3 Learning and Development

Case Studies

www.cultureamp.com 3 Learning and Development Case Studies

Introduction

One of the reasons Culture Amp exists is to allow organizations to

understand what factors impact engagement, and how they are
performing on those factors.
Learning and Development consistently presents as strongly
linked to engagement in our data, and these case studies include
companies who use Culture Amp to learn about how their
organization is tracking. They then go away and act on the insights
they find, and use the platform again to measure how they went. It's
a process we call 'learn, act, repeat'.
Measurement also allows people to present solid evidence
to stakeholders at their organization about how Learning and
Development impacts on engagement and retention. It’s my
intention to provide people geeks with feedback and analytics as
powerful as the reports of their finance counterparts.
At Culture Amp we’re still (and always will be) refining our approach
to Learning and Development. I hope the below case studies are as
interesting to you as they were to me.

Didier Elzinga
CEO
Culture Amp

www.cultureamp.com 3 Learning and Development Case Studies 2

James Balagot heads up Learning and Development at Yelp and has
been working for the company for eight years. It’s a long tenure for
anyone, let alone someone in New Tech, but it’s not unusual at Yelp.
The second practice is promoting from within. “Recently, we took
a look at people that were in our mid-market, our national sales,
and our sales management roles, and 98% of the people that we
“They just keep
He’s seen the business grow from 100 to 4000 people. promote into those roles were internal candidates,” says Balagot.
promoting me,
“They just keep promoting me, they give me more responsibility,” Because people are promoted from within, there's a culture of
explains Balagot. Yelp’s Learning and Development score was mentoring. People understand that they’ve achieved their goals they give me more
responsibility.
13% above the benchmark for New Tech in 2015. “We have a very because they were in stretch roles and mentored by others. They
interesting model. I head up Learning and Development, but I'm also see that if they develop people to take over their role, they can
the only person on my team. People think, ‘Hold on, how does that be promoted again. – James Balagot
work? How does anything get accomplished? Are people being
Yelp builds the message of internal promotion into their onboarding.
bribed or what's going on here?’”
Around 60% of the workforce is salespeople – and many haven’t
Their approach relies on two key practices. The first practice is worked in sales before. In addition to practical training, guest
that people are put in stretch roles. From the day they arrive in the speakers from the organization share their stories and career
business, they’re allowed to find their way, and coached through the progression at Yelp. They also set expectations. “It's an odds game
learning experiences they come across. “When I started I got put in where you're going to fail. In order for people to focus on their
a sales role even though I never did sales in my life. All of a sudden development, focus on the long term, it's really telling those stories
I was given a phone, I was given some training, and I was doing the of people that weren't successful the first three months and look at
hardest job that I've ever done. My job was to bring in revenue and I them now. It's really that focus on development,” says Balagot.
had to figure it out,” says Balagot.
Inevitably, people make mistakes. “We let them know they didn't
Putting people in stretch roles where they have the opportunity to live up to expectations or we hold people accountable, but then we
learn is challenging and exciting. “Rather than ‘Hey, go to a training also make sure that they know we care for them and figure out what
session that we're offering, you're learning every single day in every to do in order to improve,” says Balagot.
moment because your job is challenging you,’" explains Balagot.

www.cultureamp.com 3 Learning and Development Case Studies 3

Airbnb is growing fast, and has no shortage of job applicants, in
one year receiving 180,000 CVs for 900 positions. Despite the
demand, the company’s first preference for filling roles is to look
go through this process with others who have also been recently
hired. "We create belonging by enabling them to form a group
that hopefully stays together as they progress here through their
“Interviews
focus on our
internally, and after that to look externally and start with internal careers,” Levy says. "We schedule different kinds of lunches and
recommendations. meetings to help people to understand their colleagues they’re

core values.
going to be working with.”
Every candidate that makes it through to an interview goes through
a set of interviews related to their role, and in addition they have Another way to ensure people feel like they belong is to bring
two interviews related to core values. These are conducted by together the entire international team annually. The last two – Mark Levy
people selected by the founders, who are outside of the function years they have had One Airbnb, an all-company meetup as well
for which they are interviewing. “These interviews focus on our core as annual regional gatherings. One Airbnb is a company-wide
values to determine how in their life they have lived these values conference that has taken place in San Francisco, over the course of
in order to make sure that anyone who comes to Airbnb is going to a few days.
be successful in living these values," says Airbnb’s Global Head of
“One Airbnb is quintessential in the way we set it up,” Levy says.
Employee Experience, Mark Levy.
“For the first one we had the first day about our future, the second
Once somebody has made it through both sets of interviews and day about our people and their development, and the third day was
gets an offer, they go through a week long check-in process that learning about each other and how we work together.”
focuses on the Airbnb values, business strategies, an introduction
to each function, and ways of working. New team members usually

www.cultureamp.com 3 Learning and Development Case Studies 4

Four days at One Airbnb

Day One Day Three

Strategy and vision for the year, and a bit of getting to know This time was dedicated to learning, with about 40
the founders (looking back and forward). foundational courses that people could choose from, with
everything from giving better presentations through to project
Day Two management. In the afternoon, it’s the employees’ time to
share their knowledge with ‘Air Shares’ - something Levy says
Unpacking the Culture Amp engagement survey to talk
they do a lot of - which is where people have hobbies and
about where Airbnb did well and what they didn’t do well
interests that they share with other people in the company.
in. To get cross-functional input on the survey results they
In the evening was a family dinner, which included all 1200
broke out into groups of about 15, focusing on four themes
employees, and turned into the world’s largest karaoke party.
they could find as areas of improvement. A representative
from each team was tasked with summarizing everything into
a tweet and proposing three things Airbnb could do as an
Day Four
organization to address areas they didn’t do well in, based on The company held an ‘Air Fair’ where everyone from different
the recommendations of all the groups. parts of the company set up a booth to share what it is that they
do, and were there to answer questions. The last activity was
That afternoon the founders walked everyone through what
Airbnb employees went out in smaller groups, some with local
Airbnb wanted to accomplish that year, and in the evening
hosts to volunteer somewhere within the city. The final evening
they held a ‘host your fellow employee’ dinner, where San
event was a celebration in which individuals were nominated
Francisco based employees had others to their home or at a
and recognized with regard to the company’s core values.
restaurant for an intimate night of dinner and fun.

www.cultureamp.com 3 Learning and Development Case Studies 5

Earls Kitchen + Bar was well-regarded as an employer of choice for
many years before missing out on a Best Employers list they were
used to appearing on. The experience prompted them to return to
Last September, Earls took advantage of the the flexibility of the
Culture Amp system to conduct a pulse survey specifically for
their kitchen partners. They had been getting some feedback that
“Any time
their core values and regularly measure their performance to ensure
their actions were delivering results.
front-of-house employees were getting a lot of training and back-
of-house partners wanted that as well. With the survey, Earls was we push out
People who work at Earls are called ‘partners’. They believe that great
guest experiences begin with great partner experiences. The partner
able to ascertain that employees needed to feel more connected
to their culture, as well as what was needed in terms of training and something
experience is one of the key success indicators for the company.
development. This feedback will help mold future programs and
initiatives that have a direct impact on kitchen partners.
new, we use the
pulse survey.
Employee engagement, leadership, enablement, alignment and
development are measured. They seek feedback frequently because The surveys also help garner feedback regarding new programs.
the feedback helps drive their business strategies. Recently, Earls launched a new guest experience training program
that will be provided to all their front-of-house partners. In the – Janis Tong
Past survey feedback has contributed to company initiatives and
past, it was face-to-face training that took place in the store when a
programs like Vision + Goals (a goal setting and personal development
partner was first hired. Now, the course has shifted to a combination
program), guest experience training delivered via eLearning, and
of face-to-face training and eLearning. Having not done a lot of
changes to their compensation and benefits program.
eLearning, Earls designed a survey to see how effective the new
“The Earls Experience is about leadership, it’s about people, it’s training was and how they could improve it.
about development and growth, and we have fun,” says Janis
“Any time we push out something new, we use the pulse survey
Tong, Earls Senior Manager of Content and Digital Strategy. “Our
as a tool to see how the program or initiative is working for our
company’s soul is to live a large, purposeful life filled with fun,
people, and that’s really important for us to measure effectiveness
and so we try to inject that through all our communications,
and how we can improve it going forward,” says Tong. “We’ve been
training programs, and make sure it’s integrated into everything
really happy with the tool. The fact that we have this tool to capture
we do at Earls.”
feedback really quickly and easily is awesome and we’re going to be
using it a lot more going forward.”

www.cultureamp.com 3 Learning and Development Case Studies 6

If you’d like to know more about how Culture Amp
can help your organization, book a free consultation
with a People Geek: www.cultureamp.com

www.cultureamp.com 3 Learning and Development Case Studies