditionally has
00:14:24
been much more of a push approach, push
00:14:27
in quotes. The learning is developed,
00:14:29
the curriculum is designed and it's
00:14:31
pushed out to the employees in a variety
00:14:34
of different modalities. Those
00:14:36
modalities may include the most basic
00:14:38
which is classroom, but they also may
00:14:40
include executive education at a
00:14:41
business school like Wharton. It may
00:14:43
include experiential learning where you
00:14:45
take people off site and you do team
00:14:47
building and other leadership
00:14:48
activities. It may also include
00:14:50
executive coaching which used to be just
00:14:52
for people who had some kind of a need a
00:14:55
negative need for developing themselves
00:14:57
to be more productive in the
00:14:58
organization. But now that is becoming
00:15:00
much more proactive as well. So even
00:15:03
strong high performing leaders are
00:15:04
getting executive coaching so that they
00:15:06
can again cascade the good work that
00:15:08
they're doing to their peers and to
00:15:10
others. So you have all these forms of
00:15:12
traditional learning that corporations
00:15:14
have been engaged in and some more than
00:15:17
others have been delivering uh for
00:15:19
decades. The other side of that what
00:15:22
e-learning does to your question is it
00:15:24
creates much more of a pull operation.
00:15:27
So now whether it's the millennials,
00:15:29
whether it's the producer managers that
00:15:30
we spoke of earlier, whoever the
00:15:32
audience is in an organization, if they
00:15:34
have a particular need to help them
00:15:37
engage in their work and to be more
00:15:40
productive in real time just in time,
00:15:42
e-learning presents that opportunity. So
00:15:45
now all of a sudden you have a platform.
00:15:48
You have a mechanism for gaining access
00:15:52
to content when you want it as opposed
00:15:54
to what someone else has deemed is
00:15:56
necessary for you and delivering it to
00:15:58
you in a way that may not be uh
00:16:00
correlated with the way you learn best.
00:16:02
It's that's interesting Jason because uh
00:16:05
one of the things that we've seen in
00:16:06
academia is that there's also a pull
00:16:09
mechanism here. uh there's there's been
00:16:11
so much written about these massive open
00:16:14
online courses or MUOKs as they are
00:16:16
called uh and and and these are having
00:16:18
profound u implications uh for business
00:16:22
schools and other kinds of educational
00:16:24
institutions. Uh I wonder if you see any
00:16:26
of those kinds of trends in corporate
00:16:29
learning and if so what are some of the
00:16:32
key lessons so far? Yeah, MukOs is a
00:16:35
wonderful phenomenon that as you said
00:16:38
has emerged first from the university,
00:16:40
the academic environment where you're
00:16:42
able to take the best academic research
00:16:44
and teaching and broadcast it to tens
00:16:47
and thousands of people around the
00:16:49
world. So, it's making it more
00:16:50
accessible. What we see as a trend now
00:16:53
in the corporate space is that these
00:16:55
these muks are becoming packaged and
00:16:57
closed more for a corporate experience.
00:17:00
So the corporate mukes is a new
00:17:01
phenomenon that many of these MOO
00:17:03
providers uh are developing. We at
00:17:06
Goldman Sachs actually have launched
00:17:08
several corporate MOOs ourselves and
00:17:10
part of the benefit is is that for
00:17:12
people who don't know what a MOO is, it
00:17:14
actually is an e-learning experience
00:17:16
that combines video, it combines
00:17:18
assessment, it combines uh data
00:17:21
knowledge management materials that you
00:17:23
can read. Uh it also includes um social
00:17:26
media so you can talk to the professor,
00:17:28
you can talk to the people in the
00:17:30
classroom. It uses lots of different
00:17:32
elements that actually are intended to
00:17:34
mimic a real social classroom
00:17:37
experience. And so the benefits that
00:17:39
we're seeing is again as a pull
00:17:41
opportunity, people are able to use this
00:17:44
learning at the time that they want to
00:17:46
use it. Um they're also able to do it on
00:17:49
their own time. So a lot of traditional
00:17:51
corporate training happens during the
00:17:52
workday. It takes people away from the
00:17:54
desk, away from the office, and it may
00:17:56
in some cases sacrifice time from doing
00:17:58
the real work of the job. With
00:18:00
e-learning and with MOUS in particular,
00:18:02
you can take those courses whenever you
00:18:04
want. You can start them. You can pause.
00:18:06
You can take it again later. You can do
00:18:08
that on your own time. You can do it
00:18:10
during your commute, on your way home.
00:18:12
So, it makes it really accessible in a
00:18:13
way that people can actually use it in a
00:18:15
way that's not detracting from their
00:18:16
day-to-day experience. Number one.
00:18:18
Number two, it also caters to a
00:18:21
different learning style for a
00:18:22
generation that prefers to be able to
00:18:25
have a flexible learning experience. So,
00:18:27
a millennial who is taking the train um
00:18:30
from Chicago to their office is able to
00:18:32
open up an app. The MOO is there. They
00:18:34
can watch the video during their train
00:18:36
ride in. They can take an assessment
00:18:38
test or a quiz to find out whether they
00:18:40
know the learning um that's intended or
00:18:43
not. They can take an evaluation test at
00:18:45
the end. They can read supplemental
00:18:47
articles. They can look at a
00:18:48
presentation from various faculty
00:18:49
members all over the world and that's
00:18:51
the way that they want to learn and then
00:18:53
they can communicate with other people
00:18:55
who are taking the course to find out
00:18:56
what themes they learned or ask
00:18:58
questions of them or of the faculty
00:18:59
members. And so that dynamic set of
00:19:02
choices uh and variability in the
00:19:04
learning experience is what many people
00:19:07
in the younger generations really want.
00:19:09
But even in the older populations of
00:19:11
learners, they're finding it to be much
00:19:12
more convenient because they can pick
00:19:14
the topic that they want at that time
00:19:17
for the given challenge that they're
00:19:18
experiencing right then, as opposed to
00:19:20
saying, "I'm going to take three months
00:19:22
from now a leadership development course
00:19:24
on negotiations." And maybe I'm not
00:19:26
dealing with negotiation problems or
00:19:28
issues in my job right now. Maybe what I
00:19:30
really need help with are the legal
00:19:32
implications of managing women, and I
00:19:36
need help with doing that. and I want to
00:19:39
be able to take a course and there's a
00:19:40
moot course there that will help me to
00:19:42
be more sensitive to understand my
00:19:44
challenges, my behaviors, my biases. I
00:19:46
want to take that right now. And so the
00:19:49
MOOs are a really good vehicle for
00:19:50
helping them to be able to do that right
00:19:52
away. As you get more involved in these
00:19:57
technologydriven learning
00:20:00
initiatives, what have you concluded
00:20:03
about the limits of technology? Uh in
00:20:07
the sense what what do you think
00:20:09
technology can do really well and what
00:20:12
does it fail to do?
00:20:14
For large organizations in
00:20:16
particular, what technology allows them
00:20:20
to do from a learning standpoint is to
00:20:22
really take the curriculum and the
00:20:24
content to scale. So when you have a
00:20:27
small
00:20:27
organization, you can take 30 people,
00:20:30
put them in a room, spend a day, and you
00:20:33
can really have a dynamic and impactful
00:20:36
session where you're sharing ideas and
00:20:38
you're relaying content is really useful
00:20:40
and necessary for a given moment in time
00:20:42
for that group. as the organization
00:20:44
grows and you want to take that content
00:20:46
and distribute it to more and more
00:20:48
people where the company may have had 25
00:20:52
vice presidents but then maybe 10 years
00:20:54
later they may have 15,000 vice
00:20:57
presidents and when you have 15,000 vice
00:20:59
presidents and you have a checklist of
00:21:01
curriculum and competencies that you
00:21:03
want them all to know about then all of
00:21:04
a sudden it does not become feasible to
00:21:06
take all of those people put them in a
00:21:08
room and have group think and group uh
00:21:11
education. So technology for the most
00:21:13
part allows people to have scalability
00:21:16
in distributing learning content. But
00:21:19
secondly, as we just talked about, it
00:21:21
also provides an opportunity for just in
00:21:24
time learning that is becoming more and
00:21:26
more necessary for people who are
00:21:28
working in dynamic work situations where
00:21:31
issues come up where they don't have the
00:21:33
learning, they don't have the knowledge.
00:21:35
They need to be trained on it
00:21:37
immediately. and e-learning allows them
00:21:40
to be able to go out into that world to
00:21:42
select what they need and to take it
00:21:44
when and how they need to do it. So for
00:21:46
those two reasons, scalability and for
00:21:49
accessibility just in time, e-learning
00:21:52
provides a much better opportunity. Are
00:21:55
you seeing much use of gamification and
00:21:58
social media initiatives?
00:22:00
Gamification is a phenomenon that is
00:22:03
really growing rapidly in the corporate
00:22:05
learning landscape.
00:22:07
Uh most people know and have seen games
00:22:11
being used by young kids who are playing
00:22:14
in uh really live looking 3D worlds just
00:22:18
for fun. What corporate trainers and
00:22:21
designers have been able to do is to
00:22:24
create these immersive learning
00:22:25
experiences for corporate settings. So
00:22:27
one example uh is when you create
00:22:30
avatars of real people in organizations
00:22:34
and you model the world the office
00:22:36
environment and you create these avatars
00:22:38
and you have them navigate the real
00:22:40
world experience uh in such a way that
00:22:42
you can teach people what it's like to
00:22:46
provide leadership to communicate
00:22:48
strategy to create followership as we
00:22:51
said earlier to do many of the things
00:22:53
that we would teach in a traditional
00:22:54
classroom setting. you can watch it
00:22:57
happen in this immersive learning world.
00:23:00
And so people have the opportunity to
00:23:01
see a real world character with the same
00:23:04
kind of content with actually supporting
00:23:07
nuggets such as video clips or little
00:23:10
bubbles that may come up above a
00:23:12
person's head with supplemental content.
00:23:15
And so it's a real opportunity for
00:23:16
people to be entertained, but actually
00:23:18
to still have real hard-hitting content
00:23:22
being applied in just a much more uh a
00:23:25
much different environment. And so for
00:23:27
some people it's it mirrors having a
00:23:30
classroom session where you do a live
00:23:32
case. So, you may have a session where
00:23:34
I'm teaching a class about um
00:23:38
intercultural communication and
00:23:40
leadership and I give you a PowerPoint
00:23:42
presentation with all of the key themes.
00:23:44
And then I say, "Now, we're going to do
00:23:46
a role play where we're going to act out
00:23:48
these themes and we're going to show you
00:23:49
how this works in real life." And so
00:23:51
then I'll ask for two volunteers. I'll
00:23:52
have them sit on the stage. I'll give
00:23:54
them both a script and we'll kind of
00:23:55
play it out. Right? In gamification, it
00:23:58
allows you to do that through the whole
00:24:00
sequence. So you can actually you can
00:24:02
actually present what the themes are but
00:24:04
then they are actually being modeled and
00:24:06
acted out in really we um real world
00:24:09
looking uh entertaining experiences. So
00:24:12
lots of organizations particularly as
00:24:14
they are trying to entice millennials to
00:24:18
stay in the organization to think that
00:24:20
it is a fun culture to learn in a way
00:24:23
that meets their needs are using MOOs
00:24:25
are using gamification are using other
00:24:27
forms of social media to make sure that
00:24:29
those experiences are coming to the
00:24:31
millennials in a way that they want and
00:24:33
actually the other older populations in
00:24:35
the organization are really warming to
00:24:38
these new ways of learning as well.
00:24:40
Right. Uh I wonder if we could end with
00:24:42
a couple of uh sort of real broad brush
00:24:45
questions. Uh there's a lot uh that uh
00:24:48
has been written about the so-called war
00:24:52
for talent. Um what are some of the new
00:24:56
strategies and tactics that you see uh
00:25:00
uh in this war?
00:25:02
Well, we talked about a few of the
00:25:04
tactics that corporations are using. The
00:25:05
war for talent really is a real
00:25:08
phenomenon now. We've talked a lot about
00:25:10
millennials. We've talked a lot about
00:25:12
the global marketplace opening up. So,
00:25:14
for the first time in the last 5 years,
00:25:16
there are a lot more job opportunities
00:25:18
available to employees, you know, in
00:25:21
their region, in their industry, but
00:25:22
outside of their industry, and people
00:25:24
are leaving the industries that they've
00:25:25
worked in and grown up in at much more
00:25:27
rapid pace than they have in the past.
00:25:29
So when you have the millennials as one
00:25:31
population, but you also have the global
00:25:33
marketplace opening up, all of a sudden
00:25:36
companies are finding that it's really
00:25:37
challenging to keep their people uh in
00:25:40
their organizations and to go out and
00:25:42
get new replacements for those. So that
00:25:45
war is really escalating. Uh one of the
00:25:48
things that we're seeing is that what
00:25:50
are the strategies that companies can do
00:25:51
to recruit the talent? Well, you have to
00:25:54
be able to go out and give a message of
00:25:56
the value proposition for why working at
00:25:58
that organization is so important. Now,
00:26:00
obviously, you have to be able to do
00:26:02
those things in the organization. You
00:26:04
have to have a set culture that is
00:26:06
attractive. You have to have leadership
00:26:08
that is really strong and dynamic and
00:26:10
has created that sense of followership
00:26:11
that we talked about earlier. You have
00:26:13
to have an environment where people are
00:26:15
saying this is a great place to work.
00:26:17
This is a place where we win. This is a
00:26:19
place where we are productive. this is a
00:26:20
place that nourishes and nurtures me to
00:26:23
be the best that I can be. That message
00:26:25
gets out and becomes broadly
00:26:27
communicated um as rumor as real and
00:26:30
also you can do it with your recruiting
00:26:32
function to be able to codify what those
00:26:35
themes are so that people really do want
00:26:37
to come and work. The other side though
00:26:38
is retention. And so once you do get the
00:26:41
best people, you go to the best schools
00:26:42
and the best organizations, you attract
00:26:44
the best talent and now you have them.
00:26:46
What kinds of things are you doing in
00:26:48
your organization to make sure that they
00:26:50
want to stay? And it leads back to all
00:26:51
the things we talked about before. U but
00:26:54
organizations have to spend a lot more
00:26:56
time on that than they did in the past.
00:26:58
When we were in markets where jobs were
00:27:00
hard to get, companies could focus much
00:27:02
more specifically on the bottom line and
00:27:04
on the attributes that allowed them to
00:27:05
be successful in the marketplace. Now,
00:27:07
when we're in this talent war uh
00:27:10
environment, companies have to spend
00:27:11
much more time on their human capital.
00:27:14
Let's stay close to our people. Let's
00:27:15
make sure we understand what they want.
00:27:17
Let's make sure that we are providing at
00:27:19
least some of what they want. Let's make
00:27:21
sure that we are monitoring and
00:27:23
evaluating how well we are doing against
00:27:25
those needs. And companies haven't had
00:27:27
to do that much in the past at all,
00:27:30
particularly large companies because uh
00:27:32
people would always have the talent that
00:27:34
was coming in. You could go if you were
00:27:36
Goldman Sachs even, you could go to a
00:27:38
top business school and you know you'd
00:27:40
be able to attract the best talent based
00:27:42
on the work performance that Goldman
00:27:43
Sachs has had for years and the
00:27:46
reputation for excellence and people
00:27:48
would come and they would think about
00:27:49
wanting to stay in that job for a long
00:27:51
time over their career. Now, because of
00:27:54
the millennial orientation and because
00:27:56
of other factors of other opportunities
00:27:58
available to them around the world,
00:28:00
we're seeing that they may want to come
00:28:02
for a little while, but they're much
00:28:03
more inclined to want to go and work
00:28:05
somewhere else and try other things at
00:28:07
small companies. Uh, for example, small
00:28:09
technology companies, small hedge funds.
00:28:12
And so we have spent a lot of time
00:28:14
thinking about that dilemma and creating
00:28:17
a culture where people actually do want
00:28:19
to come where they actually do want to
00:28:21
stay where actually do uh develop
00:28:23
transferable skills that allow them to
00:28:26
think about their career in a much
00:28:27
longer way at the firm and so a lot of
00:28:30
companies are having to think about
00:28:32
their talent in just that way as this
00:28:33
war heats up. Right. Well, let's let's
00:28:36
uh tackle one last question which I know
00:28:39
you've thought a lot about.
00:28:41
Uh what is the relationship between
00:28:44
corporate learning and corporate
00:28:47
strategy and is there any evidence that
00:28:51
uh companies that are able to integrate
00:28:55
the two can uh see better performance?
00:28:59
Yeah, that's a that's a great question.
00:29:02
Uh
00:29:04
historically companies have developed
00:29:07
corporate strategies. Well, I should say
00:29:09
the companies that have been most
00:29:10
successful in business and in the
00:29:14
markets in whatever area they produce
00:29:16
products or services have been the most
00:29:18
successful when they've been able to
00:29:19
develop a very strong corporate
00:29:23
strategy. It wasn't necessarily true
00:29:26
that corporate training, learning and
00:29:29
development, leadership development
00:29:30
needed to be aligned with that corporate
00:29:32
strategy in order for them to be
00:29:34
successful. The global sense of business
00:29:37
boundaries wasn't as dynamic as it is
00:29:39
now. The speed of product to market
00:29:42
wasn't happening as quickly as it is
00:29:44
now. Those two forces alone have created
00:29:47
an environment where organizations now
00:29:49
are facing competition in such a myriad
00:29:52
of ways that they need to now make sure
00:29:55
that not only do we need to have a
00:29:56
really strong rockolid corporate
00:29:59
strategy, but we need to make sure that
00:30:00
our people can implement that strategy
00:30:02
as quickly as we can develop it. and as
00:30:05
efficiently and better than anybody
00:30:07
else. How can we get our people to be
00:30:09
prepared to develop the strategy we're
00:30:11
developing in a much faster, much more
00:30:14
creative way? Well, that's where
00:30:15
corporate training comes in. And that's
00:30:17
where jobs like mine are so critical to
00:30:20
an organization because you have to
00:30:21
think about not only the traditional
00:30:23
forms of of corporate training and not
00:30:25
only the e-learning forms but even other
00:30:28
more creative ways to stay linked very
00:30:30
tightly and and in real time with what
00:30:33
are the leaders of the organization
00:30:35
developing in the in the form of
00:30:37
strategy? How are we going to develop
00:30:39
new services, new products? What are the
00:30:42
barriers that we're facing? How are we
00:30:44
going to resist pressure? Whatever the
00:30:46
corporate strategy variables are, the
00:30:48
learning function needs to be at the
00:30:50
seat of the table at the same time to
00:30:52
think about and be asking the questions
00:30:54
concurrently. How can we make sure that
00:30:56
our people will be able to do and
00:30:58
implement whatever it is that we're
00:31:00
thinking about trying to do as fast as
00:31:02
possible? How can we get them ready? How
00:31:04
can we get the people aligned with the
00:31:06
right roles? And once they are aligned
00:31:08
with the right roles, how can we develop
00:31:10
them quickly so that they can implement
00:31:12
those challenges? How can we also be
00:31:14
creating a pool of successors so that
00:31:16
once the former population has cycled
00:31:20
out, we have a new population of new
00:31:22
leaders that are prepared to do the same
00:31:24
work. If we don't have in organizations,
00:31:27
particularly large organizations, global
00:31:29
multinational organizations, a seamless
00:31:32
connection between the people and the
00:31:34
leadership development and the
00:31:36
professional development and the
00:31:37
strategy, then what you're going to be
00:31:39
faced with is a really dynamic and good
00:31:41
strategy that the people can't function
00:31:44
with and they can't implement. And so
00:31:46
we're seeing lots of examples of that
00:31:47
now. Historically, you have seen
00:31:49
organizations like GE where they've
00:31:51
developed their own corporate university
00:31:53
and Croinville and they've actually made
00:31:55
a very strong and public point of
00:31:58
creating strategy and creating people
00:31:59
development learning together and making
00:32:02
sure that time was taken to do that. But
00:32:04
now you see a lot of other organizations
00:32:05
doing that as well and Goldman Sachs is
00:32:07
one that also does that. So we are
00:32:09
constantly in the process of de
00:32:11
developing dynamic strategy, responding
00:32:13
to the market, making sure that we're
00:32:15
providing service and excellence to our
00:32:17
customers and to our clients and working
00:32:19
seamlessly with our partners, but also
00:32:21
making sure that our leaders are getting
00:32:22
the right leadership development um
00:32:25
lessons and interventions, coaching, you
00:32:27
know, and access to content that they
00:32:29
need to be able to be as dynamic in that
00:32:32
exchange as possible. So uh you'll see a
00:32:34
lot of corporate universities you know
00:32:37
following suit on that multinational
00:32:39
organizations that are hiring chief
00:32:42
learning officers where they are
00:32:44
creating forums for corporate strategy
00:32:47
and corporate learning to come together
00:32:50
spending money providing the resources
00:32:52
taking the time because it's already
00:32:54
been proven from a return on investment
00:32:55
standpoint that if you do that then you
00:32:58
will actually be able to implement your
00:32:59
strategy more effectively and you will
00:33:01
get the return you're looking for. If
00:33:02
you do not do that, you actually may
00:33:04
lose. Now, now is a time where you can't
00:33:06
just have the strategy. If you don't
00:33:08
have the learning mapped together, we
00:33:09
are seeing companies that are losing uh
00:33:11
their game, their competitive game.
00:33:14
Jason, thanks so much for speaking with
00:33:15
Knowledge at Wharton. Appreciate it,
00:33:17
Mico. Thank you.
00:33:21
[Music]
