Sarah Welfare looks at why regularly updating skills is critical to your success and impact in the workplace
‘When I said to my first boss I wanted to do environmental management he looked at me as if I had grown two heads,’ recalls James Wyse, sustainability lead at manufacturers’ body and IEMA-approved training provider EEF. ‘Fifteen years ago, it was all ISO 14001 and not a lot else. The role was seen as a bolt-on to the health and safety role, then to the utility management role, but certainly not seen as a key role in its own right.’
How times have changed. The growth of environment and sustainability roles and functions has been rapid and fundamental, with the task at hand no less than the transformation of whole organisations to meet the sustainability challenges facing the economy and society. Moreover, the pace of change at political, legislative and business level is increasing, not slackening. ‘What’s most striking over the past three to five years is just how fast the area is moving,’ Wyse says.
To thrive in this changing milieu, environment and sustainability professionals cannot stand still in terms of the skills they build and develop. They need to put in place ways of routinely reviewing and updating the capabilities and knowledge they need – not just to meet the demands of their current role but with an eye on a medium- to longer-term career plan. Yet this path ahead can be encumbered by barriers and challenges.
Your responsibility
The recognition that you are in charge of your learning and development is an important first step in building an effective career plan. Although a good employer will support staff training and development, ultimately the individual must take responsibility for their own learning and employability. HR body the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) sums it up: ‘Only individuals can learn, and only they can choose to apply their new skills to the work they perform.’
As well as a responsibility to yourself, you also have a duty to your profession. Retaining an IEMA status and suffix now requires members at professional grades to record and report their continuing professional development (CPD) activities. This reflects a wider trend for learning to be more self-directed than ever. A CIPD study of companies leading the field in learning found that 83% were seeking to build a more self-directed learning culture, while technology has allowed individuals to take control of their own CPD.
Rapid change
‘Today, learning is part of economic survival for most of us,’ says HR and talent management leader Josh Bersin. ‘If you don’t stay current, up to date, and continuously re-skilled in our professions – regardless of what they are – you will fall behind.’
Claire Kirk, head of professional standards at IEMA, agrees: ‘The environment in which we all operate is changing, whether it be global mega trends, modern business practices or innovation and good practice. Keeping our knowledge up to date and our skills fit to tackle the challenges of today and tomorrow help us have a positive impact at work, making us a valuable employee and increasing our employability.’
Acquiring skills and keeping them current is essential for progression in any career, but particularly so in a field that requires such a complex mix of expertise against a backdrop of constant change. According to some of the providers delivering IEMA-approved courses, keeping up to date in a rapidly changing environment is seen as the most important benefit for students. Dr Kirsty Smallbone, head of the School of Environment and Technology at the University of Brighton, says the institution’s courses provide the opportunity to update your knowledge of environmental policy and law as well as spend time pondering possible future developments with peers from different roles and sectors.
As the EEF’s Wyse explains, the reality of weekly policy and regulatory change in the environment and sustainability sector quickly renders what we learn obsolete: ‘The current pace of regulatory and policy change is faster than I have ever seen.’
As well as the changing regulatory and policy context, the skills needed by environmental and sustainability professionals are changing rapidly too. Wyse describes how courses have moved from covering change management as a discrete topic to embedding it across courses. Now more time is spent on equipping students with skills that fashion transformational change, from strategic risk and procurement to communications, advocacy and engagement.
Learning and earning
There is overwhelming evidence that, as Bersin puts it, ‘the learning curve is the earning curve’. The acquisition of skills and knowledge is the most predictable factor in the labour market to drive higher earnings. Analysis in 2008 by policy consultancy London Economics considered the value of professional qualifications. It found that the combination of membership of a professional body and holding professional qualifications produced an estimated lifetime benefit of £152,000 (at 2008 value) when all other possible factors were accounted for.
The latest findings from IEMA’s annual practitioner survey (the environmentalist, March 2016, pp 19–33) illustrate the impact of qualifications and experience on salary. There are clear and substantial differences between the median salaries awarded professionals at each grade, illustrating how upgrading brings not just higher professional recognition and status but financial gain. The data revealed that the average salary in 2015 for the then main IEMA membership groups was: £70,486 for Fellows; £54,574 for Full members (MIEMA); £40,903 for Associates; £35,576 for Affiliates; and £27,274 for graduates. The differences may explain why 91% of respondents undertook some form of CPD in 2015.
Having the internationally-recognised status of IEMA membership and the training and qualifications that support it also open up career paths and opportunities worldwide as well as a domestic talent market in what is an increasingly global profession.
Personal impact
Of course, continually building your skills as a professional has many wider benefits than keeping up to date, career progression and increased earnings potential. Learning new skills or addressing personal skills gaps can contribute to confidence, satisfaction, wellbeing and fulfilment at work.
There can also be a positive impact on the performance of a wider team, especially if the person expanding their capabilities is in a line management role. London Economics described this as a ‘spillover effect’. Updating skills increases personal resilience to react positively with change, both on a personal and professional level, and equips the learner to bring about change.
Given the importance of the specialist knowledge to practitioners in transforming their organisations to sustainability, the more transferable skills such as influencing, communication (see ppvi–x) or advocacy can be overlooked. Wyse says: ‘People often assume their skills gap is one of knowledge or subject matter, but often what they need is more in the area of soft skills such as project management, communication or engagement.’ The IEMA skills map (see panel, piv) recognises the importance of those influencing skills in bringing about change as well as the critical importance of commercial awareness and the ability to assess how trends will affect business conditions and strategy.
Tackling barriers
The environment and sustainability profession is one where commitment to continuous learning is high. Yet even the most motivated learner faces barriers such as lack of time, resources or employer support.
One welcome development is the extent to which technology is dramatically reshaping the learning environment, with online courses, networks, tools and content enhancing access for busy professionals. It has never been easier to find relevant training at a time, place and frequency that works for the individual. MOOCs (massive open online courses) have increased in popularity, while IEMA reports rapid growth in the use of its webinars, which can be accessed when convenient. Meanwhile, many of IEMA’s accredited training providers offer a range of ways to access learning, with a mix of classroom-based, online, blended or distance learning available. It is easier than ever to access learning when on a career break, for example, or when balancing work with family commitments.
Barriers remain, however. Employer recognition of the critical importance of environment and sustainability skills for their organisation can be critical factors. Smallbone says: ‘There can be a lack of employer awareness about the training that is out there; employer engagement with training is really important.’
Both Smallbone and Wyse say most people attending their training courses are fully funded by their employer, although Wyse adds: ‘We do get people who self-fund and use all their annual leave to undertake a course.’
If employer buy-in or support for environment and sustainability skills is lacking, practitioners will need to make the business case to their employer. As Wyse points out, there is a powerful compliance case for organisations to take training seriously, with the £2,000–£3,000 cost of a course cheap compared with the potential £1m fine that judges can hand out for environmental offences under the new sentencing guidelines.
Then there is the more progressive case that such skills are needed to support the existence of the business in the future and their impact in saving money, insuring against shocks and using resources efficiently. The right arguments to use will depend on where an organisation is on its sustainability journey. The rationale for investing in staff learning will be different in one of the 20% of organisations identified in a survey of IEMA members last year that do not regard sustainability challenges as material to their business from those seeking to maximise opportunities from addressing sustainability issues.
The results of the annual practitioner survey referred to earlier found that the financial outlay on CPD by employers of IEMA members was good value, with respondents reporting that development activities had directly benefited their organisation. More than one-third (35.5%) said their CPD had directly helped to boost their organisation’s environmental performance. One-third reported that their development had enabled them to help upskill colleagues by running training events internally or through mentoring. Twenty-nine per cent of respondents said their CPD had enhanced the reputation of their organisation, while 22% said it had boosted the sustainability performance of the business.
Using the IEMA benefits map (bit.ly/2f8rqA1) to access training and networking opportunities tailored to any length of time or budget can help practitioners build CPD into their day-to-day working habits.
Five good reasons to update your skills
- Progress in your career and build your employability
- Boost your earnings potential and labour market value
- Keep up with and thrive in a rapidly changing work, business, regulatory and policy environment
- Fulfil your responsibility as a professional to stay updated
- Enjoy your job more and increase your confidence, credibility and effectiveness
Making your plan
The best way to ensure that you stay up to date with the skills you need now and to develop your career long term is to consider your objectives and how you can achieve them. Some of the questions worth considering include: Where do I want to be and what do I want to be doing in five, ten or 20 years’ time? What will I need to learn in order to do this? What development, support, training or resources will I need? How will I evaluate and measure my success?
Effective continuing professional development (CPD) involves developing habits of reflecting on learning and how it is being used, and can benefit hugely from the input of others, such as managers, mentors and peers. Of course, learning comes from day-to-day working at least as much as training courses. Some learning leaders are proponents of the idea, which holds that roughly 70% of learning is from workplace experience, 20% is derived from social learning or learning through others, and 10% comes from structured or formal learning. Asking for feedback at work, experimenting with new approaches and making connections between seemingly unconnected areas can be crucial for skills development and learning.
When structured courses are taken, it is important to reflect on what has been learned and how it is being put into practice at work. ‘It’s not just the knowledge you acquire, it is how you use that knowledge to shape your organisation that matters,’ says James Wyse, sustainability lead at manufacturers’ body EEF.
An approach to CPD that is most helpful in supporting the practitioner to identify and develop the skills they need is to take into account the varied ways that skills are acquired and developed. This could be from tackling a new challenge or problem-solving at work, participating in an online community of practice, volunteering, working with an inspirational mentor or studying for a master’s degree.
This is where the IEMA’s updated skills map, launched in June 2016 alongside the new membership structure, comes into its own. The map, which can be found at bit.ly/2fRB0ZE, puts the emphasis on individual impact, influence and relevance rather than a box-ticking or hierarchical approach to career progression. As IEMA’s chief executive, Tim Balcon, said in launching the organisation’s new membership structure and skills map: ‘Being a transformational change agent at all stages of our careers is not just about climbing a ladder.’
Alongside the skills map, IEMA members have access to the online benefits map. This provides access to events, webinars, training, networks, publications and other development opportunities that are easily accessible and searchable by topic and region.
IEMA’s new continuing professional development (CPD) form (see the environmentalist, November 2016, p10) enables members to record CPD activities annually in order to retain their status and suffix. ‘Recording and reporting CPD is important for a number of reasons,’ says Claire Kirk, head of professional standards at IEMA. ‘For the individual, it helps keep track of progress towards your goals and can be used to demonstrate the currency and relevance of your knowledge and skills to colleagues, line manager or clients. For IEMA, the reputation of our profession is built on having professionally recognised members that add value in the workplace. CPD submissions is how we ensure the ongoing competence of professionally qualified members.’
