Challenge
Despite pumping £millions a year into staff training, Tesco had limited visibility of their colleagues’ specific skills gaps. They wanted to allocate funding to the right areas of learning, but didn’t have robust data in this area to draw upon.
Solution
We designed an internal talent development platform for Tesco, including a skills comparison tool for colleagues to assess their skills against other roles. They could also compare different roles and evaluate the additional skills they needed to progress.
Finally, a line managers’ assessment tool allowed managers to assess their team members, which built a three dimensional picture; the role baseline, the employee’s view and the manager view.
Outcome
A talent development platform which provides both managers and colleagues with a firm basis to have career development conversations. Engagement with the platform is high and as a result, the learning and development team have robust analytics.
These highlight where they needed to channel training budget to plug the skills gaps they have now, and potentially in the future. It has also reignited the fire in colleagues to pursue internal progression opportunities – an important driver in retaining your talent.
Discovery
As always, we kicked off this project with a discovery session. These exploratory sessions are vital in uncovering the root cause of challenges and exploring potential solutions. They help us map out the objectives, drivers, blockers, audiences and existing systems, so we can design a solution that helps clients achieve their goals.
How it works
The self-assessment tool is pivotal to improve staff retention by developing a greater awareness of the roles available, the transferable skills staff already have and empowering staff to enhance their skills in a structured way.
An inviting homepage and intuitive navigation welcomed colleagues and guided them through the assessment process. The colleague carries out a self-assessment of their skills in their current role and is given a level for each skill and a visualisation showing the expected levels for the role.
Their line manager reviews their assessment and conducts their own assessment of their team member’s abilities which is shared with them. The results form the basis of career conversations and help the team member create a personal development plan together with their line manager.
When colleagues are keen to move across the business, they can compare themselves to other roles in the organisation and see what skills other roles require. The platform is a gateway to further learning, giving them access to training to improve their skills and to help create a learning plan for the career they wish to progress.
A 360 internal mobility solution
And finally, one of the most exciting aspects of the platform is that it could also be linked to your applicant tracking system and internal job board – suggesting suitable roles to colleagues with the relevant skills, as well as helping managers and recruiters identify internal candidates for open roles or specific talent programmes.