Investing in a learning organization does represent a financial commitment. According to the 2015 State of the Industry report published by the Association for Talent Development and sponsored by Capella University, organizations spent an average of $1,229 per employee on learning in 2014, and that those employees devoted an average of 32.4 hours to learning. So where is the ROI?

• Meeting objectives. A learning organization can work to help any company accomplish goals for sales, cost, quality, customer satisfaction, and productivity. Making full use of that potential begins with defining a target—for example, increasing sales or reducing costs—and evaluating how learning can contribute to meeting those specific objectives.
• Greater team and individual initiative. Learners are proven to be more engaged and self-directed and see their roles in achieving the larger goals—and they have the ability to apply newfound skills directly to their work.
• The ability to engage on several levels. Learning employees have a greater ability to meet technical challenges, such as creating PowerPoint presentations, and adaptive challenges, which is the capability to truly engage with people around a set of ideas.

While there are up-front costs in building a learning organization, the dividends include engaged teams, the ability to better meet goals and objectives, and, most important, greater opportunity for long-term growth.

Read the third in our series of Connections to Growth: Leadership guides, Leveraging the Learning Organization, to discover how learning can spur your business’s growth.