Organizational Readiness

for 70:20:10

White Paper
White Paper > Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10

Abstract
Many organizations around the world are investing time and effort to redesign their

learning and development strategy and practices using 70:20:10 principles. Although

the 70:20:10 model is on the surface a simple one, it carries with it significant change

implications. Organizations implementing 70:20:10 need to think about, and review,

their level of readiness if they are to successfully exploit the approach. Factors such

as organizational culture, executive support, manager and team leader attitudes, HR

and L&D capability, technical infrastructure, and tools and processes all play a part

in successful adoption of the 70:20:10 framework. This paper, the first in a series of

three focused on successful 70:20:10 implementation, discusses these organizational

challenges and provides guidance for addressing each. It also includes a simple

organizational readiness checklist you can use to determine the areas you may need

to focus on, and where potential obstacles may occur. After the introduction, there is a

brief overview of the 70:20:10 model.

About the Author

Charles Jennings is a leading thinker and practitioner in learning,
development and performance. Charles has consulted on,
and led, learning and performance improvement projects for
multinational corporations, government agencies, not-for-profits,
and other organizations for more than 35 years.
 “Development generally begins with a realization of current or future
need and the motivation to do something about it. This might come from
feedback, a mistake, watching other people’s reactions, failing, or not
being up to a task — in other words, from experience.”

—— Michael Lombardo and Robert W. Eichinger, in The Career Architect Development

Planner.1

Introduction • Technical Infrastructure Readiness

This paper is the first in a series of three explaining the
requirements for successful adoption of the 70:20:10 model for
learning, development and for achieving high performance. The
second paper addresses issues of technology, tools and process
readiness. The third focuses on building the business case for
70:20:10.
The 70:20:10 model, above all else, is an agent for change.
It is a framework for extending our focus on learning beyond
classrooms, workshops or executive retreats and out into the
daily workflow. It helps us move from a world of learning events
into an environment where continuous learning and development
is part of daily work.
Change management experts emphasize the importance of
organizational readiness and preparation for change. However,
unlike individual readiness for change, organizational readiness
has not been the subject of extensive theoretical or empirical
study2 and there are no “cookie cutter” solutions. So it’s
important to understand what should be considered in your
own organization as you start the 70:20:10 adoption process or
embed it further.
If 70:20:10 is to be successfully implemented in an organization,
“collective behavior”3 needs to take place. People across the
organization need to be provided with a clear understanding of
the change that’s going to occur, their role in the change, and
how it is likely to affect them.
• Tools and Process Readiness
This paper also provides a simple practical checklist to use as
part of the organizational readiness process.
The 70:20:10 Model: A Brief Overview
Our understanding of how high performers reach the heights has
become far clearer in the past few years. This new knowledge
is now being reflected in the way organizations are looking to
change their approaches to learning and development.
High-performing people engage in cycles of continuous
development. Some of this development occurs through
e-learning, classroom courses, workshops and other structured
learning activities. However, the bulk of the development that
leads the way toward high performance comes through learning
from the daily workflow and from others in the workplace.
Of course, an airline pilot or surgeon, or any other worker for
that matter, will usually need to undertake structured training on
their way to qualification in their field. However, when we study
how the high performers have reached high levels of excellence
we find it is invariably through challenging experiences, practice,
conversations with mentors and peers, tapping their professional
networks, and reflection. Additionally, high performers are
motivated to get better at what they do. Continuous learning and
motivation together create the path to high performance.

There are other considerations that also need to be taken into With this in mind, an increasing number of organizations across
account. the world are turning to the 70:20:10 framework as a way to
support this process of continuous learning and motivation. The
This paper addresses the following of these considerations: framework provides a simple and structured mechanism that
• Cultural Readiness offers the potential to extend the focus on learning beyond the
classroom and into the workflow.
• Executive Support Readiness
• Team Leader and Manager Readiness 70:20:10 has emerged from a range of studies over the past 40
• HR and L&D Readiness years that have shown informal and workplace learning to be
increasingly pervasive and central to learning in organizations.

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White Paper > Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10

Studies have produced varying figures of the amount learned
in these ways,4 and each organizational culture will display its
own profile of workplace, social and structured development
opportunities. However, these studies all indicate that most
learning occurs not in classrooms, but in the daily workplace.
The 70:20:10 numbers themselves are usually credited to a
small study by Morgan McCall and his colleagues working at
the Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) in the early 1990s. The
output from one piece of research, a survey with a small group of
high-performing managers, reported:
Lessons learned by successful and effective managers are
roughly:
• 70% from tough jobs
• 20% from people (mostly the boss)
• 10% from courses and reading
This ratio underpins the basic reference model for the
70:20:10 strategic framework.
It is important to appreciate, however, that 70:20:10 is not
a “rule” or rigid formula. The ratio of experiential, social and
structured development in any situation will be dependent
on factors that are specific to individual context. In a highly
regulated environment we would expect the “10” to assume
greater importance. In a highly innovative environment we
would expect to see a skew toward more “70” and “20”
types of development.
70:20:10 — Cultural Readiness
Organizational readiness for 70:20:10 starts with culture.
The role of culture and the need for a cultural shift to change
approaches to learning were identified and explained by Chris
Argyris and Donald Schön as long ago as 1974.5
Argyris and Schön’s work on “double-loop learning” made it
clear that one of the major elements that hold learning back is
organizational culture. To break “single-loop learning” where
principles are never questioned, and to develop true learning
cultures, they argued “double-loop learning” is needed —

“Companies can learn how to resolve the learning dilemma. What it takes
is to make the ways managers and employees reason about their behavior
a focus of organizational learning and continuous improvement programs.
Teaching people how to reason about their behavior in new and more
effective ways breaks down the defenses that block learning.”6
—— Chris Argris, Professor of Education and Organizational Behavior,
Harvard University

2
where experiences, and reflection on those experiences, help
change organizational norms and enable organizations to do
things totally differently.
Argyris’ work was a significant influence on Peter Senge,
whose vision for a learning organization7 incorporates not
only personal mastery but also building shared visions and
continual loops of team learning.
For organizations wishing to implement 70:20:10 at the core of
their learning strategy, there is a need to get an understanding
of the cultural norms that exist and then assess whether
they will support or work against the underlying principles of
70:20:10.
These underlying principles are:
• Learning is a continuous process, not a series of events
• Most learning happens as part of day-to-day work and by
interacting with other people in the workflow and beyond
• The organization, its managers and every individual worker
all hold responsibility for incorporating opportunities for
learning into everyday work
• Equally, they all hold responsibility for extracting and sharing
learning from work
Even if there is a match of cultural norms of the organization
with these principles, there’s still a need to ensure that
everyone in the organization understands the implications of
adopting the 70:20:10 model and their own responsibilities
within the framework.
Initial work will involve a well thought-out and executed
communications campaign with the communications and
internal marketing specialists working alongside the HR
and L&D teams.
A cultural readiness campaign will make it clear to everyone
across the organization the change that’s going to occur,
their role in the change, and how it is likely to affect them.
When the business case is built for adopting 70:20:10 (the
subject of the third paper in this series), evidence-based
reasoning of the benefits of 70:20:10 to the organization will
need to be clearly laid out. The cultural readiness work should
draw on this evidence-based reasoning and give people the
opportunity to question and challenge the proposed change.
Learn more about how Informal
Learning delivers significant benefits.
Start small and build on success.
Executive Support Readiness
Without executive support, any change initiative is likely to fail.
A high level of executive support is absolutely critical for
70:20:10 adoption. 70:20:10 usually requires fundamental
changes to workforce development mindsets and processes.
It is not a matter of simply reconfiguring L&D or HR processes.
This executive support required goes beyond general approval
and any financial sign-off that may be required. Executives
need to both actively support the principles of 70:20:10 and
act as role models themselves.
At the outset, it is important to engage as many senior
executives as possible. A single executive sponsor is usually
not enough. 70:20:10 impacts everyone — every individual
contributor, team manager, manager of managers, and the
senior leaders themselves. One senior executive, even the
CEO, is not able to exert influence wide enough for 70:20:10
adoption to be successful, although it is certainly helpful if the
CEO is actively involved.
One step in ensuring appropriate executive support and
involvement in a 70:20:10 implementation is to establish or
reconfigure your learning governance board or council.
Many organizations have learning governance boards, but
often membership is primarily made up of senior HR, talent
and L&D managers who deal with detailed operational matters.
70:20:10 extends learning beyond the management and
control of these groups so it is imperative that the membership
of a governance board or council is primarily senior executives.
If you are to engage senior executives in this way you need
to make it clear that governance board membership will not
be onerous. The focus of the board will be to make strategic
and operational decisions that will determine the quality of the
organization’s most valuable resource — its people.
Team Leader and Manager Readiness
70:20:10 succeeds or fails on the actions of team leaders
and managers.
People managers have greater impact on improving
performance and developing high-performing organizations
than anyone else, including the HR and L&D departments.
This fact has been known for years. Mary Broad and John
Newstrom’s work on the transfer of training indicated that
even with formal training (the “10” in 70:20:10) the actions
managers take before and after training events have the
greatest impact on the effectiveness of the training. This
involves managers selecting the right people for the right
training; working with the trainer(s) to ensure the training
is aligned with their own expectations; and, importantly,
supporting their people once training has been completed
and providing opportunities for the new learning to be applied.
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White Paper > Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10
Newstrom, in a study in 1986 (nearly 30 years ago!) found that
HR professionals estimated only 15% of training content was
still being applied by learners one year after training. In today’s
fast moving world, we can only expect that figure to be lower.
Newstrom reported the three most powerful forces leading to this
low percentage and working against the transfer of training and
conversion into improved performance were:
• lack of on-the-job reinforcement;
• interference from the immediate environment; and
• a non-supportive organizational climate.
Each of these speak to the need for readiness — organizational
readiness, manager readiness, and technology, tools and process
readiness.
Managers also determine whether people stay with their
organization (the adage “you join an organization and leave a
manager” has been validated over and over again). So not only
are managers best placed to support employee development
and drive high performance, they are best placed to help
maintain that high performance.
A key part of your organizational readiness work should focus
on ensuring team leaders and managers understand the benefits,
and agree that their role in developing their people is at least as
important as operational excellence, if not more important. You
should also ensure these team leaders and managers have tools to
help them deliver on the people development aspect of their job.
Learn more about how
collaborative technology helps
learning and talent programs.
HR and L&D Readiness
The right HR and L&D mindset and capability is essential to
support 70:20:10 learning.
HR and learning professionals should ready themselves for
70:20:10 by making sure they understand their new extended
roles and the new skills and capabilities they will need to support
learning in the workplace.
Implementing 70:20:10 involves extending the focus on learning.
This means HR and learning professionals will be stepping into
territory many have not explored previously.
The requirement to step beyond designing, developing and
delivering courses, programs and e-learning (although, of
course, these activities will still be required) means HR and L&D
professionals need to bring new capabilities to play.
4
For example, performance analysis skills (rather than training skills
analysis) are required from the outset. Designing solutions for the
full 100% is essential. “Training needs analysis” supports the “10,”
not the “100.” Performance analysis requires the skill to analyze
the root cause of performance problems and then craft solutions
to support learning in the workplace through:
• encouraging and facilitating social and networked learning;
• enabling informal coaching and mentoring, and;
• designing structured learning that leverages and links to the
workplace.
Equally, curation and community support skills and capabilities
become as important as instructional design skills in a 70:20:10
world. As does the ability to design performance support solutions.
A 70:20:10 view means the learning landscape immediately
becomes richer, more complex, and more nuanced.
One of the other main readiness challenges for these groups
is adopting the mindset that most learning can be facilitated,
supported, encouraged but not managed.
Learn more about how modern
learning strategies can help you engage
learners and improve individual and
organizational performance.
Technical Infrastructure Readiness
Technology alone is not enough, but it is a critical factor in a
successful 70:20:10 strategy.
A rich and flexible technical infrastructure is absolutely necessary
for a successful 70:20:10 implementation.
Shlomo Ben-Hur, former chief learning officer at Mercedes-Benz,
DaimlerChrysler, and BP and now professor at IMD Business
School, explains that we are living not so much in an era of learning
technology, but of mobile, cost-effective technology. Ben-Hur argues
that maturing technology infrastructure and changing workforces
and workplaces have come together to create a perfect storm.
It is essential for the technology infrastructure to support the
changing workforces and workplaces, and this, according to
Ben-Hur, means going beyond traditional learning technology
design and functionality. 70:20:10 practices will demand this.
The technology required to support both the richness and the
reach of 21st century learning — where people expect to exploit
learning wherever they are and at any time of the day or night in
“rich” and engaging ways — must be designed with experiential
and social learning prominently in mind. Tools and technology
to support social sharing; user-generated content; extensive The British Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and
repositories of rich media materials that can be accessed at, Development (OECD) data on national labor productivity shows
and just before, the “moment of need”; expert location; and many that since the 1980s and despite vast investment and research
other requirements need to be woven into the technical landscape. in technology, tools, and processes, our ability to achieve greater
productivity overall has been very limited (around 1% growth per
The second paper in this series will explore the technological
year). A significant contributor to this relatively low increase in
readiness in more detail as this is a critical element in supporting
productivity has been lack of ability to deploy and use tools and
the 70:20:10 learning approach.
processes in the best way possible. The right tools are critical, but
the right use of those tools is just as important.
Tools and Processes Readiness The second paper in this series will explore readiness for 70:20:10
Marshall McLuhan once explained that “we shape our tools and learning in the context of tools and processes in more detail.
then our tools shape us.”
Our interaction with both technological tools and with sometimes
more mundane processes bears McLuhan’s observation out. We Learn more about how Saba’s
can deploy the most sophisticated technologies and build complex Learning@Work LMS supports
and detailed organizational processes to support new learning the 70:20:10 model.
and development approaches such as 70:20:10, but unless we
understand how to best use the technologies and how to best
structure our processes, there’s a very good chance we will end
up with complexity that actually lowers our ability to build capability
and to get work done.

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White Paper > Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10

Organizational Readiness Checklist

This checklist has been designed to be a reflective action tool. Use it to carry out a quick assessment of your organization’s
readiness for 70:20:10.

 Level of Readiness
Checklist Item low moderate high Actions
✔ ✔ ✔
Our organization has a strong culture of learning and development
1
that is supported by senior executives and managers.
Our organization has a clear learning strategy that is focused on
2 exploiting experiential and social learning in addition to structured
development.
At least some of our senior leaders understand the benefits of
3 learning on the job and actively support our efforts to create a
learning culture.
Most of our managers and team leaders understand their roles
4 as developers of their teams as well as agents of operational
excellence.
Our employees are aware that their learning and development
5 is the joint responsibility of themselves, their managers and the
organization.
Our HR performance review and development objective-
6 setting process encourages experiential and social learning and
development.
Our learning governance council/ board has representative
7 membership from our key stakeholders. It does not consist of only
HR/L&D people.
Our senior L&D teams work closely with HR management and HR
8 business partners, even if L&D sits in the business line and reports
to business managers.
Our L&D teams always engage with senior stakeholders during the
9 design and development of learning solutions to ensure their needs
are being met.
Our L&D leaders understand 70:20:10 and the implications it might
10 have for L&D skills and capability development and for mindset
change.
Our IT policy and our technical infrastructure support a range of new
11
ways of working and learning (mobile, social, just-in-time support).
Our L&D team has an ongoing review process for new tools and
12
processes that can support extending learning into the workflow.

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White Paper > Organizational Readiness for 70:20:10

References
1 L
 ombardo, Michael M; Eichinger, Robert W (1996). The Career Architect Development
Planner (1st ed.). Minneapolis: Lominger. p. iv. ISBN 0-9655712-1-1.

2 W
 einer, B. (2009) “A theory of organizational readiness for change.” In Implementation
Science 2009, 4:67.

3 Ibid.

4 L
 earning through experience/informally research reports: 70% (Tough, 1971, 1979); 70%
(Bruce, Aring, and Brand, 1998); 62% (Zemke, 1985 and Verespej, 1998); 70% (Vader,
1998); 85–90% (Raybold, 2000); 70% (Dobbs, 2000); 75% (Lloyd, 2000).

5 A
 rgyris, C. and Schön, D. Theory in Practice: Increasing Professional Effectiveness
(San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1974).

6 C
 hris Argyris, “Teaching Smart People How to Learn,” Harvard Business Review
Vol.4 No.2 1991.

7 S
 enge, P. The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization. (1990),
Doubleday, ISBN 0-385-26094-6.

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