Increasing the Employees’ Learning and Development Hour Through the Individual Learning Journal (ILI)

2019

This is an Entry to the Government Best Practice Recognition Awards

Title

Increasing the Employees' Learning and Development Hour Through the Individual Learning Journal (ILI)

Organization

City Government of Tanauan, Batangas

Best practice Focus Area(s)

Human Resource Development

Year Implemented

2016

Summary

The best practice entry is the Increase of Employees’ Learning and Development Hours through Individual Learning Journal (IU). IU is a document summarizing the learning intervention attended by an employee during his/her stay at the City Government of Tanauan. It is more focused on self-directed learning than a formal learning intervention. The program was initiated by the Human Resource Management Office through its Officer-in-Charge. It is an innovation since the IU can be considered as a unique approach to learning and development. The use of IU was being used by the CGT employees since July 7, 2016.

Background and Problem

Under the Learning and Development component of the PRIME-HRM program of the CSC, in order to reach Maturity Level II status, each employee should be given at least eight (8) hours of learning and development intervention per year. The challenge posed is that there is only a limited resource for training in terms of money and manpower.

Further, during the Investors in People interview with some employees, when asked what L&D intervention was given to them, a few answered none since they were not sent to seminars and training. This served as a wake-up call that there is a need to widen the understanding of CGT employees regarding L&D. Through these two main reasons, the HRMDO thinks of ways on how best to address the situation. The solution presented is to expand the concept of learning and development and have it recorded in the IU.

Solution and Impact

Before the employees’ idea of learning and development is attendance to formal seminars and training, the HRMDO encourages the employees to think outside the box and to use the 70-20-10 learning principle wherein 70% of learning comes from actual experience, 20% from peers, and 10% for formal interventions. This was explained to them until such a time that they were able to grasp the concept, it was then that the IU was fully launched.

This resulted in a dramatic increase in the average learning and development hours per employee, but more than the figures, it widened the employees’ appreciation about learning and development and reawakened in them the spirit of continuous learning. The employees now are more excited and conscious about what they need to learn in order to improve their capability. Moreover, a culture of a learning environment and organization was established, self-directed learning is a common occurrence and the employee has control over how much he/she can learn in a year that may help in the improvement of his performance.

The IU saved the organization money in terms of training funds but it also increased ownership of the learning process among the employees. This concept was presented as one of the HR best practices during regional HR conferences as well as to other agencies and organizations visiting the City Government of Tanauan who benchmark on the HR and L&D best practices.

Milestones

There was a remarkable increase in the number of learning hours of employees from 2017 to 2016 (425.98%) and from 2018 to 2016 (480.664%). Since 2018, the target for learning and development hours of each employee was incorporated in the individual performance target with the IU as a means of verification. The implementation of IU provided an additional score in the liP Generation 5 accreditation during its initial implementation in 2016; further, the CGT received Maturity Level II status terms of L&D under the PRIME-HRM program of CSC wherein we received the Bronze Award the same program in 2017.