Karen Foster and Amy Parent continue their discussion about Critical Thinking Academy, the first in a series of academies designed to build essential capabilities for professionals in life science organizations. This is part two of a two-part series.

Access the episode here.

Karen is joined by Salience Learning’s own Amy Parent to discuss the launch of Critical Thinking Academy, the first in a series of academies designed to build essential capabilities for professionals in life science organizations. This is part one of a two-part series.

Access the episode here.

Krista Gerhard and Kim Portland discuss the difference between competencies and capabilities, and why capability models matter now more than ever.

Access the episode here.

Not long ago, success in the life science industry could be attributed to how well one mastered and executed skills:  skills in selling, account planning, customer engagement and more. Someone who perfected a skill could apply it repeatedly across similar situations without breaking a sweat.

Unfortunately, in today’s world it’s rare that the same situation happens twice, and skills are no longer enough. The products are more complex, the marketplace is more complex, the ways of working are more complex. And everything is constantly changing. As the industry evolves, so must you. Success in the life science industry today will be powered not only by narrower skills like selling and planning, but also by broader proficiencies that are called capabilities.

What Is a Capability?

A capability is a set of behaviors and characteristics applied fluidly and flexibility across conditions, situations and contexts. Critical thinking is a capability. It consists of behaviors like asking questions, thinking slowly and assessing one’s thinking. It entails certain personality characteristics, such as being skeptical and comfortable with ambiguity. One could think critically about scientific data or when dialoging with a colleague or when deciding where to go for dinner.

Capabilities come in handy across situations. They are foundational and allow you to adapt to changing circumstances and a continuous flow of information. They enhance information gathering, decision-making, and problem-solving. They’re a kind of all-purpose superpower. 

What Is a Skill?

On the other hand, a skill is a set of actions executed sequentially to achieve a defined outcome in a narrow set of conditions. Cutting vegetables with a knife is a skill. To execute this skill, you would: hold the knife safely, stabilize the item on a surface, and slice the item with the knife. You would carry out these steps in order, to make a whole into parts, and could apply this to tomatoes, carrots, basil or any vegetable of your choice.

Skills come in handy when the conditions don’t change much.

But if too many changes occur, the skill loses its value. Imagine for a second that “vegetable” is replaced with “tree,” and “knife” is replaced with “chainsaw.” Are the sets of actions for cutting a tree with a chainsaw the same as cutting vegetables with knife?

Most of would say no, unless you don’t mind losing some fingers.

Why Do Capabilities Matter Now?

This is exactly why capabilities matter in a constantly changing, complex world with endless amounts of information. Skills typically apply to a narrow set of conditions, but once the conditions change enough: poof, the skill no longer “transfers,” to use the learning science term. Could someone who cuts vegetables with a knife also cut fruit or meat? Sure. What about paper or rope? Hmmm, maybe. But expand to a tree trunk and a chainsaw and you have crossed a line. A new skill is needed. More training to be conducted. More time out of the field.

A capability, on the other hand—such as using a cutting implement safely—can come in handy whether it’s a tomato, rope or a tree. Capabilities flex further. They go farther.

How do Capabilities Impact the Business?

Professionals in the life science industry need to evolve, and capabilities provide that power.

New therapeutic areas and business models—not to mention the pandemic—have created tumult in the industry. New innovations, new types of work and new ways of engaging with customers require new ways of thinking.

Learning capabilities may not seem as urgent as learning skills, but it’s a forward-looking exercise that in the long run pays off. Capabilities future-proofs a business. Oh, and they supercharge skills, too.

Where Do I Start?

The World Economic Forum recently found that “critical thinking and analysis” was one of the most in-demand emerging capabilities across countries and industries. Critical thinking—the ability to test the validity of conclusions—is a broad capability.

It consists of five key behaviors: thinking slowly, asking questions, gathering evidence, checking assumptions, and assessing the thinking process itself. You can see how critical thinking would come in handy no matter the specific task or ability. It can even help you identify what task to undertake and what specific skill to deploy.

The business world will continue to change—likely at an ever-increasing rate. So, focus on improving both the narrow skills that solve the problem in front of you and also the capabilities that will carry over to the next one.

Learn about Salience Learning’s Critical Thinking Academy

This is the final part of our three-part conversation with prolific author, researcher, and professor Barbara Oakley, Ph.D. Karen, Krista, and Barbara discuss how the patterns and pathways picked up during past learning experiences influence how our brains react to future learning challenges when building new skills.

Access the episode here.

This is part two of our three-part conversation with prolific author, researcher, and professor Barbara Oakley, Ph.D. Karen, Krista, and Barbara discuss how the patterns and pathways picked up during past learning experiences influence how our brains react to future learning challenges when building new skills.

Listen to the episode

How to learn (and teach) like a pro…

Prolific author, researcher and professor Barbara Oakley, Ph.D., joins Karen and Krista to discuss how the patterns and pathways picked up during past learning experiences influence how our brains react to future learning challenges when building new skills. This is part one of a three-part series.

Access the episode here.

Do you work for a small affiliate of a large biopharmaceutical organization or perhaps a small startup that’s eager to hit the ground running? Are you looking to provide development opportunities that allow your team members to grow professionally and gain new experiences?

If you answered yes to both of these questions then, welcome.

In today’s dynamic environment, it’s no secret that more organizations, big and small, are investing in Learning and Development (L&D). From employee satisfaction and retention to protecting your bottom line and withstanding the tumultuous nature of business, investing in effective L&D programs is shown to prepare organizations to succeed in the future. Consider these figures:

• Nine out of 10 millennials rate professional or career growth and development opportunities as a major consideration in job satisfaction.[1]
• Organizations that have made a strategic investment in employee development report 11% greater profitability and are twice as likely to retain their employees.[2]
• Technological advancements are shortening the shelf life of employee skills; a typical business competency now lasts about five years.[3]

To compete, organizations need to quickly adapt to new business realities by empowering their people to build new skills before they need them. Investing in L&D is no longer a nice-to-have but an economic imperative.

However, small businesses may not have the resources or budget of larger competitors for L&D activities. Yet, to grow and expand their business in a world of continuous change and disruption, L&D programs are needed to upskill, reskill and build capacity for employees to navigate the ever-changing marketplace.

But how do you create an effective L&D program for your small business? Where do you start? Here are a few practical steps to help you get started establishing an L&D program:

1. Clarify the business’s goals: Effective learning programs align to the business’s goals. Collaborate with cross-functional business leaders to understand their goals and define the behaviors individuals and teams should start, stop, and continue to achieve those goals. Establishing a strategic partnership with the business at the onset of your program will secure L&D’s role at the table and be seen as a value-add.
2. Conduct a needs analysis: Once you have identified the business’s need and key behaviors, assess the current state and identify opportunities for L&D. This can be accomplished through stakeholder interviews, simple observation, or employee surveys.
3. Develop a set of capabilities: As the marketplace evolves and the rate of demand for new skills is faster than ever, the workforce is pressured to reskill and adapt. The needs for transferrable knowledge and skills, adaptability, and enduring capabilities are critical.Capabilities are defined as a collection of knowledge and skills that an individual applies across various situations. Using the L&D opportunities identified from the needs analysis, identify transferable knowledge and skills that can be organized into overarching capabilities. These capabilities will enable your workforce to endure evolving conditions through application of transferable knowledge and skills to new domains and contexts.
4. Draft a plan: Since resources are often limited, the key for small businesses is to use them as effectively as possible. First, develop a plan that articulates focus areas and goals. Then, identify what resources you currently have and identify the gaps. A thoughtful plan can also help gain buy-in from stakeholders and can be used to communicate what resources are needed and when.
5. Exercise change management: Inciting behavior change is difficult, but a structured approach to change can make it easier and have a far-reaching impact on the organization. That said, implementing and communicating change is more than a simple email. Gain leadership endorsement and identify opportunities for buy-in from the workforce; change agents are your greatest champions. Set success criteria, keep articulating your plans and provide continuous support through reference materials, coaching, and training opportunities. The development of new learnings is only as powerful as change adoption.

We recognize that these efforts require an investment that an individual or small team may not be able to implement alone. In these situations, quick wins or low-investment, high-impact initiatives can still be attained with some help.

In these cases, we suggest taking the following approach to help you deliver impactful learning:

1. Refresh, reuse, repurpose: Often, help is closer than we think. Invest time to investigate what resources are currently available in your organization. Once materials are identified, assess the gaps and focus on curating new content as needed. This process enables you to utilize existing training and resources to deploy more relevant learning faster.
2. Join an industry group: Great ideas are only a click away. Joining online industry groups allow you to stay informed on the latest insights, find and reuse publicly available resources and develop your skills by learning from communities of practice and other leading professionals.
3. Invest in yourself as an L&D professional: In smaller organizations, L&D teams often play multiple roles––content developer, project manager and facilitator––while also balancing high workloads and competing business priorities. Professionals that invest in their development can become more effective in their roles and gain the confidence they need to maximize their value proposition. Programs like Salience Learning’s Trainer Academy aim to help L&D professions build skills to efficiently design, develop and deliver impactful training that empowers teams to learn new skills in fresh and engaging ways.

Regardless of what stage your organization is in, establishing an effective L&D program will foster growth not only in your workforce but your business as a whole. We encourage you to assess what stage your L&D program may be in and dig deeper to explore the learning gaps or needs of your organization. These initial steps will get you started on your approach to an L&D program that gives you, your employees and your organization the desired results.

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[1] Rigoni, B., & Nelson, B. (2020, October 20). For millennials, is job-hopping inevitable? Gallup. https://news.gallup.com/businessjournal/197234/millennials-job-hoppinginevitable.aspx?utm_source=alert&utm_medium=email&utm_content=morelink&utm_campaign=syndication. 

[2] Ratanjee, V. (2021, March 1). 4 ways to continue employee development when budgets are cut. Gallup. https://www.gallup.com/workplace/309284/ways-continue-employee-development-covid.aspx.

[3] World Economic Forum. (n.d.). Skills stability. The Future of Jobs Report. https://reports.weforum.org/future-of-jobs-2016/skills-stability/#view/fn-13.

Krista continues her conversation with Salience Learning’s own Kim Portland, Ph. D., about the changes and challenges Medical Affairs teams are facing in 2021, and how L&D experts can better support key roles. This is the final part of a two-part series.

Access the episode here.

Krista sits down with Salience Learning’s own Kim Portland, Ph. D., to discuss the changes and challenges Medical Affairs teams are facing in 2021, and how L&D experts can better support key roles. This is part 1 of a 2-part series.

Access the episode here.