Convert Most Classroom Courses to Technology-Based Training

We realized early on that the best way to achieve our goals was to implement technology-based training. Technology would allow us to deliver training not just to geographically separated offices but also right to the desktops or workspaces of all Rockwell Collins employees . It would provide the entire staff with learning opportunities twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, regardless of their location.

Technology would enable us to make Rockwell Collins a learning organization, because for the first time the delivery of necessary training would be able to keep up with the rest of the business. As soon as there was a need for training, our team would be able to provide it. And because it would be offered 24/7, every employee at any location would have equal access to the same skills and knowledge, thus leveling the playing field for all Rockwell Collins offices.

Based on these assumptions, our team created a process for selecting the tools and vendors necessary to support our transformation. (See Chapter 5 for the vendor-selection process.) We completed all of our technology research and selection long before we pitched our business case to executives so that once we got buy-in we would be ready to launch our new technology-based training infrastructure and immediately affect the company's ability to learn.

Based on our plan and our technology research, within weeks of our launch the transformation would begin. Classroom courses would be shut down and replaced with e-learning. Catered class lunches would stop. The learning and development department would cease to support requests for classroom training if computer-based alternatives existed. This was a bold decision that would frustrate some managers who used classroom training as perks for employees. However, we decided that cutting off the masses from their classroom fix was the quickest way for us to show them the value of alternative learning options and would set the standard for zero tolerance of old behavior. Believe it or not, just canceling lunch helped to make the classroom process less attractive.