Now is the time to invest in yourself or your team
Investing in yourself or in your team is never a bad idea, and the worst of times is actually the perfect time to do so.?
2023 is turning tech on its head: layoffs looming, headcount shrinking, budgets tightening, and AI overshadowing everything with the undeniable assertion that capital-c Change is nigh. The hits keep on coming with no sign of stopping.
Those who are still standing will have oversized shoes to fill – and oversize opportunities.?
So you might find yourself thinking, “This is a really bad time to spend money on learning and development.” When in reality, there may never have been a better moment in your career to invest in yourself than this moment right now.?
As an individual, adding new tools and skill sets helps you stay at the top of your game or stand out in a crowd of fellow job-seekers. As a leader, providing your team with the opportunity to increase their impact helps them perform better at a time when performance is critical.
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For individuals: L&D can save your job
Investing in yourself is the best way to propel your career forward. And if you do find yourself back in the job market, competing with hundreds of other well-qualified applicants for the same job, you need to set yourself apart. Showing that you care enough to gain new skills that will be an asset to your new employer – is a sure way to stand out.
Maybe it feels disingenuous to hear “spend the money on L&D!” from a company that provides said L&D. We’re real people, we get that.
So we surveyed a small segment (30 people) who signed up for some of our recent workshops. And we asked them, “Was it worth it?”
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What learners had to say
The majority of folks we spoke to said they participated in a Design Dept. workshop because they wanted to increase their impact. A few were working toward a promotion or transitioning roles (from IC to manager). But well over half of respondents said they wanted to get better at what they do.
We asked how much they had spent on L&D over the last 12 months,?and more than half replied they spent somewhere between $1,000-2,500.
So how was their return on that investment?
Of the 21 people we spoke to who attended a leadership workshop, 76% said they left the workshop with improved communication skills and increased confidence. And 62% of those same folks said they experienced improved relationships with peers and managers after taking the course.
“If I think about my org as a system, then better understanding how design leadership works makes me more skilled at understanding which levers to pull or push and result in different outcomes,” said one staff UXR. “Prior to the workshop, I often felt lost when asking for resources or attempting to make more of an impact, but now I have a much more sophisticated grasp of the operations. I feel more confident and aware of myself as a leader – even if I'm an IC – by better understanding the system, even though I'm not totally responsible for the system the way a manager might be.”
When we spoke to nine different learners who completed our?Designing Businesses?series, all of them – 100% – said they left the workshop with improved communication skills. And 77.8% said they had increased confidence after the course.
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Here’s how one senior content designer put it:
“This workshop has helped me completely reframe the value and impact I bring to the team and the company. Previously, I couldn't defend or explain the decisions I made as a creative. I expected people to accept my decisions because I was the writer. But no one gave a shit. Now I share all of my creative decisions through the lens of business impact and value and – wouldn't you know it — people finally respect my decisions.”
When it comes to a more tangible monetary ROI, three recent grads from our?Design Leadership Fundamentals?series received promotions that included raises ranging from $15,000 to $30,000.
All of these responses line up with?a larger survey?we conducted a few months ago with design leaders of all levels at public tech companies, startups, agencies, and non-tech companies. Respondents to that survey listed top skills they wanted to prioritize: increasing their impact and influence, improving their communication skills, and diving deeper into strategy.?
A UX director who took our business workshop spoke about how up-leveling their skills in these areas had immediate impact on their cross-functional relationships and overall ability to affect the business:
“Learning how to speak the language of business helped me build bridges with colleagues who thought my team was only there to ‘make things pretty.’ I was brought into conversations earlier because I could frame solutions to user problems in ways that positively impacted the business.”
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For leaders: L&D can energize your team (and save your energy)
Obviously, leaders are feeling the pressure and stress of the current business climate in an outsized way. And while the idea of leveraging L&D to help your teams be more effective with their time, stay relevant to the business, and perform when performance is most critically assessed are all meaningful, there is another angle here.
In the same way that?outsourcing 1:1 coaching?helps keep you focused on the most important needs of the org, investing in L&D for your team frees up senior leaders’ time, as well.
Your time is always in demand. You could spend some of that time coaching team members for confidence or communication or impact, but that takes a lot of 1:1 time and attention. Time that you don’t have right now.
So – outsource it. Send your team to a workshop so they can make big strides and acquire new skills, and you can focus on critical tasks.
No matter how you slice it, or who you slice it for, L&D is an investment that always pays off.
Want to grow as a leader? Here are three ways Design Dept. can help: