Finding learning impact partners in unexpected places!
What is the antidote to feeling alone and isolated in our work? Partnerships! You may be surprised to find partners and allies in these unexpected places …
Your support team. Adriane Jones (bespoke learning provider) suggests we build a support team of L&D allies internally (stakeholders, managers, and team members within our organizations) and externally (friends and colleagues we don’t work with, who understand the unique nuances of our roles).
IT and business operations teams in your organization. Kevin M Yates (measurement advisor) suggests we partner with IT and business intelligence staff to get help with data management and visualization (the part of impact measurement that overwhelms most of us).
Training and tech vendors. Joe Ballou (leadership development expert) suggests we leverage our vendors as partners whose strengths can balance our weaknesses.
In my experience as both a learning leader working inside organizations and an entrepreneur managing a consulting practice, vendors have been a blessing and a curse. Sometimes more of a curse! Yet, for many of us vendors are an underutilized resource (and partner) to help improve the efficiency and effectiveness of our work. The trick is selecting the right vendors and nurturing those partnerships!
In our latest industry leader chat, Joe Ballou and I shared ideas on how to create powerful partnerships with our vendors. Here is a checklist to help you make the most out of your vendor relationships throughout the lifetime of your engagement.
Vendor Partnership Checklist
Clarify your team's strengths and weaknesses. List gaps in your team’s competencies and capabilities that a vendor could complement.
Partner with leaders to understand desired metrics from prospective vendor partners and their preferred processes for evaluating partner’s effectiveness.
Ask vendors to clearly outline their strengths and explore how they align with your team's needs (now and in the future).
Evaluate vendor integrity. Do their values and approach align with your organization?
Pilot a small project to test integration and gather insights. Is the vendor’s products and services worthy of a continued investment?
Expand the pilot only if it showed potential for impact. Continue assessing usefulness and influence on your team’s goals and your business’s needs.
Check in regularly on contracts. Review or make changes 2-3 months before expiration.
Audit the partnership annually using the 4 I's framework: integrity, integration, insights, impact.
Re-evaluate your partner ecosystem annually. Make changes to optimize for current and anticipated future needs.
If I had a checklist like this (and implemented it consistently) I imagine my previously “cursed” relationships with vendors may have been completely transformed!
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