Growth Through Learning

Cultivating a culture of learning in your organization empowers your employees to play pivotal roles now and in the future. It’s important that leaders champion their staff as so much more than pre-defined collections of skills and capabilities – this means training them not only for the job they are currently doing, but also for the job they can do when an opportunity for a promotion arises.

In this episode, Hannah Brown speaks with two leaders who have experienced tremendous success in their organizations. Their dedication to personal and professional development for their teams promoted career growth and advancement for all employees. Whatever the size of your organization, focusing on learning and growth reduces the time and cost of training newcomers by being proactive about succession plans long before a backfill is required. The burden on the leader is also alleviated. Freed of micromanaging every task and day-to-day challenge, leaders can turn their attention to strategic priorities because they are confident that their team has the capacity to excel in their jobs.

Set your team up for organizational success that stands the test of time

• The forward-thinking benefits of building a robust pipeline of leaders;
• How proactive professional development for employees gives leaders more time;
• The effect of supportive leadership on employee satisfaction and engagement;
• How cultures of learning help alleviate burnout during tumultuous periods.

Important resources from the episode

• Ontario Covid Science Advisory Table, “Burnout in Hospital-Based Healthcare Workers during COVID-19”

Connect with the leader who share their story on the show

• Andy Rombouts, Director Of Support Services, London Health Sciences Centre
• Christy Billan, Director of Small Business Lending Products, Farm Credit Canada

Connect with Hannah

• To order her latest book, Into the Hands of Leaders: Employee Growth Through Learning
• Learn about the programs that help leaders and organizations develop a growth through learning orientation
• Learn more about Hannah’s work 

Follow and listen for free on your favourite podcast listening app!

Show Transcript

[OPENING THEME MUSIC IN]

HANNAH: When leaders embrace growth through learning by nurturing their own learning mindset, and fostering a team culture of learning, they build a team and an organization for the future.

In the last episode, we focused on Christine Helgerman’s story. She shared how she created a culture where collaboration, autonomy, and shared responsibility drives long-term success.

Today, we’ll focus on two more personal stories of growth, revealing the overlooked benefits of investing in long-term development.

How does a long-term approach, not only strengthen individuals and teams, but also create a sustainable future for the organization?

[MUSIC RISES]

This is Growth through Learning – a 6-part series that anchors employee learning and team development into the hands of leaders. It bridges the gap between formal training and learning that’s embedded in the DNA of teams.

I’m Hannah Brown. This is episode 5.

[MUSIC OUT]

Career development is a long-term approach that provides internal advancement and opportunities for employees. It’s often overlooked and goes beyond developing employees in their current roles.

When employee and career development are overlooked, leaders can view their employees as a predefined collection of skills and capabilities. They fail to see the potential in their employees for future, more advanced roles. When a position needs filling, these leaders hire externally. They haven’t developed employees internally, so they don’t have suitable candidates who can easily step into that vacant role.

For example, let’s look at a manufacturing facility. A leader wants to hire a new supervisor. There’s a echnical operator on their team who could be promoted into that role. But when a leader isn’t focused on career development, they don’t promote that person. They don’t want the hassle of backfilling the operator position because then they’d have two new people to get up to speed – the new supervisor and a new operator. They’d rather leave the operator in their current role and hire for only the vacant supervisor position. As a result, when that technical operator is ready for a new position, they leave the organization.  

[PAUSE]

Previously, we touched on how leaders need to step in and take ownership for coaching and developing their employees. Carving out time and taking ownership for their part in their team’s success is challenging. But, as we’ve heard throughout this series, stepping into this role and embracing a growth through learning orientation can lead to long-term, sustainable growth.

[MUSIC IN]

What does it actually look like when leaders take ownership and make a concerted effort to coach and develop their employees?

We heard from Christy Billan, the Director of Small Business Lending Products at Farm Credit Canada, in episode 2. We discussed her evolution as a leader and the critical shift she made over her leadership journey from having more of a command-and-control style to a guide-and-empower style.

[MUSIC FADES OR OUT]

I asked Christy what was the catalyst or trigger for her to shift her leadership approach.

CHRISTY BILLAN: I had to do some soul searching, I would say, in terms of like why do I behave this way? And part of that I think when the transition from a contributor to a leader is trying to figure out how you fill up your cup, right? How you feel rewarded and get satisfaction from your work.

And I think in that first foray or leadership, it was really around like helping people which is totally your job to do as a leader. But in that telling it’s almost like you get satisfaction from like rescuing people, right? And owning their accountabilities. You know, like they had an issue with a colleague, like you know, calling that person, and it’s like no, that’s actually not empowering them to be able to do this on their own when I go on vacation or when I take that next role.

And so I had to start thinking about, how can I find ways to fill up my cup, feel like I’m adding value, but also empowering them, creating confidence. And all of this would result in capacity for me, right? Because they would be empowered to do the roles they’ve been asked to do, and I could spend more time focusing on maybe more strategic elements. Or, you know, being ready to be able to support them when things got really intense, right? Because I felt in this other way of being, I just. I didn’t have time to do anything, right? Because I was meddling in every aspect of their work.

And so yeah, doing some soul searching I think, helped to figure out, if it’s not like being the hero that like, makes me feel like I’m filling my cup, essentially, that’s what I call it. But started to shift that to , like, hey, I can still be a hero, but help coach people through it. And these people are bright. They have experience. They’re here for a reason, and so let them shine, right?  And then also be there to support them when they fall and be able to coach. And so I think it just needs a more intuitive style of leadership.

HANNAH: Christy is many years past this transition and has been operating with a guide-and-empower style of leadership for years. I asked her to reflect on the benefits of her current leadership approach. 

CHRISTY BILLAN: I think truly like, it’s impossible to be successful in a greater span of control, like a broader job if you continue that leadership style. And so while that might be effective in a domain where you don’t have a lot of complexity and the work is very tight, and I don’t perceive that a lot of employees like to work in that type of leadership style.

But I think what it’s allowed me to do is make leaps into number one, areas where I don’t have the expertise. Because I can let go of precisely how the work gets done and focus on coaching people through like what behaviours do we need to see from you and how are we going to work this forward. And also spend capacity on thinking bigger picture, strategic work, what things, what you know roadmap do we need to lay if we want to operate in this different way a year from now?

And so I think if I was still in the minutiae and the weeds and micro-managing or you know telling, you need to be in everything and you just don’t have the capacity to grow. And so, yeah, I think I’ve been successful at taking on roles in areas where again, I’m not the expert in taking in broader roles where I actually oversee far more pieces of work and way more people because I don’t need to be in the weeds and I’ve got those empowered teams that feel like they can make decisions.

HANNAH: I am so grateful to Christy for sharing her story because it provides a picture of an output-focused leader who, with all good intentions, initially did not develop her team and increase their capability. Christy’s experience beautifully illustrates the transition she went through as she shifted her leadership and took ownership of her role in coaching and developing her employees. She examined the type of leader she wanted to be – what would ‘fill her cup’ and creat space for learning and coaching.

In doing so, she increased her team’s capability, elevated her ability as a leader, and created stability for her organization. By developing her team, she has a built-in succession plan. There’s a capable team member who can step into her role when she moves on to her next adventure.   

[MUSIC IN]

With a growth through learning orientation, part of a leader’s job is to help their team members develop in their current role and prepare them for future roles.

Andy Rombouts is the newly retired Director of Support Services for London Health Sciences Centre. His portfolio included patient food services, portering, switchboard medical device processing, retail food, contract linen, and the housekeeping contract. There are over 500 people on the team with about 17 leaders. Housekeeping has an additional 500 people led by their leadership team. So, a pretty significant portfolio in a large facility.

When I talked with Andy, he was about to transition into retirement and had a wealth of experience and perspectives to share.

[MUSIC FADES OUT]

ANDY ROMBOUTS: I think I have an obligation as a leader, especially as a more senior leader as a director to develop my team. And the payoff to the organization is huge. Because, you know this encompasses not only their own personal learning and development, but it’s also so important to our succession planning.

And I like to think my biggest focus, my biggest leadership theory that I’ve always leaned on is building a culture. Building a culture where people are recognized where they’re supported, and where you know, my leadership team has an opportunity to grow and ask questions and critique and, you know we’re big enough that we have the ability to provide people with diverse opportunities to help them with that growth and learning.

HANNAH: Since his early career days, Andy’s leadership philosophy has been centred on creating a culture that recognizes and supports others. His team is a place where people can grow, ask questions, and critique situations in healthy debate. As a result, Andy’s portfolio has a tremendously stable leadership team, which can backfill leadership and critical positions seamlessly.

ANDY ROMBOUTS: Our structure’s director, manager, coordinators, all leadership positions. And then below that we have sort of advisors. We’re a large portfolio about 17 managers and directors. But the turnover can happen and we’ve been fortunate that that’s not the case. But we had a retirement. We have someone who’s off long term sick. We have people that are leaving the organization occasionally. And those positions need to be filled.

So you know what we’ve what I’ve seen in some other areas is that you take someone from the frontline and you throw them into a manager role and they’re in way over their head and the support is not there. And that’s what I like about our structure is we can say okay, we have an advisor that’s ready to step into a coordinator role. Because in that advisor role, they’ve had some exposure and had a little taste of what’s that that’s like. And when we put them in the coordinator role, they have a manager there to help them  and then I’m there to help them as well. Then we’re saying, okay, who’s the person that can come into that advisor role and start to get a first feel of that little bit.

And the other thing that, you know, I brought up, one of my managers I had made a comment back in 2020 about this is that, you know this no longer feels for our frontline staff like it’s a dead end. It feels like…

HANNAH: Ahhh.

ANDY ROMBOUTS: …there are opportunities for them to advance within our portfolio. And who better to take things on and. you know, like right now when I’m going to retire, I’m very confident that we’re running a competition for my backfill. There’s a person on my team that’s going to interview for that. If that person gets this job, they’ll be able to transition almost seamlessly, because my managers know what’s going on in my world. I’ve kept them up to date on that. And it’s because they’ve come up through the system. They’ve worked with me. They understand. I don’t want them to be just like me, but I hope they take the best parts of what we’ve done over the last five years, and integrate…

HANNAH: Mmhmm.

ANDY ROMBOUTS: …that and take it and go. Whereas if we bring somebody in from the outside, external, into a manager role, it’ll take them six months just to learn LHFC, such a big organization. And then to get to know the people and then to get to know the rest of the leadership team. You know, now you spent a year and I’ve got to put all that extra effort into getting them up to speed. As opposed to building a really great internal team and now we’ve built the morale of our frontline because they’ve seen a couple of their own move up through that system.

HANNAH: Finally, Andy shared a third example where a manager in a very technical role, with a longstanding career at the centre, was retiring. They hired a coordinator early so they could learn the details of the role alongside the existing manager.

ANDY ROMBOUTS: When we do team meeting, I have everybody present. All the coordinators and all the managers a quick update of what’s happening in that area. One, that’s a developmental opportunity for them to get comfortable presenting in front of a crowd if they aren’t already. And two, it’s so that the entire team has a bit of an understanding of what’s happening in each department so that we can step in and help out if we need to.

You know, another great example of that and my medical device reprocessing. The manager there had been here 34 years long time and leadership, outstanding, very knowlegable. We have manager and a couple coordinators in that area. We brought a coordinator on early because it’s very technical. So got them up to speed knowing that some of our long serving coordinators would probably move into the manager role. And when that person left, as knowledgeable and excellent as she was as a leader, we were able to transition and the whole organization was comfortable, going okay, we’re good, we know these people, we know that things are gonna keep, it’s such a critical area. But if we…

HANNAH: Yeah.

ANDY ROMBOUTS: …brought someone in new, now everybody has to make the adjustment. And don’t get me wrong, sometimes we do have to go external. Sometimes we don’t have the right person for that role. Sometimes we do need to go out and test the market. But in my mind, if we’ve got great internal candidates, I think there’s so much value to the organization, to them, to our frontline staff to everybod, Just there’s so much stability there for people.

HANNAH: Andy’s experience highlights the importance of an evolved leadership approach that emphasizes employee learning and development. He created a team culture of learning that cascaded through his 500+ person team.

The benefits are clear. Employees from front-line positions through to leadership roles could see opportunities for career growth and advancement. Leaders developed teams capable of backfilling critical roles. The organization repeatedly experienced a seamless transition of leadership.

[PAUSE]

When Andy and I talked, we were about 2 years past the COVID-19 pandemic, which saw tremendous upheaval for health care centres and workers around the globe. After we passed the acute crisis phase, health care continued to struggle as burnout set in.

In the spring of 2020, 30 to 40% of Canadian health care workers experienced severe burnout. By the following spring, that increased to over 60%, according to findings from the Ontario COVID-19 Science Advisory Table.

For Andy’s team to remain stable during this time is a tremendous testament to his leadership and the culture of learning he created.

[CLOSING THEME MUSIC STARTS]

So what can we learn from Christy and Andy’s experiences?

When leaders embrace a growth through learning orientation, nurture their own learning mindset, and foster a team culture of learning, they build a team and an organization for the future. 

If you lead in a small or medium-sized organization, and have been listening to Christy and Andy talk about working in a large organization, you might be wondering how this applies to you and where you work.

Perhaps you feel like you need more budget or formal training programs. Perhaps you’re tempted to stretch your budget and hire a learning and development professional.

But when we look back at the smaller organizations we’ve highlighted earlier in this series, such as with Christine Helgerman from episode 4, we can see that these small organizations don’t have training or even a human resources department. They don’t have access to formal training programs. Instead, they focus on nurturing a learning mindset and creating a team culture of learning. They create opportunities to learn and grow within their organization and through external experiences. It’s their leadership and culture that creates long-term sustained growth and positions them for the future.  

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

On the next episode, we’ll use what we’ve learned in these last five episodes to focus on your next steps as a leader. How do you adopt a growth through learning orientation in your work?

LEN SWITZER: I have had people ask me similar questions before, what’s the secret? And it’s really no secret. It’s listening and empathy. That’s the secret. [LAUGHS] And again, that sounds super easy to say of course.

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

HANNAH: For a more in depth analysis of why we need growth through learning instead of short-term results, check out my book, Into the Hands of Leaders: Employee Growth through Learning, published by Hambone Publishing in November 2024.

To learn more about developing a culture of learning, head to my website, hannahbrown.co.

Thanks to Mary Chan and Katie Pagacz of Organized Sound Productions, who produced, sound designed, and edited this podcast.

And special thanks to Andy Rombouts and Christy Billan, for sharing their stories.

I’m Hannah Brown. And until next time, remember – organizations that grow, grow their people.

[MUSIC OUT]

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