Episode 4 - How L&D professionals can move from being order takers to strategic partners.

Details of the Episode

In this episode of the L&D Cafe - Pranav Kale, senior copywriter at iMocha speaks with Mr. Sunny Verma, the group head of Learning and OD, JBM Group, about why L&D professionals should focus on being strategic partners rather than just order takers. He talks about the Kirkpatrick model, the 70-20-10 rule, the tricks for evaluation, and a lot more.

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An edited transcript of their conversation is as follows:

Pranav - Hi, Sunny. Welcome to the show! Let's just go back to when we first met and you said something, you know, which has stayed with me today. Which is that, uh, you know, an L&D professional; most of them, and with a lot of like, you know, respect and love and care, you made a statement which was something like L&D professionals tend to carry a hammer everywhere.
And, you know, they are, they're looking for a nail or two to hit on. And, uh, you know, the analogy basically, you know, if I had to explain it, it basically means that we are trying to solve every problem with, uh, with training or, you know, with, uh, with a very templatized solution. And so that is, you know, what we'll be talking about today, the notion of L&D professionals being treated as order-takers and they are not being really considered as strategic partners.
And so I just want to let you know, get us started. With the question, what is wrong with being an order taker? You know, what, why should an L&D professional actually consider or even organizations for that matter, actually consider, this, this change or this transition of moving them from being order-takers to strategic partners?
Why care at all?

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Sunny - Cool. Thanks, brother. And,  I think let me go back to a conversation. I. Not for L&D professionals, but for training professionals. So to say that, when you have something like a hammer in your hand, everything appears as a nail to, uh, so, uh, that was a context where I said that not everything in this world can be solved through training.
And especially when we talk about an L&D professional, there are a lot of other arrows, uh, you know, which are there, which can be used in terms of solving issues. Or, uh, you know, maybe for developing people, uh, apart from looking at only training purely. Uh, so that was what I spoke about. And yes. You spoke about, order takers and from order takers to being a strategic partners.
I would say that, yes. Why not? Uh, see again, it's the perspective. I think that if you want the seat at the table and, uh, you have a viewpoint, which is for some benefit to the organization, then I think it is time for people to think on those lines, especially the L&D professionals, uh, when you're not a strategic partner and only an order taker, then they don't have any high chances that the leadership team or the business.
They have a lot of assumptions with respect to the learning needs of the people because you know, they are not every time they are not qualified to have a valid perspective of L&D, that's one. Second, is the L&D value proposition. When we talk about that gets eroded because at the end of the day, of course being an L&D professional, you have to talk about L&D, but then I think you have to look at it from a macro perspective, from a corporate perspective, from a business perspective, and then understand that how you kind of try to solve something or develop something.
So I think that a wide area of, you know, competency skills are required to qualify as a strategic partner and be an L&D professional at the same time. So, yeah, so that's what I think about. And, uh, when we talk about being a strategic partner, we need to understand that it has to be long-term, and you're not a strategic partner and just an order taker.
You are all dealing with the tactical quick. Uh, and you don't have a long-term perspective for the organization and the business, which has to be there once you have that long-term perspective and macro perspective, the overall aim of where you want to reach as an organization, then you can do justice to, you know, contribution.
Contribution to the industry and the business. So, yeah, that was my thought.

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Pranav - Yeah, it makes sense. So I mean, I do want to pull this thread maybe a little bit later off of long-term thinking. But, you know, going back to part A of your answer, do you, do you think this, you know, this, this mindset, my mindset shift of being a strategic partner, do you think it needs to come from the leadership team, uh, to the L&D team?
Or should it be vice versa? Is it top-down or bottom-up according to you?

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Sunny - I see it doesn't really matter if it is top-down or bottom-up what we need to understand as L&D professionals that are ready to take that. Am I ready I'm in, before convincing the upper management or talking about certain things, which you want as a right?
We need to understand that. Am I ready? Or, you know, do I have that adequate business knowledge, industry, knowledge, knowledge of the workplace, you know, to talk and have that vocabulary. Uh, when the business guys, you need to understand that accept the fact that, uh, if your businesses go, your organization is.
That is the time where, you know, your contribution matters a lot, because then you are the one responsible for accelerating it even higher. But you know, at the end of the day, uh, you can't think of L&D in isolation. It has to be aligned with the business. Your learning strategy should be aligned with the business strategy and that is the reason for your understanding, your understanding of business acumen.
Uh, you know, for L&D is very, very imperative. That's what, that's how I look at it. And you have to be a thought leader and have a point of view. Again, coming back to- you can't just be an order taker. You have to be a strategic part of, how you're solving certain problems. You know, we talk about, uh, you know, uh, acting as, uh, acting as a provider, uh, in, in those key decisions of understanding how it works, how it adds value to that.
How we are taking the business from a to B that does how you can create value for yourself. And like I said earlier, also the L and D value proposition is in your hands. If we can't show that in terms of value, then, of course, you remain as an order taker only

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Pranav - Right. So you, definitely want to come back, uh, come back to value and ROI, uh, you know, because that is also a very, very interesting conversation.
Uh, but like, you know, you spoke about business acumen and, it's clear that you know, you are someone who believes that, uh, L&D professionals, you know, their area of expertise is not purely training. They need to have business acumen. Uh, they need to know the department or the business unit for which they are going to solve the.
So like, you know, if you could through a hypothetical example or through a real example, like, you know, just share how to let's say- Pranav has joined an organization and I am expected to solve it again. You know, we can take up a made-up fictitious problem if I'm expected to solve that problem.
How do I go about tactically understanding the business acumen? Because I don't have the acumen so far. My previous learning or my previous expertise, is it purely learning and development? So how do I adapt and how do I gain that business acumen that you mentioned?

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Sunny - So, it's not rocket science, honestly speaking.
Normally what happens is that I have seen a lot of companies that have their, you know, training departments. So to say who they fashionably call as L&D departments, um, that's more of a fashion statement in the corporate rather than a, you know, uh, value adders. Uh, but you said that a person, so what happens is that, you know, normally we see the training department or that sort of, they're running around onboarding or certain, you know, training, which is more of compliance-based training.
Uh, those are not, so we have to think beyond those, you have to think beyond those onboarding inductions and compliance training. You have to think about how we can align ourselves with the businesses. You know, like for example, if I'm talking to a CEO of a business, uh, then I have to understand.
Uh, if I use my learning lingo, that will not be of any help to us compared to if I get into his shoes and start talking about the business of vocabulary. So, you know, the entire viewpoint changes. So we have to be very careful, cautious, and conscious of what we are talking about. And there are lots of ways of asking the same question.
It totally depends on how you kind of, you know, put it across. Uh, from the perspective that the person who was sitting across from the business guy, he understands. So it's just the way, you know, suppose you don't do a CEO and you're talking that this is my learning agenda. No, I think let's start with what is his business agenda and then how I can plugin my learning agenda to his business agenda.
Like I said earlier the value, the perceived value of, uh, you know, L&D and the alignment of L&D is very important plus you have to be a partner with the business. So these are two essential things which we need to take care of. Otherwise, no matter what you have you know, please be well thought out.
In the L&D strategy you have, you know, governance models, you have robust measurement plans, or you have some clarity. You know, articulated processes, everything will fall short because you are not collaborating, or partnering with the business. You are not, you know, uh, putting business, uh, before your L&D strategy.
So again, that's what I, when I made tactical and strategic, when I'm talking tactical, I'm talking very, very, kind of a quick mode of. And you know, more of a checklist, more of a vanilla way of thinking, but when you talk to me strategically, you are actually adding to the big strategic business plan of the company and how you are contributing there.

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Pranav - Right. Right. Yeah. I think that this is super juicy. So like, you know, just to double- click on this a little bit, right? I mean, I just make up an example. Let's say that, you know,  the sales team is struggling to close the deals. Let's, uh, let's again, like, you know, make up a fictitious number that, uh, you know, let's say that, uh, that their closure rate is 7% and the CEO wants this closure rate to at least go from 7% to 14%.
So, this is a business problem that, you know, the CEO has. Now now, how does the L&D team of like, you know, build on top of this problem?

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Sunny - No, I think what, you know, talking about a sales domain is very easy you know, uh, I get to talk about, because you can simply have a look at the numbers and that's how you can, you know, have a conversion.
So I think, so I have dealt with a lot of interventions, which were targeting sales teams. We need to understand so that the design of that intervention, in terms of understanding the problem, diagnosing the problem, right, is the first step, you know, when you're out converting 7% to 14% where we are, what are they, what is the value?
What is the volume, a complete diagnostic study on where we are and where we want to be, should be there normally happens is that, you know, like I said, that we start going on a hunt. And that hunt takes us nowhere. So a good amount of time and effort in designing something to solve that issue is important without keeping training in mind, understanding this is a problem area now and how we can solve it.
Now, when you start thinking along those lines, then you actually start thinking about 70-20-10 experiences. The importance of exposure, education experience, lot of other elements can get into play.

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Pranav - Yeah. there was something that, you know, you said, which I can't get enough of and just would love for you to elaborate; which is the diagnosis part. Right. Uh, so I mean, uh, how, how does the diagnosis take place? How do we approach a diagnosis? And you could answer this like you strategically or tactically in any way

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Sunny - I talk about very practical. Yeah. Where, like I said, in one of the, you know, real-time cases which I talk about.
Yeah, no, diagnostics study in terms of understanding the entire day in the life of a sales guy. In terms of, as an L&D person or a trainer or so to say or whatever learning partner, we're talking about its part of that, that diagnostic study to not just be the figures, but let's spend a day, let's have a field, a compliment call with the sales teams at different levels at different geographies.
Let's see, you know, and a lot of material. A lot of raw data will come into the picture, which was being seen by only looking at figures, I'm just giving this one very, very raw example of the compliment cause, but that is an important element of a diagnostic study. We can see how we can have those sorts of improvements in terms of, you know, the daily approach of the sales team or the sales guy, or that let's say geography for that matter.
And accordingly, you can design. See at the end of the day, our selling cycle or the buying cycle remains the same, the fundamentals, theories, concepts, frameworks, strategies remain, uh, you know, fundamentally as a concept remains the same, what matters is that we can see that what we work where. The doctor, for example, you know, I take an example of a doctor here.
I have studied medicine and I know anything and everything about I'm a general physician, but still, you know, I have to have that diagnosis. Ready to get to know a patient to understand what is the real challenge, and you know, what will work because I have studied medicine, I just can't apply all the medicines and all the treatments to everybody.

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Pranav - So do you mean, again, like, you know, I'm intentionally trying to get super tactical here and I hope, you know, you are ok with that do you think, uh, you know, that would mean, uh, attending the sales call, uh, with, with that particular sales person? Or would it mean like, you know, spending physically spending time in their office?

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Sunny - Starting from there so maybe there is a, you know, you can have certain formats in terms of, you know, understanding the perspective of the sales guy, uh, you know it, and why aren't you looking at the performance of the sales guy? A lot of things can come up. For example, maybe on the lines of demand and supply, maybe something on the lines of product quality.
So we have to think big, we have to have a broad mind in terms of understanding everything. Uh, normally what happens is when we talk about going from 7% to 14%, you only think, there is something lacking in the sales team, which is not true every time, a hundred percent of the time, there are a lot of other factors in play.
And with an open mind, let's have a look at that. And I have seen when you do these sorts of diagnostic studies really diligently and efficiently, you come to know a lot about what works and what doesn't work. And those are the areas that are the real triggers or the game changers for the entire portfolio.

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Pranav - I think you know one thing that just came to me is that the skill of, you know, big picture thinking is so essential for an L&D leader. Because as you said, maybe it's not the sales guy's fault. Uh, you know, it could be the collateral that he's been given or the PPT that he's been given, or maybe it's the product, you know, it, the problem could lie anywhere.
And, uh, the, we need to have the wisdom to discern the problem and, you know, make proper assumptions based on what we found.

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Sunny - And as I said, that, uh, it's not that every time things are not working. Uh, so it's our responsibility also as L&D professionals to accept the things which are working.
You don't need to fix everything. . No, a lot of time, there are things, there are processes and systems, which are working really fine. let's accept those. As you know, let's build on our strengths and improve our weaknesses. So, you know, but when you start looking at everything as a problem area and you want to solve everything that is a real challenge.

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Pranav - Do you think this tendency of wanting to solve everything comes from a place of you know, certain insecurities or wanting to prove myself that, you know, okay, I have done these many pieces of training and I have done these many things. Is it like, you know?

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Sunny - So, yeah, so that's, that's, that's where we are coming back to, uh, being a strategic partner when you are a strategic partner.
The business goal and your goal try to match up somewhere. You can't be opposites. You have to be complimenting each other or support each other. That's what a strategic partner is all about because then there is no checklist. Then what you're trying to do is just collaborate as an extended team of the business and try to help solve support, collaborate, and partner.
If you have that mindset, then the entire learning strategy changes because now you are talking business. Now you are an equal partner in that game. That is the situation. Then you are not bothered about the checklist. You are here to solve the problem. You are here to reach a goal. You are here to achieve results.
And that's what matters, whereas in a scenario for a problem order taker, you know, what you remain with is checklists, uh, publishing calendars, doing programs here and there, uh, but if you talk about the net, what are you getting out of it? Maybe at times, you don't have an answer. So the way you spoke about, you know, connecting ROI with L&D, uh, in one of the.
I think that only comes when you are partnering because then it would make sense to the business. Then it's really helpful for you. And that doesn't, that is an outcome of what has happened. So you are not deliberately designing everything to talk about ROI. The ROI is coming by default because you know that the approaches are totally different so from that perspective, so you have a Kirkpatrick model for measuring effectiveness. You have Jack Phillips for measuring ROI, and there are so many, you know, net promoter scores and you would emit. So all those formulas are there, but then, uh, you know, hand on their heart, you need to understand that, "Have I actually solved the problem?" and I've already reached there in terms of solving an issue. And that is, that is what we are looking at and talking about. And they could be, a thousand ways of measuring ROI. I'm not denying that, but then I think that it will make sense only, and only if it has solved some issue, some business problem, or contributed in some way or the other.
Otherwise, I've seen the best of the systems, processes, procedures, and practices. But net, it boils down to a lot of things which are very, very tactical, you know, things which are very, very checklists uh, in a way so, just a little bit of, you know, little change of perspective and then entire game plan changes is what I'm looking at.
And I think that's what we should look at also. Uh, so I have, you know, that's the reason I have a little, uh, the issue with the, all those vanilla programs, uh, which we do for the sake of training, uh, more of an entertainment. Uh, and so I think, uh, we have to look at that high time. You have to look at that and not just, uh, you know, all these sorts of programs for sales guys.
Uh, let's talk about functional development programs. Uh, you know, I see a big gap in a lot of organizations. When you talk about functional development programs, especially in service functions. Are we doing something to upgrade these guys? The teams, I will be doing something. We are talking. There's a great buzz about digitization, but, uh, you know, what about the basics?
There's a guy who works in your finances or HR, has been through with his education some 15 years back. Uh, where is he now in terms of skills? Is the upgrading himself or are we doing anything as an L&D organization for upgrading those functional personnel also? So I think holistically, we have to look at it then only in bigger, more high-impact learning organizations.

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Pranav - So I know just if we, if you just change gears a little bit and like, you know, take this call because so far you've spoken about the diagnosis for. You know, uh, if we can touch upon the 70-20-10, the thing that you spoke about, and then we'll move towards the whole ROI piece. So can you just like, you know, briefly talk about the 70-20-10 rule?

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Sunny - So at 70-20-10 experiential learning, when we talk about, we are looking at it from a perspective of where 10% is only training, and, you know, then you talk about 20%, which is more on coaching or mentoring, and then a 70%, which is more. Uh, you know, on-the-job learning or maybe something which is a big picture.
Uh, so we have to look at it from that perspective of experiential learning. And industrial learning, andragogy, pedagogy and heutagogy; we have to understand, how it works for person to person and for different age groups for gen Z, gen X, baby boomers, and millennials. So the entire paradigm, you know, all of the aspects of, uh, the, the target audience, uh, uh, it will be wrong if the language doesn't change.
If the, you know, the rules of the game don't change, they have to be different because the target audience differs demographically, there is a difference and the approach has to be different for all. You just can't have a cookie-cutter approach. You know, expect magic that never happens.
So that is the reason I'm saying when you spoke about, uh, you know, how we are looking at it from our, from our perspective of 70-20-10, it's nothing but a way of looking at an intervention or a developmental plan. When you have those individual development plans for employees, you have to put it across that it should not be only training.

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Pranav - So Sunny, correct me if I'm wrong, maybe I'm mistaken here, but from my understanding of what I see around in the industry, and again, like, you know, these are broad strokes, uh, that I am painting with. But I feel that, uh, the 10 that you spoke about is actually 80. You know, I mean, there is a lot of focus on content and training and very less focused on peer-to-peer mentoring or coaching that you spoke about.
So, is that a fair assessment or do you think I’m mistaken here?

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Sunny - No, that is what the hammer is. The hammer is training. So whatever I want to solve is with training, but if I have some other tools apart from the hammer, I would definitely love to use them also. But how many L&D people are exposed to that? How many people who call themselves L&D professionals are equipped with that, are aware of that, or are skilled in that?
That is the real question. Forget about developing people. Um, you know, raising the bar for competencies, we as L&D professionals, have we upgraded ourselves or are we using those primitive methods till today? How often do we develop ourselves, upgrade ourselves, update ourselves, because if we don't, then I think it's all gassy to talk about, uh, developing people and what not.
So we have to be very, very, you know, conscious and professional first. That's how we are learning today. We talk about different methodologies of learning with digitization, a lot of things are changing. The entire landscape of learning is changing. Are you aware of that? Are we using AI and robotics?
Uh, you know, virtual reality, all those facets in learning today? I'm not saying all of them today, but are we on that path? Do we know what the future workplace looks like? What is the future of learning; are we aware that are we on that path, starting with the automation within our learning and development domain, or are we still using those, uh, you know, historic methods of, uh, processing and evaluating and measuring? It starts from there
It starts from, so it's inside out.

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Pranav - Yeah. That's, that's a fair point. You need to walk the talk and you need to, uh, like, you know, change starts from within. So that's a well-made point. So, you know, speaking of ROI and, you know, so it's, it's come up a few times and you have also mentioned that the L&D team does need to be in a position where they can prove the value where they can actually say that, Hey, you know we solved this particular problem, but, uh, it seems that, you know, it's, it's, uh, again, like, you know, broad strokes, because I think you won't agree with this Sunny, but I think, uh, most, uh, L&D professionals are of the opinion that it's hard to do.
You know, it's, it's hard to measure the impact and it's hard to measure the ROI. Uh, one of the reasons that come up is, the cultural reasons that, you know, the organization just doesn't care, you know, just to execute the program, just take these a hundred people through the training. We don't really care about what happens next.
So there's a cultural aspect to it. And then there is the aspect of, uh, you know, uh, the entire thing being so complex. So just to go back to the sales example, uh, you know, I might execute, uh, let's say an intervention based on my diagnosis that may be like, you know, this particular skill was needed.
And I trained them for that this time. I did use training for example. But then someone else might come and say, Hey, you know what, there's a sales team. Also. We, we change the product a little bit because of which the sales have increased from 7% to 14%. So how much do I attribute to L and D? So that, that problem comes up again.
So these are just a few objections. And if you could, uh, tackle these maybe by using the Kirkpatrick, which is probably the most well-known model or in any way that you want, but how do we actually start measuring?

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Sunny - So I think, uh, it all boils down to how you want to look at it. Whenever we talk about measuring training effectiveness or ROI, a lot of people can make the mistake of looking at it from a perspective of money or figures numbers, which is not true in a lot of cases.
ROI can be in terms of, uh, maybe increased productivity? It can be in the form of cascading that knowledge to multiple people. It can be in the form of, uh, you know, uh, reducing costs, you know? So, uh, every time we talk about ROI or, you know, trading effectiveness measurement, we think X money to Y money, which is not the case.
There are a lot of other ways of looking at it, like a few of them, which I just proposed. Uh, we do something very beautiful here at my organization. Whenever we are doing your training program, uh, we asked the training participants to have two commitments, uh, you know, which must have emerged from two learnings of that entire program.
And how would you like to implement those learnings into your work life? And how would we solve any problem or add value to the organization or yourself? It can be anything. So, uh, you know, maybe a behavioral program or a functional program or a technical program, there must be some learning. That's something which we are, you know, accepting by default.
And then how you have implemented those learnings in your work profile from today. You know, the, the magical start, stop, change, continue. Uh, and how those learnings that you would start implementing, how would you measure in terms of how it will help, you know, in your work profile and that is, a simplistic and beautiful way of ROI measurement.

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Pranav - Yeah. Sorry. I just jumped in here to make sure that I've understood you correctly. What you are saying is that, you know, after an intervention has been done, the simple thing to do would be just to go back to the participants or the learners, ask them, like, you know, what are one of the two things that you have been able to grasp from this intervention and how have you applied them?

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Sunny - Exactly. And how you've applied or how you will implement those learnings and then how it can be of some benefit to the organization or the individual. So it is right at the end of the training that they have understood the concepts. They had their learnings, they can write their commitments, how they will do it, how it will impact what is the current baseline, which they will try to work on and how much they will try to improve.
It's increased productivity, reduce cost, increase something, decrease something. Uh, and then there is a continuous follow-up with them for, with a gap of one month after a month. And again, after a month, then after a month. See, so to say that how it is progressing and they have mentors aligned with them, which are in a lot of cases majorly their supporting managers also will be responsible for.
Helping them with, by lending a hand, uh, in terms of that journey. So I think that is what I'm saying is the simplest way of looking at an ROI of an intervention apart from just, you know, what happens is that people attend the program, there are happy sheets in terms of what was the program like, how was it? You liked it, enjoyed it? And that's it. I think a commitment to your learning is very, very important. No matter what. Big or small that intervention was. And we showed you don't track that. And you will be surprised to know that out of every batch of 20 odd people, there are at least 15 cases of showing some with real-time, uh, improvement, uh, you know, in terms of their work, in terms of adding value to the organization, to the business, to their profile.

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Pranav - But, just to be the devil's advocate here. Okay. Just to be the devil's advocate, you know, someone who has been through a program and, you know, if you're, if you're taking the data from him, there is a big chance that the data is biased, right?
Because I mean, he himself, or she might be feeling that, uh, this training changed me and maybe I'm being able to apply this, but maybe it's not actually happening in real time. So, so what do you recommend in such cases?

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Sunny - So in such cases, what we do is that you know, of course when it is something figurative, we try to get it validated by the finance department of that business.
We were going to extend, we want him to get that buy-in from him also in terms of, is it realistic? Is it possible? And this is not forced, you know, they have to, so the entire piece is designed in such a manner. Then there's a lot of self-introspection that happens where again, the idea is not to have a checklist.
I have a commitment that I prove something, but a self-introspection in terms of am I actually contributing post this program to my organization or to myself? And when you have this honest self-introspection, then what you drive makes a lot of sense to you first as an individual and then to L&D, then to the organization; the entire piece of, you know, making you.
Uh, to accept certain things, is, is the process that is the Tarsus, which we talk about where, you know, you're being trained or you being, uh, you know, kind of coaching in a certain manner that by the end of the day, you will not bluff what you write is what you mean. And what do you mean is business.

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Pranav - So, you know, if you had to go beyond these, uh, you know, these, these measures that you mentioned, or do you, do you think that are other, perhaps a little more complex ways of, of, uh, you know, measuring value or have we covered them all?

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Sunny - I think, uh, there is no complex way to measure, but there are different ways of measuring. Okay. Kirkpatrick is one way, the way I said, level 1, 2, 3, 4, where it measures your reactions, your behavior results, learnings, and, uh, there's a great way, which a lot of people across the globe have adopted in terms of measuring the effectiveness of training-
the other one is Jack Phillips level five, which we call ROI. There is a formula for it and how you can calculate it. Anybody can Google and they can find it out. Then there is a net promoter score there, you know, the people who are the promoters of, uh, the program, they talk about it. And you know, again, there's a formula for calculating.
So, uh, it's totally up to you as an L&D professional; how would you want to look at it? What kind of a unit do you want to measure, what happened at spot example? Uh, but you know, who did? They don't, uh, they don't measure GDP. What matters to them is the gross happiness index. So again, uh, you know, one of the examples, so as an organization, what matters is- how do you want to measure, what do you want to measure? That's totally up to you. And, uh, I will definitely agree that there are a lot of ways of doing it and measuring it. Uh, there is no one particular way, but multiple ways of measuring it, but it has to be your goal to understand what you want to measure.
You know, uh, like for example, two, three individuals let's talk about, uh, somebody is conscious of measuring their weight. Somebody's conscious of measuring there, let's say height that has grown in length or not. So it matters from person to person.

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Pranav - What is the one skill that you think all L&D leaders need to start in a learning today?

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Sunny - Learnability. So, uh, as an L&D person, I have to be, uh, you know, uh, learning skills should be the topmost agenda for myself. How am I learning? You know, am I learning? Am I upgrading myself? The way I spoke about, I see that piece missing in a lot of people of this domain, they don't upgrade, they don't update, and then they face challenges, uh, and they operate at a sub-optimal level.
But when you constantly upgrade, update yourself, and again, it's all great importance, not just to you, but your workplace also, but with the people, you are working with your team members, your peers, you know, you can definitely, that adds a lot of value. So you have to invest in developing yourself first, your learnability, your learning skills, your learning aptitude and attitude are really very important.
If it is not there in you, let's not expect this from anybody else, but if it is there within me, then I can definitely demonstrate how to tackle it, how to go about it, and how to achieve it. So I would strongly recommend that all the L and D professionals must update, and upgrade themselves on a regular basis

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Pranav - Yeah, I think, I think we have completed a full circle here.
You know, we started with the premise and then we spoke about diagnosis, the 70-20-10 frameworks. Uh, we also spoke about measurement. So this was so, so, so much fun. And I personally learned a lot, Sunny we can always like, you know, have a part two where we zoom in on one of, you know, one of these things for sure.
But, uh, what I like about interacting with you is that you're not short of opinions and you don't conform to, to, you know, what others are conforming to, you like to define your own path. So that has been one of the highlights of our conversation. So thank you so much for bringing so much value to this.

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Sunny - My pleasure. It was a great interaction, and I hope anybody who sees this podcast can pick up a thing or two from here and maybe have some learning and can add some value to themselves. A big thank you to you!

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Pranav - For sure. Thanks, sunny. And I hope to talk to you soon. Thanks. Bye!

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