Corporate learning and future-proof training

These impact the work environment in different ways, such as:

• new skills requirements (often displacing existing skills and needing rapid deployment),
• limited availability of subject expertise for training, and
• new options and expectations for learning resources and delivery.

According to the same WEF report, workers can expect that 39% of their existing skills sets will be transformed or become outdated over the 5-year period from 2025-2031. The implications for learning are vast and bring new perspective to the concept of lifelong learning.

Remote and hybrid working patterns have become a norm, and staff may be located cities, and even countries, apart. This has implications for managing and leading teams as well as collaborating and learning in different ways. Additionally, people may be full- or part-time employees, contingent workers or gig workers; these all change the workplace dynamics and influence the approach and responsibility for skills development.

Many of the organisations we work with have global operations with staff across different countries, while others provide training and learning support to people situated across the world. This introduces complexity in understanding the needs of a very wide audience and how to effectively engage learners across different time zones, languages and cultures.

Influenced by the wide choice of media and learning channels out there as well as different working arrangements, learners want personalised, flexible solutions that are available at the point of need. Making training accessible is also key, from physical to digital and cognitive accessibility.

Predicted by Forrester to make up 74% of the workforce by 2030, Generation Z and millennials have high expectations for learning and development. They rank it in the top three reasons for choosing an employer, according to the Deloitte 2025 Gen Z and Millennial Survey.

Rapid technological changes have increased needs for new and more advanced technical skills, such as technological literacy, AI, data analysis and cyber security. Amid these, however, many recent surveys, including the Future of Jobs Report 2025, highlight the equal importance of personal and people skills such as resilience, flexibility, leadership, diversity, social influence and lifelong learning. Both skills sets are critical in times of change within industries and work environments.

E-learning has many benefits, especially for large corporates, as a flexible, time- and resource-efficient learning methodology, that is scalable and enables rapid deployment across geographical locations. There is growing recognition, however, of the importance and demand for social learning and collaboration, whether in groups or through one-on-one mentoring and coaching. The result is often a blend of approaches; being intentional about the balance realises the benefits of each approach.

Within e-learning, there is greater demand for microlearning - bite-sized 5–10-minute modules or resources focused on a specific topic. These may be standalone or can be used flexibly within different learning contexts.

Immersive learning also plays a valuable part, creating a ‘safe’ environment in which to practise skills and support transfer into the work environment. This may be done in different ways:

• practical step-by-step scenario activities to develop judgement and decision-making,
• screen simulations to practise the steps within a system
• fully immersive Virtual Reality (VR) that places a learner in a realistic work situation.

A Learning Management Systems (LMS) and other platforms enable a range of learning resources to be made available, tracked and managed in one place. As learners seek a more personalised learning experience, Generative AI is also continually evolving and opening up interesting opportunities to offer this.

Following models such as ADDIE, and ensuring that the required skills and learning objectives are accurately defined at the outset, ensures a focus on learning in the right areas. It also helps to define metrics and enable tracking and evaluation of the training investment and results.

Organisations are increasingly seeing the importance of a future-facing learning strategy that actively supports organisation performance, career development and employee retention. Developing critical skills is one thing, retaining them is another. As the 2025 Workplace Learning Report from LinkedIn Learning highlights, employee expectations around career development are not just about promotion pathways but also ongoing learning opportunities for people to keep their skills updated and relevant.

The right system for your organisation enables seamless deployment and access to personalised training pathways and resources for learners, and efficient administration, management and reporting for organisations.

From analysing learning needs and determining the appropriate methodology, through to the design, development and implementation of e-learning, facilitated solutions and learning resources, the curation of custom e-learning content forms a large and important part of addressing the specific learning needs of organisations.

In some cases, an off the shelf learning solution will be an appropriate approach to meet a generic need and enable fast deployment at lower cost.

Broader services extend to developing learning strategies or researching, analysing and determining skills sets and learning content through to designing competency frameworks and assessment. Many corporate learning service organisations also facilitate sharing of expertise and ideas on current learning topics through webinars, articles, websites and other online platforms.