Turn Your Team's Conference Learning into Action

What happens to conference learning once everyone is back at work? SHRM’s research report, Skills (R)evolution: Preparing Employees for Tomorrow’s Jobs, found that 68% of respondents at organizations with the strongest L&D practices rated skill retention as good or excellent, compared with 34% at other organizations.

The report highlights the importance of connecting employees’ learning & development (L&D) experiences to everyday work and supporting their learning beyond training. Your HR team can start by agreeing on what it wants to improve and how each member’s learning will contribute to that goal. 

Plan for Learning That Lasts

SHRM’s report identifies four connected elements of strategic L&D: aligning learning with business goals, assessing skills needs, designing relevant learning experiences, and maintaining the systems and processes that support them.

The report explains why those connections matter. An organization may offer strong learning content but lack a clear understanding of future skills needs. Another may have useful skills data but lack the leadership support or resources to act on it. 

For your team, the implication is to plan beyond what each colleague wants to learn. Identify the work that needs to improve, who can help apply new approaches, and what resources or leadership support they will need. Those decisions give individual development a practical connection to how your organization operates.

Give Different Learning a Shared Purpose

A shared priority does not mean everyone needs the same development.

SHRM’s research found that tailoring learning to employees’ needs was associated with stronger financial performance, better results on nonfinancial measures, higher employee engagement, and a more positive organizational culture.

If your organization wants newly promoted managers to hold more effective performance conversations, colleagues could contribute in different ways. A colleague who works on learning design for the organization might focus on opportunities for managers to practice. An HR business partner could clarify expectations within the business unit. A colleague overseeing HR technology could explore how existing systems support documentation and feedback.

Agreeing on the intended improvement helps you connect those contributions before choosing an approach. 

Connect Individual Learning at HR-X Live!

That shared focus can guide your team’s experience at HR-X Live!, the next evolution of SHRM’s annual conference grounded in SHRM’s HR-X framework for HR excellence. 

At HR-X Live!, each participant concentrates in one of four areas, or dimensions, of HR excellence: Talent Optimization, Market Discernment, Functional Acceleration, and Organizational Impact. They can explore electives across all four dimensions, and the experience includes applying learning to a real challenge and developing a practical playbook.

During the conference, your HR team can compare what each member is learning and discuss how it could support a shared organizational priority. For example, colleagues working to improve manager development could compare approaches to coaching, performance feedback, and supporting technology might work back at the office. Together, they can consider how those ideas would fit into the organization’s existing manager development program and what support would be needed to apply them.

Make Application Part of the Plan

SHRM’s report explains that even well-designed training needs leadership support, adequate resources, and a clear understanding of the skills employees need. After HR-X Live!, your HR team will need to consider those requirements when deciding on how to put its learning into practice.   

For the aforementioned manager-development example, your HR team might follow up their HR-X Live! experience by testing a revised approach with a small group of newly promoted managers. Together, they can agree on who will adapt the materials, support participants, and address system or approval requirements.

SHRM’s research on skills-first talent management emphasizes demonstrable capabilities. You can bring that same focus to evaluating development by defining what successful post-conference application should look like.

For the manager-development example, that might mean practicing a performance conversation, setting clear expectations, and documenting useful feedback. Reviewing those work samples can help your team identify where managers need further support.

A shared organizational goal gives your team a reason to learn together at HR-X Live! Each colleague can build skills relevant to their role, then help put that learning to work after the conference. The opportunity is to return with more than individual ideas: a coordinated plan, colleagues ready to contribute, and a clear way to assess what improves.