Learning on demand gains ground at Maitland Group

Delivering learning content to time-poor employees in a global company can be a challenge. Maitland Group has increased engagement by keeping its learning on demand relevant, finds Cath Everett.

Variety is the spice of life when it comes to learning and development at legal and tax specialist Maitland Group.

The company, which provides legal, tax, fund and investment advisory services in Europe, North America and South Africa, prides itself on being able to offer its 1,000 or so staff around the world learning on demand as and when they require it.

Core to this is the company’s e-learning content, which is made available from its learning portal.

Maitland has worked with Video Arts, Walkgrove and Skill Boosters to offer a range of video content on generic workplace and management skills.

In addition, Maitland develops its own courses – for example on regulatory issues – created with input from relevant subject experts.

Then there are the blogs, wikis and webinars for knowledge-sharing, as well as Sharepoint-based discussion forums for debating hot topics and traditional classroom training.

Topic of the month

The organisation has also started running a topic of the month, which covers everything in the soft skills arena from coaching and mentoring to presentation skills.

A course of the month is designed to be “as appropriate to the business cycle as possible”, according to Charlotte Gibbs, Maitland’s talent and learning coordinator. Last month the topic centred on employee engagement, following the release of its annual survey.

“We try to offer variety as we understand that people have different learning styles and so benefit from different approaches,” Gibbs explains. “But all of our training is also accessible on-demand regardless of time zones so people are able to learn in their own time.”

Although most employees still prefer to access content via their PCs, mobile uptake is on the rise.

The company has undergone expansion over the past year, which made a one-to-one training approach increasingly difficult to manager. The move away from this has led to higher levels of uptake and enthusiasm, however.

“In terms of time management, training is now much easier to access and people can do it when they have a spare moment,” Gibbs says. “They’re no longer limited to being in the office, but can learn at their own convenience. It works really well.”