How Do You Get Employees to Learn, Develop and Perform?

What do you do if your growing business needs to build talent faster to meet the challenges of solving the world’s most difficult diseases? You empower employees to take charge of their own development.  

Recently at AbbVie, we asked employees to participate in Learn.Develop.Perform.—a global initiative focused on providing AbbVie employees with the opportunity to learn the skills they need, develop the capabilities for success, and ultimately, perform at their best.

We kicked off the initiative with a weeklong event featuring live webinars and local events hosted by development experts and AbbVie leaders from across the globe.

To be successful, we knew Learn. Develop. Perform. had to be relatable – with something for everyone, regardless of level or position. We also knew we needed to make development personal – everyone is in a different stage of their career path. Last, it needed to be functional – we recognized employees were juggling other responsibilities, so we made sure our offerings were mobile and/or virtual, voluntary, free and, above all, relevant.

We had two basic goals for Learn. Develop. Perform.: Gain a high level of participation from employees, and engage leaders. We more than surpassed our goals:

·        45% of all AbbVie employees registered for Learn. Develop. Perform.

·        90% of registrants participated in webinars

·        49% of our VPs registered, and 54% of participants were people leaders

·        We had participation in more than 70 countries where AbbVie is represented

During the event, we used four tactics that were key drivers to our success (and could be easily adopted at other companies):

1.      Involve leaders. We know that leaders drive participation, so we created “LDP Radio,” a live 24-hour event that featured AbbVie leaders sharing personal insights and advice related to career development.

2.      Think global. We hosted 25 webinars multiple times across several time zones to accommodate employees worldwide.

3.      Stay focused. To ensure our content was manageable and easy to navigate, we organized our materials into five development topics—one for each day of the week.

4.      Provide a “go-to” hub. We created a microsite that housed daily articles, eLearning modules and online resources that were mobile-friendly and easily available.

After the event, participants said they have a greater understanding of the importance of development. Going forward, participants indicated they are more likely to focus on development of their direct reports, ask for feedback to improve performance, discuss development with their leader and create a development plan.

These results indicate a direct correlation toward our strategic intent: talent development as a business priority. It is clear that Learn. Develop. Perform. needs to be, and is, more than just an event. It is an ongoing initiative that enables employees to make a lasting, personal connection with their development and demonstrates AbbVie’s commitment to supporting its employees.

And considering that, at AbbVie, our employees are working each day to drive business results and deliver a consistent stream of innovative new medicines, their long-term development couldn’t be more important.