How is a CU different from a T&D Function?

Three features distinguish a corporate university or learning institute from the normal training and development function.

First of all, the corporate university is not focused on improving the personal skills of individual employees through classes or seminars. Rather than teach presentation skills, time management or other generic skills; a corporate university aims to improve a broader set of skills that will have a measurable impact on corporate goals, or business results or on customer satisfaction.

An example might be developing a curriculum devoted to improving sales. Emphasis would be on analyzing what the weaknesses are and then in designing a set of activities, programs and interventions that would deliver some predetermined results.

The second big difference is that a corporate university aims to have an impact on strategic thinking and decision making at the senior levels of the organization. The corporate university incorporates elements of change management, team effectiveness, negotiation into its programs and activities so that overall organizational capabilities are improved and strengthened. Most training and development functions are tactically focused and have little effect at senior levels.

And finally, the corporate univeristy has an interest in the future and in helping the organization understand and develop appropriate responses to opportunities and threats in the marketplace.

Instead of being reactionary, the best corporate universities anticipate competition and change and help senior management understand and craft ways to take advantage of opportunities or defect challenges.

General Electric’s John F. Welch Leadership Development Center at Crotonville is often used as an example of an effective corporate-based learning institution and for good reason. Crotonville has consistently helped the CEO and his staff to assess market opportunities and challenges and then develop forward-looking curricula to educate management on how to deal with those challenges. Its Workout program helped GE become more nimble and less bureaucratic just as the ability to respond rapidly to market changes became critical to success.

It is unfortunate that many organizations fail to grasp what power they could unleash if they created and gave appropriate resources to a corporate university instead of a training and development function, albeit a great one. The two functions are no more similar than bookkeeping is to financial management. Both essential, but not the same.