Growing: The 70/20/10 rule
I know how you feel. I want to develop my team, but we don’t have the budget. We don’t the time. But if I don’t send people on training, on courses, they won’t stay. There are a lot of wrong assumptions in this, so let’s unpack them. But first let’s talk the ACTUAL reality of how learning works, in the workplace. Let’s talk about the 70/20/10 rule.
The 70/20/10 rule
Tl;dr: Most of what we learn is by doing, then by guidance, and only a little bit by classroom learning.
If you want proof of this; watch yourself at work. every action you take in the day (booking a test, asking a question, answering a patient concern)- did you learn that in a classroom? did you learn how to that well on the job, or from a book.
This model is arguably the foundational concept of workplace learning. It posits the following:
-70% of what we learn come from doing. Specifically challenging assignments- tasks, actions, responsibilities that are new or near new to us, such that we need to develop new neural pathways (i.e. learning). These are new tasks, new situations, new questions that you need to provide to.
To give a medical example; building trust and rapport with patients. Did you learn that from a book, or from trial and error on the job? Your subconscious is watching you, squirreling away every little comment, smile, concern, friendly term of endearment. If it works, it goes in the mental book.
-20% is learnt from developmental relationships, or informal teaching. Where someone explains something, checks something, guides you, gives you feedback. This can be within a formal management relationship (e.g. your boss) a mentor relationship (a senior person in the team), a manager you work with, or even outside of work.
To use the same medical example of building trust and rapport. As well as personal trial and error, you’ve watched others, often senior/experienced peers, and seen what works for them. You’ve modelled them, if not the whole, at least parts (sometimes we learn what not to do too). You may have discussed it from them, but even if not, these are little, practical learning tips we take in all the time
-10%. Formal learning. This is courses, workshops, conferences, degrees and so forth. Any time you are off work, focused on structure learning objectives with the explicit purpose of upskilling you.
Takeaways
More knowledgeable people on the subject than I would contend that this model is outdated, inaccurate and simplistic, and in many ways they are correct (the round numbers alone give it away). But disagreements over the finer details do not remove the overall key takeaways you should, well, learn. Let’s discuss.
It’s not all about courses
The common misunderstanding of L&D is that courses = learning, and if you’re getting courses, you’re developing, and if you’re not getting courses, you’re not getting developed. In fact;-
Courses can be placebos
The assumption endemic to most workplaces is that if you’re sent on a course, it’s a good thing, you’re being invested in, and you’ll come back smarter and more knowledgeable. But if an employee come back invigorated, but goes back to doing exactly what they did before, and 1, 2, 6 months later, they can’t recall anything they learnt and haven’t changed anything, have they really learnt?
Different is learning
Every time an employee does something different, they are learning. The question is; how much difference comes as part of the job? Some jobs are highly repetitive; payroll for example is highly repetitive, with payruns often being the same run after run. Other jobs are highly varied; a stand-up comedian gets a different crowd every night, and is judged every joke.
Teaching doesn’t just come from the boss/the partner/the surgeon
The manager has the greatest capacity to teach, but this often isn’t the case. Often its colleagues- both in the the team and outside of the team who provide feedback, input and guidance on how an employee is performing. Personally I’ve had dozens of bosses, but haven’t learnt anything meaningful from any of them, but instead most of my mentoring has come from sideways or diagonal feedback.
Don’t ignore L&D just because you don’t have a budget
Too much L&D thinking begins and ends with the budget; I’ve got $XX,XXX in FY25 (or $0) so let’s spend it. So little of learning is about about structure learning, so if your approach is only to think about learning that comes with a price tag, you’re missing so much.
Your culture plays a big part in encouraging or constraining naturally occurring learning
You’re here to help, foster and nurture natural behaviour. There are two things that you can take from granted; people will learn, and some people will teach. This will happen without you. But conditions can exist within the organisation to be conducive, or be adverse. For example:
o Working from home policies
o Remuneration
o Adversarial office politics
o Contractors or employees
All can have significant impacts on knowledge sharing.
Recognise the little learning opportunities
Different= learning, so begin to recognize the little ‘different’ events that come up day-to-day as opportunities for learning. This could projects (big and small) different tasks, new areas, new customers. This can be trade off between efficiency (Dave does the immunisations, so he’ll get it done faster) and breadth of knowledge (it will be good for Andy to know how to do in case Dave is sick).
See your own ‘30 second’ opportunities to teach
Teaching does have to be 5, 10, 30 minute session; little explanations of medical ‘whys’ occur all the time. Taking small opportunity to go into a little depth of why we do what we do will likely be picked up and retained. Development doesn’t have to be chunky; often it is a combination of little micro-lessons.
