According to LinkedIn Learning, 94% of employees say they would stay with their employer longer if they invested in their employees learning.

This number underscores just how critical it is to invest in team development

However, before you choose which courses to offer, you’ll need to determine what skills your team needs.

Where do you start? Which skills should you focus on first? Here’s an overview of how to get going with your team development strategy. 

Why You Need a Team Development Strategy

When it comes to ensuring your company has the talent you need, upskilling your existing workforce is always the best option.

The key to success is getting your team invested and engaged in learning as early on in the process as possible. That starts with fostering an environment of learning.

While there are several upskilling strategies you can use for team development, before you jump right in, you’ll need to create your team development plan.

To help you through this first stage of team development, here are five steps you can take: 

#1. Identify Your Overall Needs

Start by getting input on the needs of your team, other teams and the broader organization. The organization’s leaders need to review business objectives and identify skills needed in the short and longer term. 

Together with the leadership team, employees should consider creating a skills matrix for the team. A skills matrix will help identify existing skill sets and skill gaps so you can better assess overall requirements. 

#2. Get Your Team Involved

Your employees are your most valuable resource when it comes to understanding what skills can improve your day-to-day operations. By getting your team involved you’ll get more buy-in for upskilling.

Work with your employees to find out what areas of the business may be lacking skills-wise. Speak to each of your team members to ask specifically what skills they’re interested in developing, and how those skills can support their career path.  

#3. Determine Your Priorities

Once you’ve gathered input from your stakeholders, you’ll need to prioritize everyone’s input to help execute your team development plan in stages.

Look at the current priorities by business area, including what’s urgent and what can wait. Then, identify which skills take priority to address the most critical gaps.

#4. Assess Learning Modes

Now that you’ve laid the groundwork, you can start diving into the what and the how of your team development.

Key questions to tackle at this point are:

  • What kinds of events will you offer? 
  • How will learners gain experience? 
  • Who will be mentoring learners? 

#5. Draft Your Team Development Plan

When you sit down to draft your team development plan, resist the urge to plan too far ahead. Start by focusing on the next three, six, and 12 months only.

Create a timeline that takes into account details including: peak periods for the business, how many people can be learning at once and ideal times of day for supplemental learning.

Also, don’t forget to define all the roles and responsibilities of everyone involved — teachers, mentors, learners and management. 

With your team development plan nearly complete, you can then start putting together a list of final course selections that employees can choose from.

Make Team Development an Ongoing Focus

Your company’s team development plan will require an ongoing focus and effort, but it will be well worth it as it contributes to overall business growth, as well as team collaboration and relationship building. 

Looking for a broad range of courses to offer employees as part of your team development strategy? Explore our Enterprise offerings and how they can be part of your team’s plan. 

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