CSR and Learning

The Insurance Distribution Directive, Basel 3, Solva 2, the CSR Directive, the Sapin 2 law: over the past few years, there has been an explosion of European directives, international standards and other legislation aimed at imposing societal standards on international corporations. This battle of standards is one of the pillars of modern Western capitalism, and is based on a laudable intention: to guarantee employees and company stakeholders a working environment that reduces risks and factors of inequality. It is also – depending on one’s point of view – a lever for regaining control of our sovereignty through standards, or further proof of Europeans’ candor in unbridled capitalism.

Societal impact of European standards on companies: between social mobility and challenges

It would never occur to anyone to question the validity of these standards. They contribute to making the company a much-needed space for social mobility and personal fulfillment, as political and trade union spaces are clearly losing ground. It is rather the question of the means used that is largely debatable. By creating learning obligations associated with these rules, we hope to spread best practices within companies. However, the results have been mixed.

The DDA insurance standard: between mandatory learning and implementation challenges

Let’s take the example of the DDA standard on insurance distributors’ duty to advise: it requires 15 hours of training for each employee every year. Why 15 hours? Nobody knows. Insurance HR departments are tearing their hair out to keep their employees busy during these 15 hours. In some big companies, compulsory learning accounts for up to 30% of the time spent by employees on learning programs. The large budgets involved are putting a strain on investments in more sustainable talent management initiatives. Training traceability takes up most of the time of learning managers, who have to “track” their colleagues. And the employees end up reducing the word “learning” to these often infantilizing compulsory modules. They can feel force-fed and end up rejecting learning.

The burden of compliance in learning: issues and consequences for companies

Far from aiming to transform employees’ mental models, learning is held hostage by compliance. In the event of an inspection, the consequences can be dramatic: loss of marketing authorization, fines, reputational risks. To protect themselves, companies are piling up e-learning modules of widely varying quality that they call learning to ensure compliance with external regulations.

Solutions exist to realign CSR and learning:

• Put the question of instructional design back at the heart of mandatory training: rather than rushing through modules, organizations have everything to gain by taking advantage of innovative learning methods. Games, simulations, virtual reality, real-life scenarios. Any skill can be approached in a constructive, interesting and stimulating way. The creation of teams and learning providers specialized in CSR and compliance will enable us to reach employees with the right content. Organizations that make this choice quickly see the positive consequences: employee commitment, sense of belonging, curiosity, development of collaboration.

• Moving from an obligation measured in hours to one measured in progression: imposing learning measures in no way guarantees their appropriation. Not all organizations are equally mature. That’s why it would make more sense to measure the progression between an initial diagnosis and the objectives to be achieved, and to put organizations in a dynamic adapted to their starting level. We treat a patient according to his symptoms: the quality of the diagnosis is crucial to the healing process.

• Conceive training programs as part of a value chain and extended enterprise approach: involving all of an organization’s stakeholders, including subcontractors and distributors, from learning financing to deployment, would give greater meaning to learning obligations and link them to strategic corporate challenges (relocation, efficiency, digital transformation). The creation of CFAs (apprentice learning centers) and shared learning programs, to name but a few, are ways of integrating compliance issues in a positive and useful way.

Learn Assembly is a hybrid consulting firm created in 2013 to support the transformation of all those involved in learning and employment. Our mission is to help them play a strategic role in their organizations to meet the challenges of skills in a context of environmental transition and technological transformation. We support the general management and L&D departments of major groups, public bodies and higher education institutions in their strategic development.