What I Learned about Knowledge and Training at the SkilljarConnect 2021 Conference

Earlier this week I had the pleasure of attending and presenting at SkilljarConnect 2021. Among all the facets of work related to Customer Success, which is my profession, Training, Education and Knowledge Management is the area I feel the least experienced in. So, I prioritized attending this conference to inject myself with a 2-day concentrated dose of knowledge and climb the learning curve. By the way, for simplicity, I will refer to this space as K&T (Knowledge and Training), which is the way we refer to this powerful and fast growing team at talech.

Overall, it was a most interesting and very well worth experience. Thank you, Sandi , Sara , Michael and the Skilljar team for a very well run and content-rich event!?

My key takeaways from the conference:

1. It is possible to run a very engaging conference in this era of post-COVID world.

The Skilljar team did a very good job balancing the safety with the experience. The conference was held in Sonoma, CA, a relatively moderate weather location that enabled a large portion of the activities to be held outside. A tent was set up outside the hotel and was kept very open for the larger audience sessions. The conference was kept to a relatively small size (under 200 people) to minimize risk. An app (Clear) was used to monitor people’s health and attendees were requested to indicate their level of interaction with others (hugs, fist-bump or no-touch social distancing) and were requested - and most adhered to - wear masks while in the indoor sessions.

2. Most companies that use Skilljar also use a Customer Success Platform (like Gainsight, Totango, ChurnZero, ClientSuccess, and StrikeDeck)

I found that point very interesting. We selected Skilljar at talech after an evaluation of a number of LMS (Learning Management Systems) solutions mainly as we found them to be the best in enabling training to customers. Most LMS solutions are focused predominantly internally, providing required training and certifications for internal team members, hence traditionally sit within the HR org (more on that later). While they “can” be used externally, that is not their DNA. We wanted the core of our solution to be in external training, hence the selection of Skilljar. It seems that most companies that use Skilljar have selected them for the same rationale, which extended to additional investment in Customer Success tools, mainly a CS Platform. Many of the teams also suggested they use In-App Guidance tools (like Pendo), for the same reason. I do not know if this correlation extends to other LMS, and I’d be interested if anybody has insight into this question.

3.? K&T teams are diligent in monitoring performance and use relatively consistent metrics to repot on it

A number of sessions and a lot of conversations surrounded metrics. Most teams are keen on measuring training inputs (number of knowledge assets like training classes or KB articles created) and outputs (number of training classes taken, % completion of classes, % of customers trained, customer satisfaction with the training, etc.). Other more sophisticated suggested a framework that also measures training impact: mainly correlating training stats with Retention and NPS. Overall, I sensed a very strong commitment to measuring performance in the field, which is great.

There is an opportunity to evolve the framework to also include impact on the CUSTOMERS. Specifically, assess the metrics that are important to the customer (which is not renewing the contract with us, the vendor, via a retention metric…). Such metrics should include Usage of the solution, Adoption of key features, and Value generation that is important to the customer. This last one can be growing their revenue, reducing their cost, improving their employee retention/satisfaction/productivity, etc.

4. Scope of responsibility for most K&M teams is limited and partial

Most teams we talked with had a relatively narrow sphere of ownership within the K&T needs of the company. Most were either responsible for customer training, or internal team training or sales training. Their reporting structure followed that distinction: teams that were responsible for customer training tend to report to the Customer Success org, though some report to Product while others to Marketing. Teams that were responsible for internal team training tend to report to an HR / People function, and teams responsible for Sales training tend to report into either the Sales, Marketing or GTM function. We found the teams reporting to Marketing to be at the most unease with their roles that tend to be, well... marketing focused and not customer one...

At talech, the K&T team, lead by the wonderful and talented Cassandra Waring , is responsible for the full breadth of knowledge management, education and training needs of the company. This includes 4 audiences: Customers, Internal team members (excluding compliance), Sales and Partners. The team therefore reports into the Chief Customer Officer. We received strong positive feedback for this structure that enables a lot of consistency in the messaging to the different audiences as well as economies of scale in content development, delivery mechanisms and maintenance. This seems to be an area of opportunity to many Training teams out there!?

5. K&T teams are very diverse

Gender diversity is not surprising, but still refreshing. I expected such diversity for many of the same reasons it exists in Tech in general, within Marketing and HR teams in particular and to a slightly lesser extent within Customer Success. The somewhat surprising observation was the age diversity. The portion of much more experienced people in the conference was very evident and is interesting as in many other areas of Tech it is the younger generation that pushes for the new technology tools. In K&T it seems like the push comes in many ways from the more experienced generation.?

6. Many teams struggle to get Budgets

Many teams lamented the hardship of getting the budget to address their needs. When looking into it, it felt that there is a correlation between the scope of responsibility (and the consequent reporting structure) and that hardship. K&T teams that are responsible for internal training (and tend to report to HR) have a much harder time getting budgets compared with those who are responsible for customer and/or sales training and report into either Sales or CS. This makes sense as the latter ones are closer to revenue and can more easily present an ROI based on a correlation between their efforts and sales revenue.

This point underscores, again, the reason why at talech we tasked the K&T team to be responsible for both the external and internal training. Not only that we can benefit from the proximity to revenue and the ability to show impact there, but also we benefit from the economies of the scale in our operations (we use Skilljar both internally and externally, for example, and reuse many of the training material for customers as the base to train our internal team members and the sales team).

7. And lastly, K&T people know how to party!

I guess this is where a picture is worth a thousand words. If only LinkedIn enabled me to add a photo here... grrr... Short of being able to do that, I'd simple say: Sonoma, wine tasting, 80's music band, training people, fun!

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