The first step towards creating a "Learning Organization"

Onin is a member of SAP Recruitment Operations team. He wanted to learn about SQL language as it would be helpful in his job. Since he did not know anyone who is well-equipped with this skill and can teach him, he was not sure whom to reach out to. Sounds familiar ?

In today’s day and age when Organizations are really struggling with creating a Continuous learning culture, we need to start with the basics : That knowledge should be accessible to all.

Dissemination of knowledge is the cornerstone of a learning organization. One of the key challenge in order to create a “Continuous Learning” culture is to have knowledge easily accessible, constantly shared and leveraged. Creating such a culture requires an open approach that encourages two directional participation of “Knowledge seekers” and "Experts” and encourages collaboration to happen across boundaries.

So how do we get the knowledge seekers and experts together ?

Onin came across Teach Hub, a learning platform piloted by the SAP HR Team in APJ Region. Two of his colleagues also joined and they reached out to Jordan who had registered himself as an SQL expert. Jordan, an expert from a different location hosted a mini-classroom virtual session which they found extremely helpful.

What is Teach-Hub?

Teach Hub is an internal learning platform which helps connect the knowledge seekers with experts. A simple, intuitive in-house platform created by Takvor Tilkiyan, an developer in SAP, it allows people to easily connect, engage and interact on learning topics. It allows employees to seek experts on any topic, ask questions to the expert community, have visibility to the conversations and shared knowledge that has transpired. In the process, not only does it help in knowledge sharing also leads to an open and interactive learning experience. Experts need to register themselves on the tool , clearly calling out the level of their expertise and that information is visible to anyone within the Organization.

Teach-Hub was launched as a pilot in SAP APJ region to enable close collaboration and unhindered flow of information about products, services, and most importantly skills within the company. Since launch , more than 700+ employees have registered on the platform as experts to share their knowledge with the employee community. It has touched several employees who were looking for a guidance, mentoring and most importantly a Teacher who has the subject matter expertise.

It also helped employees to transcend boundaries and create networks beyond the natural organization structures.

Jothivenkatesh is an expert on the Databinding topic and was made aware of the TeachHub platform. He found a help request in his inbox from a working student in Germany, who was keen to know more about Data Binding in SAP Wifi Tables. The two of them set up a 1:1, and for Jothi, the ease of setting up a help session at his own preferred time and day with a requestor, was a major plus. According to him, “TeachHub has allowed him to give back what he had learnt.”

Siva Kumar, who works in Cloud Operations Enablement in India, found the entire experience very ‘rewarding’. As one of the earliest users of the platform, he was the first person to connect with knowledge seekers. He has mentored many employees on topics related to Machine Learning and allied areas and says “This platform benefits both learners and mentors. As a mentor, it helped me improve my skills and expand my network.”

Renata Janini Dohmen, Head of HR in APJ, sponsored the pilot in APJ Region and believes that platforms like Teach Hub democratizes learning where by any person can be a teacher and a learner on any topic of expertise. It offers the required flexibility to meet the demands of a changing workforce in networked organizations. Teach Hub is powerful in helping employees and organizations to promote a culture of continuous learning and, as such, to remain relevant now and in the future.

Over the last few months, Teach Hub has also helped in creating one of the kind in-house skill repository including future skills making it easier for learning on key skills to be accessible.

Today with the shift in workforce demographics, there is greater emphasis being placed on innovation and collaboration, SAP has made a new stride in creating a learning culture which leverages on learning through collaboration. This is the first step towards creating a learning organization.

In collaboration with Takvor Tilkiyan, Utkarsh Jain Sankhla, Arnab Poddar.

Twitter: @shwetamohanty