Strategic Alignment Workshop

Many practitioners struggle with the issue of alignment. They know it is important, especially to their senior leaders, but they have not found a practical way to get it done successfully. Consequently, it becomes difficult to secure funding for good programs.

Join us for the Strategic Alignment Workshop to explore what senior leaders really want to see and how to learn how to achieve and demonstrate strategic alignment. We will begin with a review of the literature on alignment and suggest a working definition. Then we will discuss the theory of alignment and how to have good business discussions with senior leaders. Next, we will share a six-step process to achieve and show alignment. Last, we will address real-world alignment issues. Extensive use will be made of case studies to allow you to immediately apply what you have learned at each step. Alternatively, you can bring your own organization’s goals and programs to use in this workshop.

This workshop is designed to improve your business acumen, make you a better and more strategic business partner, and increase the impact of your programs. You will learn how to:

• Align programs and initiatives to organizational goals
• Discuss alignment and expected impact with senior leaders
• Show alignment and expected impact in reports
• Manage the alignment process

Special attention will be paid to the following issues:

• What CEOs and senior leaders really want to see from L&D
• Speaking the language of business to communicate effectively with senior leaders
• Planning and communicating the expected impact of a learning program
• Business-centric versus L&D-centric reporting
• Nature of planning, estimating, and forecasting

At the conclusion of the workshop you will have completed strategic alignment for the case study (or your own organization) and you will know how to approach strategic alignment in the following situations.

• One program in support of one goal
• Multiple programs in support of one goal
• Programs in support of multiple goals
• Supporting a non-priority goal
• There is no goal
• You don’t know the company’s goals
• Suites of e-learning courses
• Enterprise alignment at the department level

The workshop will be highly interactive and applied, employing multiple case studies. The central case study (six-pages) will be distributed to all registered participants by February 10th and participants will be expected to have read it prior to the workshop.