Elevating Learning

Elevating Learning

There has been a lot written on the topic of building a learning or growth culture.? From Carol Dweck to Tony Schwartz to Bob Kegan, many thought leaders have studied what makes an organizational culture developmental and progressive.??Their views vary to a certain degree, but also have a lot in common.? The most consistent theme across all of them is that growth cultures are deliberate and planful about creating the places and spaces for learning to happen and thrive.? This is what I generally think of as intentionality.? It’s about the act of purposefully elevating the role learning plays in our lives by giving it weight, prioritization, and psychic importance.?

This elevation of learning and the role it plays in our lives leads to a liberation and sense of empowerment that can be quite powerful.? Psychologist Robert Sternberg writes in his book that “expertise is not some fixed prior ability, but purposeful engagement.”? In short, Sternberg illuminates the idea for us that if you work hard and ‘learn hard’ you can achieve great things.? Nothing is fixed; it’s all adaptive.??Carol Dweck agrees, of course.?With her theory of the Growth Mindset, she suggests that to understand successful people, we should “find out the tremendous effort that went into their accomplishment – and admire them more.”

The organizations and individuals that ‘outlearn’ the others – that are the most intentional – will deliver the most innovation and impact over the long term.? This is liberating because it puts the power back into the hands of the organization, individual, and team.? Whether in sport, medicine, military, the arts or in business, those that work and learn the best will emerge from the pack with a greater degree of impact, capability and long-term sustainability. This agency makes improvement and ‘performance’ a choice, not some abstract outcome determined by forces outside of the organization’s control.

Learning happens all the time.? In our roles, day to day tasks, and in our relationships, we are always taking in new information, processing it, and converting it into lessons, rules or thinking frameworks that we can then use in subsequent situations.? And while learning in the flow of work and experiential learning (learning by doing) are highly effective developmental strategies and are the primary way that we take in new information, they are not comprehensive.? Our experiences and life-learning needs to be surrounded by intentionally created moments (i.e. school) that help us make sense of what’s happening around us – to process, analyze, and to understand.? Our experiences need to be complemented with new ideas, frameworks, and tools in order for those lessons to convert into new applied behaviors. This is how we grow. And when we do so intentionally, deliberately, and methodically, we can accelerate the positive impact of learning on our lives and careers.

If elevating learning means being intentional about it, what are some things we can do to establish and scale this kind of growth culture?? At Moderna, we are intentionally elevating the role learning plays in our work, our organization, and our culture.? First, one of our Moderna Mindsets is to “obsess over learning.”? By stating it and building it into our systems, we make it important and take the first step towards it being part of our actual cultural reality.? And by the way, what could be more intentional than obsessing over something?? This mindset provides guidance and encouragement to our people to always be evolving… because for our patients, “we don’t need to the smartest, we need to learn the fastest.”?

We are also developing the corporate university of the future – a structure, digital platform, campus, and curriculum that keeps our people at the cutting edge of skill development in biotech and beyond.? Moderna University is being built as a physical, digital, and symbolic manifestation of our commitment to intentional learning – a statement to our people, partners, and communities that we are elevating learning to play in an essential role in our culture and company life.

It’s important to point out, however, that elevating learning doesn’t just happen.? Being intentional about learning is hard work and there are many headwinds and sources of resistance that need to be overcome along the way.? The enemies of intentional learning include a fixed mindset, a chronic lack of time, and a company culture excessively focused on short term execution and performance.? When people do not have explicit permission, safety, role modeling and encouragement from their manager, they will immerse themselves in their ‘work’ at the expense of their learning and growth.?

The good news is that this polarity can be managed.? There are many ways for people to seamlessly toggle between work, life and learning.? It starts again with the intentional creation of places and spaces where learning can thrive and evolve.? When this is coupled with visible leadership role modeling, managers who believe in coaching and development, and reinforcing mechanisms that incent people to continuously get better, learning can take off and become part of our everyday life.

Being intentional about learning in order to elevate its place in our lives is a powerful concept that can produce many benefits and positive outcomes.? To do so, here are 5 things we are doing at Moderna to elevate learning and be intentional about how we continuously get better

1. Build it into Our Mindsets – ‘Obsessing over Learning’ means people should be relentless and passionate about their journey of personal and professional growth and development.
2. Use Data – Information tells us what programs resonate the most and are getting the best learning outcomes.? That way we can target our investments to areas of biggest impact.
3. Give People Permission – By talking about it and visibly prioritizing it, we give people the psychological safety to engage in non-immediate exploratory learning-work.
4. Tie it back to Our patients – Our work shows up in lives saved and suffering reduced.? When we learn intentionally, we help more people and deliver on more of our promise.
5. Experiment – Learning is the perfect place to use an experimental approach.?When we try new things and take an exploratory position on our work and lives, new discoveries and breakthroughs become possible.

Intentionality elevates the role learning plays in an organizational culture.? This is built through the creation of places and spaces for learning to happen, visible role modeling, and the removal of the most common barriers to growth.? This is the journey we are on at Moderna.? I invite all of you to share how you are experiencing this evolution in your own organizations.