Create your own L&D department
I have a passion for all things learning and development (L&D), helping new individuals with their learning but also helping others develop their professional skills. And because I love what I do so much, I’m also happy to share what I’ve learned and done over the years in education and development. What can you learn from this article? In this article, I outline the ten steps needed to create a new L&D department that can:
- Develop resilience
- Have your own culture
- Help the team grow and improve their skills
- Increase the level of proactivity, independence and responsibility by involving them in different projects
So, let’s get started!
10 steps to create and organize an L&D department
1. Have your own onboarding from the company
Get to know the company’s culture, vision and mission, learn about the company’s services/products, get to know your other colleagues and co-workers by understanding their roles and how and when your department will work with them.
2. Create your own strategy
Start creating your own strategy as a manager, ideally step by step, focus on the three month, six month and one year mark.
3. Create a presentation of your own department
Create a custom department presentation for your new team based on your newly developed strategy. This will help your team to have an overview of your vision as a manager, to know how the team will be divided, what their main activities and projects/programme will be and what their processes will be.
4. Start working on processes
Start working on processes that will help you and your team work efficiently, in an organized manner and in good collaboration with other stakeholders. These may include: manuals, review processes, learning communication process within the company, new hire announcements, newsletters, welcome email to team members, collaboration with other teams, etc.
5. Start the recruitment process
Begin the recruitment process by preparing questions, assessments and exercises. Work with the HR team to post and promote your roles, recruit candidates and schedule interviews, conduct interviews, and then select the best candidates that fit your project needs.
6. Start the registration process for your team
Begin by outlining the strategy, the organization of the learning and development department, the projects or programs, other activities they will be involved in (if relevant), and the next stages.
7. Hold the first team meeting
At your first team meeting you should:
- Set up the administrative part
Repeat team meetings, their date and time, who will lead the meetings, who will take notes, etc. - Talk about one-on-one sessions
Whether your team members prefer to schedule them as they please or prefer recurring sessions. - Split the team
For main tasks and as needed. If there are any other development projects from the beginning, identify possible volunteers and get them involved. - Talk about your team’s appraisal and professional development process
What will be the main KPIs and how will the evaluation take place, what are your plans to help them grow professionally, what projects will be created for them to learn more, etc. - Create your own team group/channel
Enable your team to better communicate, identify and share solutions to your project situations and inspire collaboration among team members.
8. Assign a buddy on board
This is optional. If you already have enough team members, assign new hires an onboarding buddy and give them time to shadow their onboarding buddy. This will help new members better understand the main tasks and learn more about the processes and make their initial activities easier.
9. Start projects/activities
Here, the team begins to examine their tasks and look for ways to identify, solve problems, and achieve better performance. During this time, they will probably still need your support, so it would be really helpful for them to know that everyone on the team can work together to find a solution.
10. Improve your team’s skills
By developing other projects, providing useful learning resources/training, occasionally asking what topics they would like to learn more about, etc., you can come up with ways to improve your skill level as a team.
Conclusion
I hope this article will help a new manager/leader know how to start a new project/program within a company, as well as how to help grow and keep their teams motivated by providing the main steps for organizing such an effort. Knowing that your team can rely on you as a leader, that they can learn from you, and that they can later develop and pursue their own career paths is incredibly rewarding.
