Over the years we’ve developed many resources to support learning businesses in growing and improving. Few, if any, of them are intended to be “one and done” – they are meant to be revisited and re-used over time. So, we find it can be helpful occasionally to highlight some of these resources and remind Leading Learning readers that they are available.
In this post, you’ll find five that address topics ranging from better conference sessions to more effective product strategy.
The Learning Business Maturity Model
Intended as a tool to help you assess the current state of your learning business, the Maturity Model articulates the characteristics of a mature market-facing learning business or line of business, as well as the stages that typically precede full maturity.
We developed it based on the common problems and opportunities we’ve seen in our years of working with a wide range of learning businesses. The model’s framework helps you assess your organization’s capabilities and problem areas and provides a clear path so you can move from problem to opportunity to innovation.
You can find a detailed overview of the Maturity Model on the Tagoras Web site, including links to download a visual of the model and an assessment. We also dedicated an episode of the leading Learning podcast to Leveraging the Learning Business Maturity Model.
Conference Learning Methods Series
We’ve hosted many events, online and off, over the years, and we’re always trying to come up with new approaches to try. We’ve documented some of these in a series of posts (and will add more over time). We encourage you to take them for a spin at your own events.
- A Why-To and How-To on Hot Seats, AKA Collaborative Coaching
A detailed overview of a simple approach that can make your learning events – whether face-to-face or online – more interactive and effective. - A Why-To and How-To on Rethinking Panels: Dynamic Panels
Traditional panel discussions are often not very engaging or effective. This post provides details on an approach to breathing new life into them. - A Why-To and How-To on a Structured Approach to Networking: Curated Connections
Curated Connections is a way to structure some of the networking time that occurs at conferences to provide more focused learning value.
The Value Ramp
One of the consistent findings from our periodic research is that relatively few organizations have any sort of formal product strategy or pricing strategy. While not a replacement for a fully thought-out strategy, the Value Ramp is a simple tool can get you a long ways down the road.
The Value Ramp serves to illustrate three key points:
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- There is a relationship between price and value when it comes to selling just about any product of service.
- It’s generally true that to get to a higher place—whether literally or figuratively—you need momentum, beginning with providing significant value before you ever charge a dime
- The stronger your brand, the more—and more quickly—you are able to charge for the value you offer.
Understanding these points, and using them to plot out your portfolio can produce insights that lead to much more effective product strategy.
You can find a detailed overview of the Value Ramp, including a downloadable handout, on the Tagoras Web site. See also 8 Tips for Optimizing Your Value Ramp for further guidance.
The Informal Learning Business Curriculum
We’ve had many discussions on the Leading Learning Podcast about a range of topics related to the learning business. Over time, these have amounted to a sort of informal “curriculum” for anyone interested in expanding and deepening their knowledge about what it means to serve the market for lifelong learning, continuing education, and professional development. We’ve gathered together and categorized these episodes on a single page to make them easy to access. The categories are:
- The Learning Business and Leading Learning
- Strategy
- Capacity
- Portfolio
- Marketing
- Key Trends
You can tune into these any time on your own (or read the show notes). Assuming you are not a solo operator, though, we recommend having all members of your team listen to them and discuss them over time.
You can access the informal curriculum here >>
The Market Insight Matrix
So many organizations struggle with the “if we build it, will they come” question. The problem is that most aren’t taking the time to assess their market properly, or if they do, it’s just a one shot deal like sending out a survey every few years.
Truly understanding your market is a process that needs to take place over time and make use of multiple inputs – and we created the Market Insight Matrix to provide a framework for that process.
The Market Insight Matrix combines three stages (idea generation, idea verification and idea testing) with three types of activities (tracking, listening, and asking) to create a rigorous and practical process to help you better understand your market for lifelong learning, continuing education, and professional development and identify learning products that will address market needs.
You can find a detailed overview of the Market Insight Matrix, including a downloadable handout, on the Tagoras Web site.
Of course, those are just a few of the resources we offer. You can more by visiting our Resources section. And, of course, if you haven’t already, we encourage you to subscribe to the Leading Learning Podcast and the Leading Learning Newsletter.
Learning and Flow with Jerel Bonner
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