A model to better adapt at speed when in need?

Starting with purpose, applying a relentless focus on people, cultivating enduring capabilities and rewarding an intrinsic motivation to learn are indeed a great candidates to succeed.

Quick intro related to the present state

In light of the developments since the beginning of this year, learning is back on the main stage. And leading companies such as Novartis, the NBA, IBM, Nextdoor, UHG, PVH, Roche, Microsoft and many others deserve kudos for their investments in people and for being the enterprise role-models in their respective industries regarding their willingness to take responsible decisions. More than ever before, it is becoming clear that changing established culture of a company which is in business for decades or more, is exponentially harder than building a company culture of learning right from the start, and therefore being a leader in giving opportunities to employees to grow and evolve is not only absolutely spot on, but might prove vital to a company's survival. A recent post by Josh Bersin an following series gives good insights to those who want to adapt some of the same practices these role models do.

Personally, this extraordinary but not unprecedented time is outfitting us with the chance to reflect, recalibrate, and make decisions about our future, to move forward strengthened. It is also the time of opportunities and developing new solutions to address unmet needs, particularly as change is being accelerated at an unseen pace, even in industries and business areas that have been resistant to change thus far, including Healthcare.

I have experienced people of all ages engaging in learning very differently than before the pandemic, advancing their skills & knowledge and thinking in new ways. From homeschooling of young children, to the adoption of online learning by older generations like my own parents - every group seems to tailor their own, personalised, contextual approach to advance. Most already engage on some of the open learning and collaboration platforms such as LinkedIn, Courser and others, consuming curricula and content digitally with fun and curiosity, driven by their willingness to learn and move forward. Those platforms providing highest levels of flexibility and diversity, seem to prevail in adoption. But more to that later.

Another aspect of this crisis seems to be, that the world is proving not to be equal to all, e.g. not all countries are able to adapt these technologies, which might further increase the digital divide across the world. And while 1) those in need of a more structured environment for learning (e.g. children of younger ages) might have been in a more advantageous position in case their parents were able to give them the needed attention while working at home, 2) others might fall behind because of missing infrastructure and capabilities to access information. A WEF article I found interesting and I am truly passionate about what will.i.am spoke about with one of our strategic partners.

At the seventh Life Sciences Leader Forum

Even before we understood the meaning of the term “COVID19”, new technologies like artificial intelligence and cloud brought about by the digital age, have been driving profound changes in people’s personal and professional lives. How companies and workers meet the demands of this profound change, has been a recent topic at DXC Technology’s 7th Life Sciences Leader Forum (LSLF) in Basel, which I had the pleasure to host.

The impact of digital, such as increased focus on value creation through data and insights, the rise of cloud and global platform economies, the digital consumption of services, has begun to radically challenge core business models and the ability to capture value for many traditional companies. Organizations are struggling to cope with the speed of change in this new age – it has never been so clear before that many will fade, and others will flourish. Companies impacted include global corporates, but also smaller, nimble and agile organisations. While rigid, inflexible corporate cultures often prevent rapid adaptation to new circumstances and usually nip new ideas, approaches and innovations in the bud, which means technological trends can hardly develop their full potential on the top or bottom line. 

These new challenges mainly require new, progressive leadership skills and a humble approach on increasing a company’s agility with its strengths in mind. 

Simon Brown, Chief Learning Officer at Novartis, who was joining me for a conversation at the LSLF, sees a key aspect in fostering a corporate learning culture. This is intended to inspire employees into being “curious” and thus better prepare them for future challenges.

Asking the right questions

To establish a learning culture, business leaders need to ask themselves the following questions: Why do we do what we do and what is our purpose? How do we prepare for fundamental change? Which ways of thinking, which sustainable values, skills and practices are crucial? How to build a culture that helps your employees to consciously adapt and build skills for the 21st century? How do you arouse their curiosity for “the New”? How do you empower them to expand on what they are capable of?

“Millennials demand continuous learning – 42 percent will leave the company if they don’t learn enough.” Gartner / CEB 2018 Shifting Skills Survey n = 7,101

Accelerate digital transformation with corporate culture change

At Novartis, addressing these issues has led to an adaptation of its corporate culture. The strategy to improve their digital transformation capacity consists of four key elements: 1. Twelve so-called “digital lighthouse” projects, to be implemented in two to three years, which will have an innovative impact on the entire value chain. 2. Driving digitization forward to improve decision-making with AI and Data Science. 3. Promoting new partnerships in the “Biome” tech ecosystem and quickly scaling innovative solutions from our partners. 4. Taking bolder steps to be ready for disruptive scenarios in healthcare.

One of these Lighthouse projects is the Digital Capability Building initiative. The aim is to enhance the skills of its employees, and thus increase their performance and satisfaction. In order to support the success of the projects, Novartis is aligning its corporate culture to three key points for their people to adopt:

1. #inspired: The ability to be enthusiastic is crucial for the constant motivation to learn new things and helps to bring oneself and one’s ideas into the company.

2. #curious: Be a learner, not a knower! Stimulating the curiosity of your employees increases their willingness to learn and enables them to deal more deeply with problems to be solved, from which innovative solutions emerge.

3. #unboss: Instead of dictating solutions, delegating decision-making competencies to teams increases the sense of responsibility.

“High performers want to learn – 91 percent say it is important to work for an employer that offers learning and development opportunities.” Ceridian 2017

Development of an internal learning platform

In order to take the findings of the studies and surveys into account and adapt the corporate culture accordingly, Novartis established a comprehensive learning platform for its employees to provide learning content that can be consumed in various formats, wherever their employees decide to consume it. Mobile on the go, at home, with their families, at work, etc. They further encourage 100 hours of learning for every employee each year. In addition to establishing basics through language and other courses, they also offer online course content from more than 200 universities, as well as many lectures and podcasts, ranging from STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) courses such as Programming and Data Science to Politics, Economics and Philosophy.

“70 percent of workers do not master the skills needed today.” Gartner / CEB 2018 Shifting Skills Survey n=7,101.

The aim is to unleash the person’s inherent power of curiosity and diverse thinking and to overcome inhibitions and fears of learning. In this way, employees are intellectually challenged on a broader scale and thus further develop and grow. This not only improves performance through a broader knowledge and skills base, but also increases employee satisfaction and therefore, the engagement for the company respectively.

“19% of the current skill set will be irrelevant in three years.” Gartner / CEB Q1 2018 Global Laboratory Market Survey n=21,247

Strategy becomes a g success

An overwhelming acceptance and adoption of these learning opportunities confirms the need and willingness of employees to develop and contribute, which justifies the efforts and costs involved. Although the learning platform offers many different types of content, including non-industry or role-specific content, a majority are choosing to learn and acquire broad skills that enable them to be more resilient and agile in the digital age. Courses that teach programming as well as how to handle bots and automate work steps are particularly popular.

“I believe that the rapid changes in the world associated with the acceleration of globalization and digitalization make learning even more important today than in the past.” Simon Brown, Chief Learning Officer, Novartis

The investment in the education and training of employees certainly pays off, and the learning offer is gladly accepted. By orienting the corporate culture towards continuous learning and curiosity, not only does it increase the productivity and satisfaction of our own employees, it also makes the company more attractive to already well-trained and motivated talent,” says Simon Brown. Thus, an exponentially positive effect can be observed, which of course also has a positive impact on the business result.

During Simon’s session and the subsequent open discussion in the leadership forum, one thing became clear: technological change in the digital age is only one aspect. Sparking change in a profound and sustainable way and impacting the ways in which we live and work, requires putting our people and their most precious values at the center of our change efforts, in order to use the full potential of the present and the future. Evidence has shown that Novartis’ three-point strategy (engagement, curiosity, hierarchy reduction) produces the desired business results and their ability to maneuver.

How do you spark that change and overcome the fears of addressing cultural change with clarity and authenticity within your own company? Making the transition from knowing to learning? Increasing adaptability and mental agility by offering growth opportunities to employees to go beyond? 

That’s the leadership challenge. In the infinite game theory, such as the transformation process in which we find ourselves at present, finite goals have limited impact. (I like this short intro to a concept by Simon Sinek). The goal is to achieve flexibility that allows us to adapt better in times of continuous change and volatility – and some of the best concepts available for enterprises, might indeed be Novartis’ three “hashtag” initiatives, nurturing and expanding on linked enduring capabilities. Microsoft, on the other hand, sums their initiative up with a term they call the “growth mindset”, describing the capabilities in people they have a desire to hire. Other companies will need to find their own way of adopting within.

Thank you, Simon, for joining us and sharing your journey - those were great insights and learnings for us all.

Moving closer together - virtually and in a protected manner

Further to the need of increasing agility and the ability to have your workforce in a networked state as an organization, the actual crisis demonstrates another aspect clearly. The one that societies need to find ways of coming closer together virtually and serving activities such as interacting and transacting remotely way better going forward. Based on what makes us us, our identity and our credentials. 

Never before in the digital age has the world seen such a vital need for digital identities. To ensure remote activities can happen safely, securely in a validated fashion, between the parties that they claim to be, with the credentials they claim to have. May it be imagining the availability of digital identities to issue a certificate for a particular skill online, supporting a transaction in context with a teaching class and certifying a participant’s attendance, consuming e-government or healthcare services from home, or simply marrying and witnessing that marriage by signing digitally, fuels my personal imagination for a massive shift in how services can be consumed and should be consumed, especially in the age of distancing physically beyond your closest ones.

But there are also concerns in regards to what digital identities can do to data privacy, in enabling a fully transparent society that could be mis-used, even fraudulent and for some democracies not fit for purpose when handled centrally and without full control over sharing mechanisms for the identity and credential holder. But today’s concepts don’t keep pace with the needs for more general interoperability requirements across the globe, while still ensuring the protection of personal information.

That opens the door to more decentralized models such as the identity models offered by technologies like decentralized, self-sovereign identities, where there is no central body in control of the data (the credentials) other than the owner of the identity or credential. A deeper technology and business intro to the concept, by Vasily Suvorov, CTO and head of technology strategy at Luxoft. Those technologies could offer a fundamental change to how the mechanics of interacting and transacting work, while significantly reducing the risk of fraudulent activities and other global risks such as not being able to transact during a COVID19-like event.

Some other thoughts on the restart

For some thoughts on beyond the pandemic, here's a Leadership focused article from BCG that suggests to lead with "Head, Heart and Hands", which I truly admire, as it demonstrates how true leadership should be inclusive of the scientific facts, the purpose and responsibility for people and clients and for a clear focus on execution and creating value.

Further a simple graphic I truly liked, that defines the agility needed as being "antifragile". It was created by the Leading Edge Forum (LEF) in 2017 and has utmost relevance to moving beyond the pandemic's initial shock.

More insightful information on activities that might position companies well for the next months can be found here (By LEF) and here (by BCG) and here (by McK).

With that, there’s so much we can take away as lernings and opportunities from this global pandemic and I am positive that we will emerge stronger from it. Driven by an intrinsic motivation to advance, I call on you to keep on being curious & nimble. Keep on experimenting, failing and learning fast, to succeed.

By Daniel Saeuberli, Head Healthcare & LifeSciences at DXC- Views are my own and I am very much looking forward to reading your comments and perspectives.