L&D Trends: Adaptive, Personalized, and Self-Directed Learning

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the digital transformation of the 21st century workplace. LinkedIn refers to this period as the Great Reshuffle. Many workers now demand new options such as hybrid and remote working arrangements and expect their employer to support them in skill acquisition and career development.

Self-directed learning (SDL) is personalized learning that meets the needs of each employee. SDL puts learners in the driver’s seat, empowering them to define their goals, to upskill or reskill with tools adapted to their individual learning style, and to pursue long-term career advancement. SaaS solutions, such as the Edflex learning management system (LMS), ensure that employees have high-quality, curated learning content at the ready.

Learning & development has a major role to play in creating a culture of continuous and adaptive learning. The future of work will encompass automation, economic uncertainty, demographic change, and the risks of new pandemics and political upheaval. Jobs and skills will change rapidly in this complex environment. LinkedIn, for example, found that members’ skills for the same occupation changed by 25% between 2015 to 2021. It expects skills to change approximately 40% between now and 2025.

Let’s dive into how corporate training can evolve to ensure that organizations and employees remain agile and responsive. From front-line staff to functional leaders to the CEO, embracing self-directed learning is a powerful way to empower employees and generate a return on investment.

Making self-directed learning work for your employees

Self-directed learning has multiple advantages for the organization and workers, particularly when it is supported by investment in the right L&D tech stack that includes a high-quality LMS and curated content solution to ensure content is timely, well-sourced, and relevant and so that L&D leaders can track engagement.

Here are eight reasons to consider a cultural shift to self-directed learning in your company:

1. Self-directed learning empowers employees to shift from being passive learners to actively identifying their own skill and knowledge acquisition needs.
2. Self-directed learning improves the skills and confidence in not only the individual employee, but it also generates accountable and self-directed teams.
3. Self-directed learning ensures that the acquisition of specialized skills is driven by the actual needs of the employee in a real-world environment.
4. Self-directed learning supports deep learning versus surface learning. Deep learning occurs when students focus on understanding the material and applying it, rather than just memorizing, or regurgitating it.
5. It enhances the bottom line by improving learning outcomes for employees.
6. Once a high-quality learning management system is in place, the cost of providing content and tools to additional employees is minimal. 
7. Learning how to learn is essential in a rapidly changing society. Self-directed learning builds confidence over time in one’s ability to master new challenges. This confidence, in turn, supports the emergence of strong and adaptable leaders.
8. Self-directed learning fosters critical thinking skills. Critical thinking is the ability to look at issues or concepts in a new way and to connect skills and knowledge across different domains. It is—along with communication, collaboration, and creativity—a fundamental skill for success in the 21st century workplace.

Harnessing these advantages requires a well-developed L&D strategy to support learners. Corporate trainers should be able to map learning outcomes to business needs and demonstrate ROI to the C-Suite. In the aftermath of the pandemic, L&D is assuming more responsibility for future-proofing the organization. Taking the time to build a world-class SDL culture is a core part of this expanded mission. This is why we developped an ebook to give you 5 ways to rethink learning and development in your company.

Without a strategy, workers can also burn out quickly. Self-directed learning can be powerful, but if employees feel that the resources on offer are low quality or difficult to access, they are likely to deprioritize learning.