Throughout my book The New Learning Architect I take time out to look at real-life examples of great learning architects in action. In this extract, we take a look at how learning is architected within Shell, one of the world’s largest and most successful multinational corporations. Sebastian’s vision for learning covers all of the contexts that in which learning can occur at work.

Dr Sebastian Graeb-Konneker is a Learning Adviser, Design and Development for Shell International. Sebastian was inspired in his approach to learning by Professor Betty Collis, with whom he worked at the University of Twente in the Netherlands and later in Shell. Like Betty, Sebastian is a champion of work-based learning, aided by technology. He is responsible for designing learning solutions across Shell’s global workforce of more than 100,000 employees. His leaning is towards rich blends, going beyond the typical classroom plus e-learning mix to include both formal and informal elements. As Sebastian explains, “Learning happens as we speak. If you make learning look like work, then employees won’t believe that it’s a course they’re going to.”

The place for formal learning at Shell

Even though Sebastian favours informal approaches, he acknowledges there is an important place for more formal, structured learning, such as when transforming a graduate into a full working professional. He also accepts the need for compliance training such as for health and safety, although he acknowledges that this is sometimes “less about learning more about assuring that they’ve done it.”

In his design for leadership development and technical training, Sebastian brings a wide range of non-formal and experiential approaches into the mix, including a 360 degree feedback tool and job shadowing. Where it is required that participants meet, they can do this on the phone or with LiveMeeting (a web conferencing system), as they would at other times in their work. Sebastian is a big fan of asynchronous group activities, centred around Shell’s Moodle platform. As he says, “Working together far apart – that’s what work is like these days.”

Sebastian prefers his designs to be activity-driven, not content-driven, working back from the performance goal. The design process is global and, while highly systematic, also agile and iterative. Stakeholder management is of the upmost importance, with the learner an important voice in the process.

Learning beyond the course

Shell is really good at providing a myriad of other, less formal, ways in which employees can develop core competences, keep up-to-date with changes and prepare to take on further responsibilities. The whole approach is based on a framework of competencies. As Sebastian explains, “They expect you to be developing yourself. And someone is always responsible for supporting your development – with coaching from your line manager and mentoring. Communities of practice have been established for more 12 years, with well-defined policies and systems.

On-demand approaches

To support on-demand learning Shell has its own wiki, with 70,000 users and more than 40,000 articles. Backing this up is a knowledge management strategy based on the simple requirement to “ask, learn, share.”  There is a strong incentive to share, particularly in the technical disciplines and, as a result, networking is vibrant.
As well as the wiki, collaboration is facilitated by the Shell International Global Networks, which allows employees to easily locate expertise and discuss issues using forums. This bottom-up approach has proved to be effective, although the degree of success does vary from area to area. Every employee is encouraged to establish a profile on the network.

Learning through blogging

Blogging is possible within the firewall using SharePoint, but hasn’t taken off in any significant fashion. On the other hand, employees are encouraged to blog externally. A good example of this is the blog of Sebastian’s colleague Hans de Zwart, Shell’s Innovation Manager for Learning Technologies. Here’s what Hans had to say about the ways in which the learning architecture in Shell is evolving:

“The one thing that I think that Shell is innovative about is in its complete focus of alignment of learning and work. We focus more and more on on-the-Job training, on learning events that are completely relevant to somebody’s work. The way that learning events are designed, they always have work-related assignments to them, and most of them require supervisor involvement. You need to agree with your supervisor on what you need to do. Learning is often integrated with knowledge management – through the wiki for example.”

“There’s really a broad spectrum in the delivery of learning, but everything is still delivered from a course paradigm and from the idea of competence profiles. What you are starting to see is that the course paradigm is starting to crumble a bit. So it’s called informal learning or on-the-job learning. I think what you will see (and we are starting to see it here in the way we are architecting our next steps in our learning landscape), is smaller, modular content pieces, a different perspective of what we consider to be a learning event. This is more of a ‘pull’ idea – learning when you need it, than a ‘push’ approach; specific learning interventions based around very current direct business problems – instead of through competencies.”

Sebastian is part of the Learning & Organisational Effectiveness team in Shell Project & Technology. Analysing the organisation's business issues, he works to ensure that learning solutions are aligned to the goals of management. Following a doctoral degree, Sebastian began his learning and development career in Japan, where he co-authored some 30 TV programmes tailored for students of the Japanese Open University.

Today his work includes clients as diverse as Philips, the Swiss Embassy in Indonesia, the Talented and Gifted Students Program at U.S. University of Oregon and the German National Academic Exchange Service. Key contributions for Shell include the development of the group's blended learning strategy, implementing the company’s global Virtual Learning System and establishing knowledge management as a key component in learning programme designs.

Sebastian is a Fulbright Alumni and founding member of the German-European Centre of Excellence at Japan's prestigious Tokyo University. He is author of five books, of which three have been co-authored, and has written over 30 articles and book reviews. He is also a certified retail salesman and has done a great deal of acting alongside his career.

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