Get fit, stay fit
A series of half day training programmes at Hyundai have been helping staff to maintain their positive focus and their health. Here Anthony Landale takes a look at this bite sized learning programme and considers its practical benefits.
There is an increasing trend within organisations to encourage staff to ‘choose the attitude’ that they bring with them to work. The HR message coming through is that employees have to expect work to be tough, change to be endemic, and markets to be volatile. That is reality. But alongside such conditions staff are being told that they still have control. It is up to them to choose to bring their energy, their engagement and their leadership to what they do. Freedom of choice is the means by which success will be delivered.
There are many companies which put this ‘can do, will do’ attitude at the heart of their culture and the car manufacturer Hyundai is one of these. Their brand is different, distinctive, perhaps even a bit quirky, and that is reflected in the emphasis they put on having a positive people focus at the fore of their culture.
With this as the context perhaps it isn’t surprising to find that in 2005 Hyundai have embraced the latest thinking in accelerated learning (AL). As a general approach the focus of AL is all about how forward looking executives can get through their work faster, learn more effectively and remember more. So how well has this initiative been digested by staff?
According to Nicky Boobyer, Learning & Development specialist with Hyundai Motor UK the issue is all about supporting the goal of personal effectiveness. “We regularly conduct capability studies - we are strong in the area of management development - but on our last study we noticed that people had some gaps in the area of self-confidence and how best to handle themselves when the going gets tough.
“We wanted to raise the bar for our people so we contracted Illumine, who are leaders in AL, to design courses for us that would address these behavioural and capability skills issues. We branded them as courses to help you get fit (Fast, Impactful Training) and presented them to the business. These are not compulsory training events but the promise of take away skills which people could learn in half a day really appealed to staff - from directors to those on the front line. All our people are busy but this doesn’t stop them wanting development support and this format worked really well.”
Within the FIT programme Illumine has run courses on Speed Reading, Mind Mapping, Generating Ideas, Emotional Intelligence and Positive Thinking. But can such bite sized learning events, lasting just a few hours, offer any substantial benefit?
Nicky Boobyer is confident that they can. “What was both surprising and extremely gratifying was to find how well our culture fits with the whole notion of AL. The trainers involved brought energy, they provided practical techniques, they stimulated us with ideas and they encouraged us to use all of our senses - not just sit on our chairs listening. Eighty four percent was the lowest satisfaction rating we received for any of these events and people came away inspired to use what they had learned in their day to day work.”
“To give you a few practical examples I recently attended a marketing meeting where staff were using creative concepts from the Generating Ideas module to help them think ‘out of the box’ and in the HR department a manager was using Mind Mapping to help plan a briefing that he was making on pension provision. On top of this you hear people using the language from these training events every day. It has embedded very comfortably into our culture.”
It has been said that another phrase for enthusiasm is ‘knowledge on fire’ and certainly once the AL spark was lit in Hyundai it appears to have caught the imagination of employees.
“Before too long we had departmental managers asking for these courses to be run specifically for them,” explained Boobyer. “The demand has spiralled and we have run additional days for the marketing team, for HR and for the field team.
One of the ideas that has really been in demand at Hyundai has been how to handle information overload. This is a challenge faced in every business, everywhere as staff are bombarded with information through internet, email, phone, fax and mobile technology. If you have too much information landing on your desk it can quickly add to stress levels.
Said Clive Lewis, MD of Illumine: “Today’s corporate executives are having to take in, absorb and recall more information than ever and, of course, most of this data arrives in written form.
“That is why we emphasise speed reading as one of the essential techniques in managing overload. And
there are two very distinct aspects to our approach. The first is to help people become better at assessing the material they get sent. Do they need to read it at all? Could it be delegated? And if they have to read it in how much detail do they need? These assessment techniques sit at the heart of effective speed reading. Second is the skill of learning how to read much faster. We teach people discrete techniques here and once people have developed their skills in this area they can triple their reading speed. That makes them much more effective and confident.”
The issue of managing time is also one that always gets raised alongside information overload. And Nicky Boobyer suggests that Illumine’s time management training has been of particular value. “We wanted to help our staff to use their time more wisely,” she suggested “and the trainers on this course encourage people to observe their own patterns. How do they spend their time? What habits have they got into that are not working? How many times do they get interrupted when they are doing something important? On this event we looked at giving people tools which would help them break their unproductive habits and get much clearer about their priorities. As you can imagine such practical input was received very well.”
And Boobyer also talks about the way she has personally been affected by the training. “One of the ways my life has been impacted is through the event I went on called ‘Exercise and Physical Activity’. This module highlighted the link between body and mind and how we need to look after our health through diet and exercise. I recognised that I hadn’t been taking enough physical exercise and have now started classes that are making a real difference to my energy. This has helped my productivity and I also feel much better about myself for addressing this as an important issue.”
And, in the end, that is what this training programme is all about. It continues to point out to people what actions they can take and what skills they can take away and use. And it promises people that in taking such initiative they are serving themselves and the business.
As for the future at Hyundai the continuing emphasis is on creativity. “With the recent takeover - the company has just been acquired from RAC by HMC - we have been going through a time of exceptional change,” said Boobyer “but we can’t let that affect our performance. In fact we have to continue to be innovative and energetic in order to compete in a very tough marketplace. Training that supports us in this way is certain to be a major part of our future.”
ENDS
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Tags: Positive focus, Staff development