What does it take to reimagine the workforce and develop the skills needed for the future? Join us as we explore this fascinating topic with our esteemed guests, Michelle Ockers and Arun Pradhan. As experts in the field of learning and development, they have been instrumental in shaping our professional lives and those of countless others.
In this insightful conversation, we discuss how learning and development can deliver strategic impact, but we need to start with our own profession and lead by example.
As we navigate the future of Learning & Development together, Michelle and Arun share their wisdom on bridging the gap between disciplines and developing concepts that boost confidence. We also touch on the crucial role of lifting professional standards and living by the same learning methods we expect from others. Don't miss this inspiring episode, offering valuable insights for your own professional journey.
The Reimagined Workforce podcast is brought to you by Workforce Transformations Australia Pty. Ltd.
All opinions expressed are the speaker's and not the organisations they represent.
If you have a story about a workforce transformation to share and would like to be a guest on this podcast, please contact us at kathhume@workforcetransformations.com.au.
Connect with Kath Hume on LinkedIn
What does it take to reimagine the workforce and develop the skills needed for the future? Join us as we explore this fascinating topic with our esteemed guests, Michelle Ockers and Arun Pradhan. As experts in the field of learning and development, they have been instrumental in shaping our professional lives and those of countless others.
In this insightful conversation, we discuss how learning and development can deliver strategic impact, but we need to start with our own profession and lead by example.
As we navigate the future of Learning & Development together, Michelle and Arun share their wisdom on bridging the gap between disciplines and developing concepts that boost confidence. We also touch on the crucial role of lifting professional standards and living by the same learning methods we expect from others. Don't miss this inspiring episode, offering valuable insights for your own professional journey.
The Reimagined Workforce podcast is brought to you by Workforce Transformations Australia Pty. Ltd.
All opinions expressed are the speaker's and not the organisations they represent.
If you have a story about a workforce transformation to share and would like to be a guest on this podcast, please contact us at kathhume@workforcetransformations.com.au.
Connect with Kath Hume on LinkedIn
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Voice over:This is the Reimagined Workforce Podcast from Workforce Transformations Australia, the podcast for people and culture professionals seeking to drive meaningful, impactful and financially sustainable workforce transformation through curiosity, creativity and data science. In this podcast, we hear from talented and innovative people making a positive difference for their people, their organisations and those their organisations serve. They share stories and learnings to help others on their path to transforming their workforce today and tomorrow. Now here's your host, Kath Hume.
Kath Hume:So Michelle Ockers helps leaders to build a high impact learning and development function. With her guidance, learning can become a key lever to improve business performance. She helps L&D as a performance partner that adds strategic value. Her purpose is to create belonging in order to empower others so that they can expand their world and make a bigger contribution. Belonging and connection are a thread throughout how she works and the legacy she aspires to create.
Kath Hume:Michelle is a strategist, mentor, facilitator, trainer and speaker who believes that everyone deserves the opportunity to learn and perform at their best. Arun Pradhan admits that, first and foremost, he is an extremely curious, empathetic and geeky human. Beyond that, he is the GM of learning at ANZ, where he is working with a wonderful team to implement an ambitious learning and transformation agenda. He is also the co-founder of ModelThinkers. com, along with Shai Desai, which is a digital solution empowering you to be smarter faster. with the big ideas from the big disciplines. He helps to empower people and organisations to learn, innovate and perform. He has led countless projects and teams to co-design performance and learning solutions for some of Australia's largest companies and has developed a global reputation, particularly for his work in design thinking and developing learning agility. He was recognised as the AITD learning professional of the year in 2017 and won the e-learning industry Australia prize for individual excellence in 2015. He has experienced a range of emerging technologies and is an unashamed geek when it comes to cognitive, psychology, behaviour, economics, marketing and anything that provides insights into how people think, behave and change. Importantly, he is adept to translating his broad tech and get knowledge into impactful strategies. Michelle and Aaron are my heroes. I think I might be one of the most fortunate humans in the world who is able to state that they have been mentored by not just one, but two inspirational and intellectual experts whose generosity continually promotes the value that the learning and development profession can offer. They raise us all up to be better at what we do for the benefit of those we support.
Kath Hume:I reached out to Michelle in 2016 when I returned from a year living in the UK. I was about to embark on a new opportunity in New South Wales Health and I was absolutely determined to do everything I could to prove my worth. I desperately wanted to make a contribution to an industry that I was new to. Michelle's guidance provided me with direction and resources to do just that. She kept me just outside my comfort zone where I could stretch myself and offer the greatest value I could Over our time together. I'm unbelievably fortunate to be able to say that we've become great friends, which is a little bit tricky now because it's harder to arrange mentoring, because it becomes awkward about whether I need to pay for her valuable time. When I asked her to talk me through how she creates her hugely successful podcast, Learning Uncut last year, she provided me with all the details I needed in an area where I had virtually no knowledge or expertise. Yet here we are. I was honoured to be one of Michelle's inner circle at the 2019 Australian Institute of Training and Development Awards in 2019, when Michelle was widely acknowledged as the Australian Training and Development Professional of the Year. There is an awesome photo of us holding Michelle proudly grasping her well-deserved award in her hands.
Kath Hume:That evening, as we left the venue, the gorgeous and gracious Aron Padan, who had won the same award two years earlier and was someone who, in my mind, was as famous as Kylie Minogue, came to me to say that he valued the articles I'd written for the AITD magazine. The fact that the Arun Padan was even speaking to me was beyond belief, but that he'd taken the time to read my writing and affirm me, for it was beyond anything I would ever have believed would happen in my lifetime. He is such a genuine and generous human. He offered to call me so he could help me progress my thinking. Treating his word, he honoured this offer.
Kath Hume:when I contacted him about ideas I had around, how we leveraged purpose to achieve fulfillment in life and how his work and learning played into that, i met with him several times to talk through those ideas and how I could bring them to life. That all had to be shelved when COVID hit, but it's something I've recently returned to and are planning to bring to life in a book or some form. I have endless admiration for Michelle and Aron and all they contribute and still pinch myself to think that I'm fortunate to not only have been mentored by them both, but also to call them my very good friends. Their generosity continues. When I asked them both if they would be guests on the podcast that was due for release on the day of I would make my debut as a presenter at the AITD annual conference, they both agreed without hesitation. It is a great honour that, after possibly the longest podcast introduction ever, i get to introduce the inspirational Michelle Ockers and ArUn Pradhan.
Michelle Ockers:Wow, i don't know where we take that Arun I think we have to hang up now.
Arun Pradhan:We can't live up to that. I think so. It's going to only get worse from here on.
Kath Hume:Yeah, exactly, i have absolute confidence that you will demonstrate everything I've said there, and more, in the next 45 minutes.
Michelle Ockers:Kath, I've got to say, can I just say as a young mentor to a number of people, it was just a delight to mentor you because you just took action right. I think you were always courageous and it's like, well, what else can I do, what can I try? And it's just wonderful to be able to work with someone, both individuals and clients, who just get on with stuff and try things out, who are willing to test things, to do new things and are so open. I think that's one of the qualities I see in you.
Kath Hume:But it's a safe space to do it if you've got people who are backing you, who are supporting you, who you respect, who are intellectual experts in this field. if you're doing it on there And it was I wouldn't call it advice, because you never sort of said this is what I think you should do. Kath, it was more. here's some information, here's some content, here's some resources. Take this if you will, but the fact that you had given that to me gave me the courage to be able to progress.
Michelle Ockers:Lovely, and here we are.
Kath Hume:Yeah, so could I start What have got? We've got a list of questions. What I'm going to do is I'll start with you, michelle, and then we'll go to Aaron and then we'll just see where the conversation takes us. So, michelle, would you mind starting by telling us a little bit about what you do and why you do it?
Michelle Ockers:Okay, so my parents were post-World War II immigrants to Australia Dads Dutch and mum's German and they came out as children And when they were in their teens their families were kind of struggling financially and they were both doing well at school. But they both left school at the age of 14 to help the family financially And they were married very young Mum was 18 when I was born and dad was 21. And they were just such hard workers And I was really conscious of this work ethic from an early age And I don't think they ever made a fuss about it. But I was also really conscious that they had never had the opportunity to have a complete education and to be open to all the possibilities that a good education brings. And I remember when you know they couldn't afford private schools.
Michelle Ockers:But in Australia there's a selective stream in high schools, there's some schools that are set up and there's selective public schools, government-funded, set up on English and maths And I'd applied and done the entry exam. And I remember coming home from a school camp I must have been like 12 years old And this letter, this envelope, had arrived with, you know, the government stamp on it And mum and dad sat me down in the lounge room and I was on the lounge and mum was on one side of me, dad was on one side of me and my brother was there And I opened this letter and it was this letter of acceptance into this school And it was like everyone was so excited Like I think dad may have even had a tear running down his cheek And I was really conscious that I was being given an opportunity they never had and that my life was going to be different because of this opportunity. So one of the things that really drives me is this fundamental belief that everybody deserves to learn. Everybody deserves the opportunity to be at their best. I think people come to work. Most of them want to do their best in one way or another.
Michelle Ockers:So one of the things that really drives me is this idea of how do we make it easy for everybody to be their best self at work? How do we move some of the friction? How do we give everybody the opportunity to learn, not necessarily through formal education, but in ways that really support them to work at their best? So I think that's one of the things that drives me, and the way that expresses itself for me is largely through the work I do with learning strategy And I will say I'm happy to work with any organisation. But I've got this really soft spot for kind of frontline workers, for manufacturing environments, for physical stuff, and I think it goes back to that kind of childhood experience, you know, in terms of why I do it and why it means so much to me, kath.
Kath Hume:I think it takes me back when I was in year 11 and 12, i did a subject three unit Economics And one of the electives we got to choose was distribution of income and wealth, and I remember being told that virtually you can't move out of your class if you're of a horror demographic, then that's unlikely to change.
Kath Hume:And I remember being absolutely determined to buck the system on that And growing up in the Western suburbs of Sydney, being quite determined to say actually no, but if I can learn, then surely I can offer more value. And I've always since then and probably even before that, but just thought no, but it's learning is the differentiator. If you can learn and if you're able to learn and that's why I really like what that you do are into about the learning to learn and empowering people to create their futures because they're able to learn then that's what we're here for, that's how we empower people, that's how we can help them make a difference in the world, and that's where I see the whole purpose and fulfillment coming into it, because find what you love doing what's valuable to the world, develop your capabilities to do it and then go and do it. And we get such fulfillment when we know we're doing something that matters. That's awesome, and I think it speaks to why we get along so well.
Michelle Ockers:Yes, i grew up in the Western suburbs of Sydney as well.
Arun Pradhan:Yes, I mean, my experiences are actually quite similar to both what you've been talking about. Then I actually grew up in a place called Wayala, which is a BHP town in South Australia, and similar experience where, like you know, really working class town and just seeing the people who were making it beyond Wayala, the key difference being education. I think I was partly slightly uncomfortable with that intro, kath, because I feel like you're not giving yourself enough props to, and I think part of my motivation is just the sort of frustration at the sort of celebrity culture that we have around ourselves And just like.
Arun Pradhan:I think I'm putting people up on pedestals and stuff, So like even the way someone might invent or someone might happen to be around in eBay or do some really dodgy website, dodgy sexist website that ends up turning into Facebook And suddenly these people are considered to be talented billionaires who are like you know, who have some sort of way of seeing beyond anything else anyone can see, And yet, from my opinion, they get really great experiences in those and really privileged experiences and have really privileged conversations and opportunities to experiment with billions of dollars and burn social media sites just, or do whatever they want. But that celebrity culture I think takes away from people to think that there's almost like people who can do and people who are just like you know, down the bottom. So I'm finally I'm driven by that and just realizing that people have a tremendous ability to develop and learn and wanting to be on that side of things, wanting to be on the side of empowering people.
Kath Hume:And I think it also talks to your purpose where, if you've got these capabilities? So I think that the social media giants have really understood behavioural economics, understand cognitive psychology. Have they used it for good? I don't think so. I watch my kids, and myself too. This is the way I'm driven to my phone and the dopamine levels that get pushed because my phone is there. But have we made the world a better place because of this? I'm not really sure that we have. What if those people had a more positive purpose for the world and saw it not just as an opportunity to build empires but to say well, how do we face the world's biggest challenges with these tools and technology, and how do we use that for good? Anyway, that's going off on a massive tangent, but I'll get weighed. This is already an emotional enough episode without me going along that tangent. So, aaron, could we just talk a little bit?
Kath Hume:You've got lots of things that you're offering to the world. Do you want to just explain a few of those for us, please?
Arun Pradhan:Well, now, because I've given away my consulting because I got a day job. Really, the only thing I've got as a bit of a side hustle is model thinkers still, and as you described model thinkers, the brief was really how do we support people to be smarter, faster? And what I found was the need today to be a greater cross-disciplinary thinker, to grab concepts from different contexts and apply them. And certainly that was what I was doing. That kind of made my own life Like. I was trained in architecture and then worked as a UX designer.
Arun Pradhan:Before going into The UX designing happened to be for one of Australia's first LMSs and then happened to go into sort of learning, with a bit of a detour towards sales, and I almost had a branch to say and it was SEO engineering at the time And I almost had a choice to go down sales and marketing or learning and went down learning using those skills for marketing. So it had worked for me And so wanting to support other people to be able to grab those concepts from different disciplines and apply them in their own world more effectively. So that's model thinkers, which I do with Shai, and then my day job is general manager, like really heading up Enterprise Learning for ANZ, which is quite a considerable job too, given there's a lot that goes on at ANZ.
Kath Hume:Yes, there's massive organisations, but leaving the charge, no doubt, and I just see Rat the Hillm for the whole transformation journey there, and Michelle. I listened back to Kat Malcolm's episode the other day around how she's capturing metadata and making learning more accessible, and that was really intriguing. So I think that my background is actually in financial services. I actually started my career in ANZ Bank.
Arun Pradhan:I didn't know that.
Kath Hume:Yeah, there's huge opportunities in those organisations And I think that they've got the technology, they've got the foresight, they've got that innovation mentality And they're also driven by. We need to make this a better experience for our customers, and I think that's really admirable, that we've got you leading the charge there.
Arun Pradhan:Yeah, i mean, i think there's no big company that can sort of stand alone from big tech, and so and the big tech have obviously been very user centric and iterative and agile in the nature of how they produce products and services, so that's basically impacting everything, and the big four banks and all banks really are going there as well.
Kath Hume:And they do feel like they're ahead of the game in some respects. All right. Now the question that I ask all my guests is this is a reimagined workforce podcast. So when you dream of the future, could you tell me, michelle, what does your reimagined workforce look like?
Michelle Ockers:The kind of words that come to mind are porous, fluid, collaborative. I kind of got this picture of something very dynamic. I think in a lot of big organisations. Some of them are breaking through but there's still a tendency for very siloed thinking. I think our traditional structures around job roles and functions kind of start in a breakdown a bit And I get really excited where I see people working And it's capital aim or agile ways and bringing people together around specific outcomes, projects, initiatives.
Michelle Ockers:I think, if you think about the realm of learning and development, where I obviously work, there's very little at a strategic level that we can accomplish on our own. There's some really big challenges that organisations are grappling with And in the past I've too often seen, even within the HR or people and culture functions, people trying to kind of almost put a boundary around. This is my part of the problem. You know I'm the OD team. I'll take senior leadership, i'll take this Learning and development. You take these other things. The talent team does something else. But I think what's happened more recently is we're starting to recognise that some of the bigger challenges cut right across the talent life cycle And we've all got to come together and work together And those that are making the most progress are those that are actually finding ways to work a lot more cross-functionally. So I think breaking down some of these boundaries and borders is one part of it, reaching even beyond the boundaries of the organisation and forming collaborations, partnerships. I've been doing some research, actually for the ARTD conference, kath I'm doing a session on microcredentials And you know they start to make an impact when you get into partnerships Across education, sector, industry and organisations. So this idea of more solid partnerships where we bring together different expertise to solve problems in new and novel ways And that we're more fluid around how we structure, i think the whole shift to skills is helping with that. We're not there yet, but I think in time we will. And when you look at talent marketplaces I've done one learning and podcast episode around Schneider Electric and their talent marketplace What that's starting to do is to see skills as a new commodity isn't the right word but a new way of looking at how we can bring people together to pursue different opportunities. Microcredentials has the potential to do the same thing, but even on a bigger scale. This interoperability and transportability And most of the Western governments are looking at that at a policy level as well. Now, the idea that not everyone's an employee. I've got a data analyst in Turkey that I work with, i've got a graphic designer in Nigeria. I've got a couple of marketing people in Australia putting together the skills you need in the way you need at the time you need to solve challenges And, i think, more openness.
Michelle Ockers:I was at the Smithsonian I'm not meaning to name drop anything here, but I had this trip recently. It was an amazing trip. I went to London to the Learning Technologies Conference and that was the 3rd of May, and then three weeks later was the Association for Talent Development Conference in San Diego And I kind of did a bit of a round trip. I was at the Smithsonian University sorry, smithsonian Institute and it's a series of museums And I was in the American History Museum and I had this special section on innovation and places of innovation and what makes for places of innovation around particular domains or areas.
Michelle Ockers:And one of the things that really struck me was something I think we've kind of lost sight of a bit is the openness and the open sharing of knowledge and initiatives rather than it being competitive. I think maybe we saw a bit more of that during COVID and the race for a vaccine, but this idea that we all get better and society gets better. Everybody benefits from greater openness and less closing of boundaries and closing of knowledge. So that's kind of I don't know if that was very coherent, but it's more around this kind of openness, more dropping boundaries, working more fluidly and using skills and expertise wherever they come from to solve problems and to do things better.
Kath Hume:It's funny. When I did my strengths finder a couple of years ago I think competitive was right down the bottom And I found that quite insightful And it's always driven my husband a little bit crazy when I play netball because I clapped the other team when they score a goal and he always says to me no, catherine, you do not clap the other team. But I think we're not Like if people are doing good things, and I do feel like there is massive opportunities in these ecosystem models where we can leverage and share talent. Rather than this, we own talent as an organization, and especially in these rural and remote towns where we might have an organization that has found its unicorn that they've been able to place there And maybe that person's time isn't fully utilized in that particular role. They may have additional capacity. They may have partners and family that they bring with them. How are we making sure that all of those people are optimized? And they're doing that because they're doing things that they can contribute value to And it's back to that whole sense of purpose. You know, why are we here, what are we contributing to the world And how do we enable people to do that well, so that they get experience of satisfaction and fulfillment from it, so I love it. I think to that collaboration that you speak of.
Kath Hume:We've had endless conversations, michelle, just around that human skills and the need for people to develop the capability to just talk to each other, and it was interesting an episode I had a couple of weeks ago with Ed Morrison. He's written a book about strategic doing and there's 10 skills that he's actually gone and done lots of research and proven what they are, and it's really quite formulaic And he says some of us have really ordered it naturally, but they are things that can be learned And I think that they're almost an essential component of you know. I'd love to see them brought into curriculum because they're the skills that we're going to need going forward And that really I cannot see getting replaced anytime soon by robots and AI. So let's move over to our curious geek, then, and that's been probably a lovely segue. What does your reimagined workforce look like?
Arun Pradhan:I mean I think Michelle covered it really well. I think you can go either micro or macro And if you think of it from an individual point of view, a reimagined person is that person who is cross disciplinary, is collaborative, has those human skills, is able to adapt and use their skill stack in different contexts. And I think, if you expand that out to think of the workforce, it's the same sort of things that Michelle was talking about there, that there's a greater fluidity and going with that sort of at that skills level, rather than putting people in their little box and saying this is your career now. It's the idea that I feel like we've gone through a bit of a phase where previously you know you'd get an education, then you'd have your career and that was the thing that was like, you know, a grandparents kind of world. And then there was a period where you would get, maybe, an education and then you would have to reinvent along the way, which is kind of what we've been talking about for a while now. And I think now it's shifting a bit more to organizations, supporting that reinvention and actually giving you the data to say you've got these skills. There's actually opportunity over here If you add XYZ and these experiences, you could actually move in this spot And it's a win-win because the person is actually wanting to be relevant, wanting to make an impact, and the organization is gaining too. So it's not just doing out of the kindness of their heart. There's a win-win there, there's a trade off there. So I think so what Michelle said really echoed and even what you were saying, kath.
Arun Pradhan:One of the initiatives like ANZ, we're definitely moving down that granular skills path with launch and UKBilly framework. One of the things that's driving that more is that it's actually part of the system. So with the new implementation of HRIS, it's sort of like across that whole talent life cycle. So even to the point where, previously, where we're like, where L&D are talking or ODA are talking about assessments, what we're finding is we're having conversations with the recruitment people and like the whole talent life cycle to try to get consistency around assessments and ask well, what does that talent profile, that skills profile, look like for an individual and how has that sort of come up to play in different parts of their journey? And similarly to your point, kath, around those human skills, we actually did a, the team actually did a whole analysis piece around both external and internal, about what are the most in-demand professional skills. We're calling them. I prefer human skills, but professional skills have the better cut through.
Kath Hume:Yeah, that's right. People die in days more possibly.
Arun Pradhan:Yeah, and we're actually developing programs around that which are kind of interesting because we wanted to get away from the generic And so they've got the sort of centralized experience like we even had James Clear talking about, like habit development as part of that. But then the good stuff happens at the contextual level. So we're actually going with critical segments and understanding, well, if this group could actually prioritize more effectively or if this group could use storytelling and influencing more effectively, what would that give them? So we're doing the performance consulting at that segment level and but still rolling out those skills more broadly, but being able to contextualize it for those key segments as well, to be able to build up skills which are kind of universal but really in a contextualized way. That's the plan anyway.
Kath Hume:No, it's great because I've got a daughter who's studying nursing at the moment and she started during her HSC or her final years of high school And it was a real relief to my husband and I to have a learning experience where she was learning practical skills. It was all contextualized, so she wasn't ever loving maths. But when you put maths in the context of this matter is because if I don't get medications right, you know people die. There is that contextualization piece is the motivator but also clicks the knowledge and the skills into what matters And I think it's a beautiful blend And I think it's funny that we have and I understand why we do that we have an education system where you go.
Kath Hume:So my son, for example, will sit today in engineering and then he'll stand up and he will go to maths and then he'll stand up and then he'll go to another subject where those same skills are being applied in different ways. Wouldn't it be great? And I know that this is a pipe dream and we've tried project based learning and things like that, and I understand why we need to do it with the curriculum that we've got. I would love to see a world one day where he can go and do his maths, economics and engineering all at the same time and relate all of those concepts in a contextualized way that makes sense, so he doesn't have to come home and say, why do I need to know this?
Arun Pradhan:Yeah.
Michelle Ockers:Spot on the number of times you hear kids, and I went through the same thing with my daughter with some of her subjects. I don't understand why I?
Michelle Ockers:need to know this. I don't understand why I need to be able to do this. because it's not context based, it's not relevant enough to them, because you've got to lay the foundation somewhere right and it starts with. you know, i did this. I can't believe I'm going to talk about this.
Michelle Ockers:I lived in the UK for a few years and I did this course through City and Guilds called creative design for embroidery. It was actually very cool, but one of the things we did was in that you did an art unit and an embroidery unit at the same time And we might have been learning of a particular type of embroidery. So straight stitch, right, and there's a number of like this cross stitch variants and a number of different types of straight stitch. Before you could get creative with it, you had to learn the fundamentals. You had to learn how to do it right, and then you had to. then you could just start breaking the rules and bringing the art into it and so on, and it's almost like you need a certain base level of skills that you have to develop and then look at how can I apply it in different contexts. Aaron, what's your take on that idea of teaching skills independent of context. I guess it's different for adults than it is for kids as well. Yeah, absolutely.
Arun Pradhan:I mean with kids. Even I went to the extreme.
Voice over:Like we actually homeschooled our kids for a while and we unschooled.
Arun Pradhan:So we did it totally unstructured, because I was influenced by the summary model and by people like John Holt who were railing against formal education In at childhood level, and so we did like the whole point of unschooling or homeschooling at that point was really about trying to expose your kids to interesting experiences and people So they would maintain curiosity and then and then providing structure for them when they want to, were motivated to learn something. If I was to do that again, i think it was great if you're really really hands on and had amazing energy, which we didn't always have at the time. And I think those building blocks are quite crucial and I think it's about trying to provide the motivation for those bloat or the relevance for the motor, those building blocks. And I think in an adult context, the way we're rolling out the capability academies, for example, is going to be pool. It's not going to be pushed, people don't have to do it But it's also going to be cohort based, so a team is going to have to create like a, like it might be.
Arun Pradhan:Often, i imagine we haven't done it yet, right. So this is the plan, but I imagine the way it's going to work is a leader might say well, we need X, but also individuals might think we want these skills and they're going to have to like almost win their team over to it And then the team are going to go as a journey, as a group, and I think that provides immediate opportunities to contextualize. So we'll be delivering some key concepts and like, obviously a scaffolding of a learning experience, but we'll also be doing contextualized work with different personas, essentially to give them off the shelf scenarios or stories that they can apply. So it is a balance. And I think that's one of the challenges of the sort of industrial kind of a learning complex, if you like, is that it went very generic and push that to far and relied on people too much to try to find the relevance and contextualization for themselves, which is fine for some people. But I think in general you've got to provide a bit more scaffolding there.
Kath Hume:Yeah, absolutely.
Michelle Ockers:Do you remember when Beth Hall was at Cottonon and she set up Cottonon University and one of the things they did with their leadership development I'm going to say it loses the word program loosely. They had credentialing, like they called them creeds because they're cool. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, they are cool, they always cool.
Arun Pradhan:I always struggled working for Cottonon. I know you'd be right.
Michelle Ockers:I wouldn't, i'm an old man. But one of the things they did was they didn't facilitate learning. They facilitated a project based off right. So people like you didn't do change management as, like this theoretical subject, you did change management when your team was having to work on a change, so that was your project, and they would facilitate the work, not facilitate learning. I don't know how far you're going down that path, but that always struck me as a particularly useful model.
Arun Pradhan:Yeah, I think if you can connect it with, as we know, like close to the point of need and the point of apply like people are motivated. I mean it's so sad that people think engaging is just make people click more, as opposed to engagement is actually make it relevant, make it really like timely, and then ideally, make it social and so on as well. So you've got those behavioral economics aspects in there as well. So, yeah, we're definitely trying to go that way.
Kath Hume:Make it have an impact, make it so as, when they go and do their job, they actually do their job better and they feel better about themselves because they're doing a job that they love and your purpose is meaningful and therefore are adding more value.
Michelle Ockers:Yeah, have we taken your right off track.
Kath Hume:Yeah, i've got four or five questions. Ashley Sinclair from the UK, who I love because she's a little bit controversial and she's unashamedly so she's put up a post after the conference recently I think it was actually Lantec, but she was saying what could we do different next year? And I did sort of throw out what if we had a conference where, yeah, we had speakers, but we also then took the content from what the speakers spoke about? But then we sat in a room together and went OK, this is a problem that we have. How can we bring in what we just learned, workshop that together, because then all the humans in the room too, who are knowledge experts in their own areas could also contribute. And what a great opportunity it would be to you know where else are you going to get that cross industry insights and really understand who can play in this space and how we can learn from each other. That's possibly one of my reimagined workforce things that I'd like to see in the future.
Arun Pradhan:I mean, you described a hackathon and like it's something I've been suggesting to conference organisers for quite some time.
Michelle Ockers:It would be very cool. Maybe we need to organise for that Breakaway Don't get carried away.
Kath Hume:Don't get carried away. All right, let's go back to my questions. Have a look. Other than the AITD professionals of year awards, it is both one. What are you most proud of about your work and what you're achieving? And I might go to you first this time, Aron.
Arun Pradhan:It's funny When I think of what I'm really proud about. it's kind of like it's that Stalin quote which is really weird way to start this conversation. It's part of my brain is saying not to go there. But like what was he say that? you know he was talking in terms of like deaths and stuff, but what's the quote?
Michelle Ockers:I don't know where you're going.
Arun Pradhan:One one person's death is a tragedy. A million persons of death is a statistic, and so it becomes impersonal after a while. So I've been involved in some really large programs for very large organisations, but I haven't had that. There's a dissonance with the empathy, if you like. Like it's kind of like you and you don't really see the impact you make.
Arun Pradhan:And so, ironically, the things I'm most proud about are the teams I've worked with and the people I've had been, not necessarily who have experienced the solutions I've rolled out or helped develop, But the people who have been in my immediate sphere because I see them.
Arun Pradhan:I see like you know, i see the development and and there's that sort of ongoing relationship with them and so on. So when I think back, that's what I'm most happy about. It's not particular programs because it's like, yeah, we, i saw the data and the data looks really good, but it's not as human for me. There might just be my lack of imagination and that respect, but it's just the people in front of me that I feel like I've made an impact or helped make an impact, and they've made an impact on me as a result as well.
Kath Hume:I know this podcast episode isn't about me, but I taught economics at one stage and I had a student whose parents had said you're not allowed to play soccer unless your results improve, and I sort of. They came and saw me and I said what if we'd slipped it? and said you can play soccer and still your results go down? And so she was allowed to play soccer And when she graduated she just gave me the most beautiful hug and she said thank you so much, miss. If I hadn't had soccer, i would never have survived the past two years. And just that. To me it was a small thing, a massive thing to her I wholeheartedly agree with you that it's a difference in people's lives And what?
Michelle Ockers:about you, Michelle. So what you guys just said, absolutely, When you can see someone grow or see a group come together or see a people's mindsets come open. But the other thing, well, firstly, in terms of ARTD profession, the year I set it at the time and when I accepted the award, it's almost like it shouldn't be an individual award. And I don't know if you follow a guy called Austin Cleon K-L-E-O-N. He's I can never remember. I think he's an artist who writes. I don't think he calls himself a writer who draws. I think an artist who writes. Brilliant guy. And he's written a few little books, including one called Show Your Work and another one called Still Like An Artist, which is really cool.
Michelle Ockers:But one of the things he talks about is being part of a senior, that this whole idea of the lone genius is an absolute myth And we don't achieve things on our own. It's not the way the world works, So surrounding ourselves with others. So, in terms of an ARTD professional, you know one gets there on their own. It's almost contrary, because it's only through your connections with other people and being part of a scene, If you like, a network, that you get to make an impact. And to that point.
Michelle Ockers:The other thing I'm proud of is probably the Learning Uncut podcast. It's about to turn five years old And I could never have imagined that you know I would get. Firstly, I would get so much joy and learning out of it myself, And every episode is a case study. But how cool is it Like people in our profession are so open and willing to talk about their work that I can keep finding people to talk about things they're doing in their work that are having an impact in their organizations in the area of learning.
Michelle Ockers:I don't look at the data anymore. I used to like early on, how many countries have I been missing in how many downloads? But I've stopped tracking the data a while back. And then what I get a real kick out of is when someone comes to me, and every now and then I get an email or a message from someone to say I have one recently from a woman who works at 711 and she reached out and said I listened to this episode you did with Dye Hickman at the Australian Public Service And what I realized was this I was really stuck in the work I'm doing with getting people engaged with it And I think this idea of principles, decision principles that explain what learning looks like and that we use them consistently with all of our decisions around learning. Like I think that's going to unlock so much. Every now and then I get someone reach out and say I took this away from that episode and here's how I'm using it, And it's just such a joy for everyone that reaches out.
Arun Pradhan:There'll be like 5000 that didn't. It's such a magic trove of knowledge that you've got there. I'm just I was thinking the other day, you know, with the rise of generative AI, i was thinking the people who have got like interesting knowledge bases are going to be really well positioned and yours, like, you could actually turn them on transcripts, feed a LLM into that and have a L&D expert advisor.
Michelle Ockers:You know, like say So I'll tell you a little secret. This is going to put me on the hook, oh my goodness. So there's this doctoral by public works program that Middlesex University runs and some well known people in the industry have either done it or are doing it, and I had the opportunity to take a closer look at it and actually drop in on one of the cohorts just an informal meeting when I was in the UK recently. And I'm so excited about the possibility of doing it because I could use the podcast as my body of work. And then, aaron, what you'd like about it.
Michelle Ockers:I don't know if you're familiar with this program, but what it does is it says for your public body of work, bring a multidisciplinary, transdisciplinary set of lenses to look at that work, to critique it, to figure out how you can build on it, extend it, build the contribution from that body of work. So I think that would be an awesome opportunity. So, yeah, the podcast. I think it makes a contribution, i think it makes a difference. It helps me stay connected with people across the profession And I really love doing it.
Kath Hume:And honestly, michelle, it's so easy to access, it's so jumping, and any episode seems to relate to what I'm doing, and it's been the constant, i think, for me over the past five years is that there's always there, it's always something that I can go to and I can reflect in, and then if I do have something that I'm looking for, i can go and find it there And so you could do a search on the web on the podcast page on the website You can do a search with any term you like and see what I know.
Michelle Ockers:I do it regularly. Can I talk about? I like where you're heading with AI. I don't think that collaboration.
Kath Hume:Michelle, can I talk to your point around? no one works in isolation And I'll hardly remember that. And you know my slogan is something like creating brighter futures, comma together. So everything I have is comma together, because I completely agree, we don't do anything on our own, but I do think the difference with the people who are awarded learning and development professionals the two of you bring people up with you. So, yes, you don't do it on your own, but you also don't bring people in, use them and send them off. You are doing it because you are wanting to develop people who are in that conversation with you, and I think that is the difference for me And that is where you get awarded the recognition, because you're doing it for us. And I really see that the work that both of you lead.
Kath Hume:And, aaron, i'm just thinking model thinkers I can't tell you the number of meetings that I have been in where people have had discussions and I've said hang on a minute, let me just show you this model. So, for those of you who don't know, go and check out modelthinkerscom. I guarantee you will find something. But the fact that you send us a weekly email, aaron, connect the dots and your latest work. So saying this is how these different models fit together. It just makes sense. And it is so simple, it is so easy to bring into a conversation. It's got the visual there for people so you can talk to the concept how it applies. It is just gold. It is just such an enabler And I can't imagine an industry or a professional that can't use that in their work.
Arun Pradhan:Oh thanks, Kath, I mean, honestly, it's the way my brain was working And it was like just trying to commercialize the notes I was taking for myself at the end point Whenever I got too clumsy. Now it's getting a bit slack. It was like now I do this publicly And now it's like holding me to account as well. But yeah, I feel like there was a real in terms of where the world's going and just needing, as we discussing, just trying to hook up those different disciplines and have quick ways of understanding different concepts. Obviously, if you need to go deeper, you need to do the work, But just to get initial concepts that you can use quickly and get that confidence up is kind of where I was going with it. So, thank you.
Kath Hume:And it's funny because there's a number of times. So, for example, i was having a conversation the other day and I said, oh, that's a temporal landmark. And everyone looks at me like this My stance is in the room.
Arun Pradhan:And they said did you mean it was a Monday?
Michelle Ockers:I just love it that everyone thinks I'm really smart. And then, I'd say, oh, hang on.
Kath Hume:I have to be honest, he's dispute it. What do you?
Voice over:think.
Kath Hume:Because you might want to take a look at, and Kudos to Shia as well for that, because he's been great with it.
Arun Pradhan:Yeah, he's always making the suggestions and bringing things back down to reality with it as well as like just really because he's so just action focused and business savvy, yeah, yeah.
Kath Hume:I can so see that He's getting in the background and saying, yeah, that's good to hurry, but yeah.
Arun Pradhan:Yeah, he'll tell me when I'm getting too geeky.
Kath Hume:Yeah, i remember you showing us your Trello board one day and it just I had a little bit of a moment that we didn't quite particularly well with that.
Arun Pradhan:I think that's. I've cleared it down to 500 concepts now.
Kath Hume:And that's why I just go to model thinking, because I'll let you do that hard work. We're running out of time. I knew we could do this. Could I ask you I'm just looking at our questions which one's the best one? So we've talked about how you empower others, so we can probably skip that one. What about? where do you think the learning profession is headed, michelle? Oh, it depends which research report you're reading And we're hanging out with basically.
Michelle Ockers:Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, yeah, there are times I'm truly deeply optimistic. And you know, i see you know, if you read the link the last two years worth of LinkedIn workplace learning reports. You know we've become more strategic, come more central, come more cross functional. And I look around me and I see examples of that. Right, i see Aaron's team at ANZ, i see the work that Damien Woods is doing at 7-Eleven, i see the work that Gareth Colleen did at Rease and I get really excited and think, yeah, we're making, we've come a long way.
Michelle Ockers:But then I look at the Mind Tools for Business Learning Performance benchmark and it's like we're still dealing with the same old issues and we're still struggling with the same practices, with the same skill sets. We know like there's plenty of evidence as to what it takes to make an impact in the world of learning and development, but we still struggle as a whole profession with putting those in place. And I think partly as mindset and courage, but partly it's also because the profession is so porous And I gave a session at the Learning Tech Conference in 2019 where I challenged are we even really a profession? Because we don't actually meet a lot of the criteria truly for a profession, even though we like to call ourselves a profession.
Michelle Ockers:We don't have professional standards in place, there's no barriers to entry. Anyone can come in without any knowledge whatsoever and say I'm now working in learning and development, so there's this constant body of new people. Why do we have to keep debunking learning? It's because there's constantly new people in there who are falling into the same traps. Right, so I'm optimistic overall, but I really think those who are in the profession for the long term and have kind of built up a strategic position I hate to say the word responsibility, but it's on those people to help bring the others along and to lift the professional standards, for us to make a difference and to hold on to the more strategic position we do have now. I think we can do it, but we should always remember that it is a poorest profession and there's always new people who are nick mentoring, who need guidance, who need some solid practice and leadership.
Kath Hume:And we have to practice what we preach in that space and say, actually we need to look after our own as well as looking after the people that we're client-based.
Michelle Ockers:Well, yeah, I call it drinking our own champagne. Why would we expect other people in the organisation to engage with learning methods and approaches that we don't use ourselves? I've been drinking your own champagne I've always been using.
Arun Pradhan:eat your own dog food. I should have known that you would have gone with a champagne metaphor instead.
Kath Hume:I was thinking over the weekend. I wonder if any other professions. I feel like the greatest value I can add sometimes is when people come to me and say I need a training solution, that I can turn them away and say, actually, you don't, you need some other form of performance management or you need.
Arun Pradhan:One of the teams that I work with is the strategic capability team and they're kind of we don't call them KPIs, but essentially KPIs was around developing mastery for core segments And recently I was discussing with them and then my boss, about how I want to add a goal, about the training that they stop. Because a lot of the work wasn't being seen because they were out there advising in the business and they stopped. So much waste of money and, in many ways as importantly, waste of time and overwhelm of people.
Arun Pradhan:They killed projects, these training projects, and for me that's like success. Yes, it's about balance, that you need to actually deliver the master's degree.
Kath Hume:Yeah, you have to make sure there's something there.
Arun Pradhan:I just wanted that to be acknowledged, because they were doing some great work there. Just like calling out this is actually a process issue or that this isn't ready for a training intervention here, yeah, I saw.
Kath Hume:I can't remember who it is, but is it Alex Stevenson? It's a guy who had a really funny photo on LinkedIn, but he's very, very intelligent.
Voice over:That just narrowed down.
Kath Hume:But he had and I don't even know what was an official date, but he put up a post about today. Is the official clear out that that was there, Dyson?
Michelle Ockers:Oh yes. Because I think it was a waste like National Waste Day, but it was like about reducing content.
Kath Hume:Yes, yes, yes, Something like that, Yeah so he was making it a day to go into all of the material that you've got on offer and actually remove anything that's not adding value. And I think, yep, that is, that is gold. But it's just educating our clients and the people who come to us that you know, just because you're trying something, someone in something, it doesn't mean that that's actually going to lead to performance. You know what are the barriers to the performance that you're looking for. What even is the performance that you're looking for And how do we actually and then I've already power people to do that. In a lot of cases, it's actually not training or learning. It's that people have got the knowledge, they've got the skills. There might be other reasons why they're not performing.
Michelle Ockers:So what are they? part of our job is to remove friction, right, yeah, yeah, exactly.
Arun Pradhan:I do think that the debate, like this conversation to your point, Michelle. it feels like we've been having it for a long, long time And I do think you know like, you can't talk about the future of L and D without talking about the future of work, and the future of work about to get pretty disrupted Yeah.
Arun Pradhan:And I think over the next five to 10 years I mean obviously even over the next year, but particularly over the next five to 10 years things are just totally going to be like incredibly different And L and D is going to have to adjust to like I don't think there's going to be the same, they can't be the same. focus on content when you've got AI coaches supporting you to do things.
Arun Pradhan:I think there will be, to our, to our conversation earlier, there will be that sort of initial structured support for starting new at something. I partly wonder if L and D will be much more focused on like designing, onboarding experiences and then almost getting out the way because things have been moving for performance support and and AI just in time support more.
Kath Hume:I've actually got a client who I'm working on to adjust that at the moment, Aaron, because I, yeah, that's absolutely where we need to be playing. And there was actually a report someone like me to last night saying the NHS have done this mass recruitment of healthcare workers in the UK but productivity is going down. And I sort of commented saying, are we surprised by that? because we've got.
Kath Hume:productivity is output per unit of input and our units of input now don't have the capability and the organisational knowledge and experience in the networks. Why would be expecting them to be as productive? but if we have onboarding off with our mentor and we have shadowing and partnering and and we're bringing them on the journey, Yes, they're never going to be as productive right at the beginning. We'll get there faster.
Michelle Ockers:I think this idea of building learning agility in our organisations And that's not just at an individual level, but at a team level and an organisational level, which is really what learning culture is about right helping our organisations to to sense and respond to change, to innovate. Maybe we don't retain our identity as the learning and development profession. maybe it morphs to something else and we need to be open to that, to be of service as well. right, i'm seeing OD talent and LND team starting to be integrated. LinkedIn in America has just integrated, i think, their talent OD and LND team, or maybe just a couple of those, but I know there's been some integration. Another client I'm working with is just integrated that OD and LND team and it just makes sense right.
Michelle Ockers:So maybe we need to be so precious about who we are. You can't tell everyone how we use our skills.
Arun Pradhan:You can't tell everyone to reinvent themselves and then not be prepared to reinvent like your profession.
Kath Hume:This is a part of your focus. Look, we are out of time. We both have to get on with our days, but thank you so much. I'm very excited that this will be released on the day that I speak for the first time at the AITD conference that's been a goal of mine for a while and very excited that I'll actually and you might be happy to know that I'm not presenting as much as doing a workshop. We're going to be applying their world into the experience and the story that I'm telling and hopefully walking away with something contextualised that they can apply in there.
Arun Pradhan:And kudos to you, Kath. I mean Michelle was saying before you're willing to experiment. You've got the courage, despite the sort of fear and nervousness and unfounded self-doubt that you kind of just get in there and do it anyway. You're launching a podcast, you're putting your hand up for that program and you're also contributing to so many people as well. So yeah, kudos to you.
Kath Hume:Thank you, Michelle says to me one day Michelle, you might have to correct me because I'm not going to say it right, but you said something about just assuming that no one's listening And so if you go out on LinkedIn and just assume that that was the thing, that it doesn't matter. But I don't think I've ever touched wood. I don't think I've ever been criticised for anything that I'm doing. So I think that fact that's that psychological safety which actually you introduced me to in our mentoring and when you talked about Project Aristotle But the fact that we actually do have a generous group of people in that LinkedIn community who are actually looking to support each other, rather than judging, and I've been here called Kath online, and it's not like, at the end of the day, they're such small voices you can kind of just move on.
Kath Hume:Yeah, definitely be.
Arun Pradhan:So even if it does happen it's not like you know put her off. Her ducks back.
Kath Hume:Yeah, move on All right. so how could people connect with you both, michelle?
Michelle Ockers:LinkedIn is probably the best place.
Kath Hume:Yes, great And learning our cut I will link to in the show notes as well, and Aaron.
Arun Pradhan:Yeah, same LinkedIn and model thinkers. You can subscribe to the newsletter which I write regularly.
Kath Hume:I absolutely recommend that everyone listening subscribes to both of those valuable services have been invaluable to me. So thank you both for not only today, but for all of the experiences and opportunities you've opened up for me. I don't know that there are any two people who I could say have made such a difference and, look to be honest, i've been very, very fortunate, but I have lots of people around me who support me. I really really cannot state enough about how much your contribution has made a difference for me and my family. So thank you so much and thanks for coming on the podcast today.
Arun Pradhan:Thank you. Thanks very much, Kath.
Michelle Ockers:You know you make your own luck.
Kath Hume:Yes, Yes, but you also need people to take you on the journey.
Michelle Ockers:Absolutely, generosity begets generosity. Thanks Heads. Thank you.
Voice over:Thanks for listening to the Reimagined Workforce podcast. We hope you've found some valuable ideas that you can apply to transform your own workforce today and tomorrow. Additional information and links can be found in the show notes for this episode at workforcetransformationscom. au. Please share this podcast with your community and leave us a rating to let us know what we can do better for you.