6 ways to equip yourself and your team with a sense of learning

By Servane Mouazan

Sense of learning = the way people make use of reflection and inspiration for themselves and others

Growing your social business means spending time managing the flux of information you generate, the data you collect, the anecdotal evidence, the academic studies that back up your claim, the ones that refute it - and then making sense of it all.  

And there are days when you wonder whether the learning you’ve gathered makes any difference at all. Despite thousands of studies converging into identical conclusions, sometimes money gets invested in the wrong ventures, commissioners still don’t take notice, reports don’t get read, or buyers demand something else.

It’s disheartening…

In this situation, what can you do to equip yourself and your team to be the guardians and the vessels of the knowledge that you need to sustain your venture now and in the future? How can you ensure that the learning you acquire grows the value of your venture, even when some of your people change?

At Ogunte, we’ve mapped six ingredients that make a great foundation for a learning culture:

1.  You and your team need to consciously assess and implement continuous professional and self-development needs. After all, training is not just about paying for a staff member’s day out - it is about investing in your own organisation and your future impact.
2. Identify how your knowledge is acquired (your sources) and create a system by which the team can easily codify and access it, then relate it to indicators of success. For instance, you can demonstrate that certain industry events ARE good value for money every year, because you get a good chunk of technical assistance, prospects for mutual collaborations, and you come out of them feeling like a new person!.
3. Investigate whether you create, or contribute to the creation of, a learning curriculum in your area of impact?
4. Support activities that ensure learning is cascaded inside and outside your organisation - and keeps on circulating. (Look at producing videos, how-to guides, roadmaps, co-mentoring, reverse mentoring, co-coaching, etc)
5. Encourage people in your organisation to become board members of peer organisations.
6. Systemise methods that enable people to understand and map the knowledge and the skills they have personally acquired and/or been able to share.

For more support, follow the rest of our series about 5 pillars of support that will help social entrepreneurs to face tough times.

You can also contact us here to trial a Thinking Booster or team coaching that could help you shape a plan around learning.

 You can also use our Beesmap Toolkit to help yourself off line!