A learning culture at work should reflect the values important for you and your business. Providing your employees with opportunities to develop new skills supports your business and enhances your competitive advantage. A significant reason for investing in the development of your employees is to make your company better, the skills and knowledge of your employees will support your business success.

Learning can happen in a variety of ways. It can be informal as well as classes and courses. There are lots of different ways to incorporate learning into daily working life to achieve a positive impact on staff wellbeing and your business.

Ideas for creating a learning culture at work:

• Lead by example – explore your own growth and learning opportunities and share these with your team
• Mentoring – having a mentor at work can help develop professional skills and navigate challenges
• Create time to learn – provide and value the time for someone to learn a new skill
• Give regular feedback – positive and critical feedback delivered well can give the recipient confidence to learn and grow
• Self education – providing the time to devote to reading professional newsletters and publications, printed materials and on-line learning platforms
• Formal learning – access to webinars, courses, events and conferences
• Informal learning – sharing resources and learning at team meeting and events, accessing help, enabling problem solving meetings and work shadowing opportunities
• Knowledge base – creating resources in one place which are accessible to which everyone can contribute
• Not everybody learns in the same way, around 10% of the UK population is neurodivergent, so you may need to take a variety of different approaches 

Allowing time for learning and investing in learning opportunities, whether they are formal or informal will not only benefit the mental health of your team, but also the quality of their work and productivity.

Learning and development opportunities in the workplace builds the employee’s confidence because they have a stronger understanding of the industry and the responsibilities of their job. This confidence will enable them to perform even better and think of new ideas that help them, and the business excel.

A learning culture is a particularly important element of sustainable success in business because it positively impacts on: 

• Employee health
• Strategy
• Innovation, resilience and flexibility
• Staff loyalty
• Employee engagement and sense of purpose
• Employee retention and recruitment
• Succession planning
• Customer service
• Addresses weak spots

When mastering new skills and gaining knowledge, members of your team will develop new interests in the business. This helps them set new goals, both professionally and personally.

At Wiltshire Council we are here to help you and your employees to develop a healthy workplace. Our team can provide support, answer your queries and signpost you to the latest information and guidance.

If you would like to make your workplace a healthier place to work, find out more or meet with us, please contact:

Call: 0300 0034566

[email protected]