An interview with Bryony Maud, Learning and Development Coordinator for the World Duty Free Group, who decided to organise a Learning at Work Week (LAWW) after meeting Findcourses.co.uk at an industry event in January. She subsequently entered and won the LAWW competition for a 4-seminar conference ticket to the CIPD L&D Show 2015, held in London Olympia in earlier this year.
Was this the first time you organised a Learning at Work Week for your staff? How did you find out about the initiative?
Yes, this is the first time I have organised the event, although the company have been involved for the past few years. The timing meant that we could tie in the theme with a benefits initiative that had just been launched within the company. As it was my first time organising the event, I found it really useful speaking to the people from Findcourse.co.uk at the Learning Technologies Exhibition in Kensington Olympia, as it gave me a good general understanding of the initiative.
Your theme for this year was "well-being". How did you come to choose this area of focus and how did you translate that into practical activities?
Well-being, whether it be physical, emotional or financial, is such an important factor in life that can often be pushed to the back of our minds by day-to-day life. Improving the health & well-being of employees and their environment makes them happier and reduces illnesses, which in turn increases personal happiness as well as job satisfaction & engagement. We decided that Learning at Work Week would be a fantastic opportunity to increase awareness of well-being and enable staff to learn about it in a fun and interactive way. At Head Office we had information sessions on "simply health" and the "ride to work scheme", promoted healthy eating with materials and a "smoothie bike", highlighted physical well-being with chair massage and "know your numbers" appointments and discussed financial well-being with our in-house pension specialist. The teams in our retail stores got on board with the theme with dance lessons, self defence lessons and healthy recipe sharing.
How has the response from your staff been?
Great! The variety of activities within head office meant that everyone could get involved. Whether they hopped on the smoothie bike (pedalling to power the blender and make the smoothie) or they simply read the materials on healthy eating, everyone had the opportunity to learn something new.
The teams in retail did a fantastic job with organising activities too! They used the expertise of their staff to share knowledge, and many collaborated with our in-house consultants to gain specific knowledge from them.
What advice would you give to other organisations thinking about organising a Learning at Work Week in the future?
I’d recommend starting the planning as early as you can! A lot of organisation needs to go into creating a week of dedicated activities and events, so get people interested early on so that you have the support you need. Saying that, it is definitely worth it! You can make the event as specific or as broad as you like and tailor it to the needs of your business and staff.
You won a set of conference tickets to the CIPD L&D Show in May 2015. What did you think about the event? How useful and relevant were the sessions you attended for your day-to-day work?
I found the CIPD L&D Show very interesting. It was great to hear examples of what other companies have been doing, and what worked/didn’t work for them. I enjoyed the Exhibition too, as it enabled you to speak to a variety of different suppliers at one time. Meeting these contacts will help me when researching potential suppliers in the future.
Will you be organising a Learning at Work Week in 2016?
Yes! We received great feedback and lots of people got involved. Whether you stick to the national theme, or adapt it to a specific company theme, it provides a great opportunity to promote learning within a dedicated week.
See also...
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What is Learning at Work Week? |
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6 ways to get the most out of an L&D event |