QA Report: Covid-19 and Corporate Learning Impact

Introduction

The QA Customer Survey in Light of Covid-19 ran between 17 April and 14 May 2020.

The survey was completed by a total of 330 respondents. Almost half (49%) of the respondents hold IT roles and 20% of respondents work in learning and development.

When looking at the job level of respondents, over 75% hold a position of manager or above, with 20% of these being in positions of CxO, director or a head-of role.

1. In light of Covid-19, how important is it that your organisation develops skills in the following areas in the next 3-6 months?

Key findings:

• • Top 5 areas that organisations are looking to develop skills in the next 3-6 months:
    1. Effective home-working (50.9% highly important / 32.6% somewhat important)
    2. Cyber security (47.4% highly important / 34.2% somewhat important)
    3. Leadership and personal development (50.9% highly important / 32.6% somewhat important)
    4. Cloud technologies (50.9% highly important / 32.6% somewhat important)
    5. End-user/office apps (50.9% highly important / 32.6% somewhat important)
  • The area of least interest was software development and programming, with 30.5% of respondents indicating this as not important.

2. Are there any other areas in technology and leadership where your organisation needs to develop skills in the next 3-6 months?

The key themes that emerged relating to other technology and leadership areas that organisations are looking to develop skills in were:

• • Change management, particularly leadership skills in uncertain times.
  • Wellness and wellbeing, with many citing the need to support employees with building resilience.
  • Helping employees to embrace new tech and to develop a digital mindset.
  • Training for trainers (and teachers) that are transitioning to virtual delivery.

3. In response to question 6, when thinking about your organisation’s overall investment in training, are you most likely to:

• • 56% said they would be investing the same, more or significantly more.
  • 28% said they would be investing less or significantly less or would stop training altogether.
  • 16% said they were not sure.

This seemed a more optimistic outlook than maybe anticipated, so we drilled down further into the data to see if this outlook was the same when we looked at the feedback from those in senior roles (CxO, director and heads of). The feedback from this demographic was slightly less optimistic but not significantly so:

• • 49% said they would be investing the same, more or significantly more.
  • 41% said they would be investing less or significantly less or would stop training altogether.
  • 10% said they were not sure.

4. When we are able to reopen our physical classrooms, how do you think your usage may change?

• • 23% stated that classroom training will still be the main delivery mode they want.
  • A further 55% said that the physical classroom will still have a role but as part of a blended learning experience.
  • Only 3% of respondents stated that now they have seen how effective virtual live learning can be, they no longer see a need for physical classroom training.

It is worth noting, as one respondent did in the comments, that significant behavioural change often takes years rather than months. Therefore, this will be an interesting question to revisit as the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic continues to play out, particularly if there is a return to stricter lockdown measures as some are predicting.

Download a copy of the report