How LinkedIn Learning Helped This Management and IT Consulting Company Scale Learning

“Whenever, wherever.”

When the HR team at MHP Management — a 2,500-employee management and IT consulting company with offices in Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, United States, China and Romania — started investigating online learning options for their employees, they knew that ease-of-use and mobile capabilities were critical.

The vast majority of MHP employees work as consultants for other businesses and have no permanent working space. They are on the road, providing clients in the automotive and manufacturing industry (manufacturers, suppliers, dealers, and importers) with strategic and operational support.

“We knew we had a great need for online learning,” said HR Manager Vanessa Kümmerer, who leads talent development at the company. “It couldn’t be just in a classroom. We needed flexible learning opportunities, literally available whenever, wherever.”

So, in January 2018 the company bought 500 LinkedIn Learning licenses. Since then, employees from around the world have flocked to the platform, as over the summer alone the average MHP Management employee watched more than seven LinkedIn Learning lessons each. Plus, its helped them attract better talent, with recruiters touting it in their pitches to candidates.

“LinkedIn Learning was a very good investment and addition to our portfolio,” Kümmerer said. “We are very happy with it.”

Why MHP Management Chose LinkedIn Learning: It Had the Content and the Ease-of-Use They Needed

MHP Management’s culture is defined by its philosophy of “driven by excellence.” Their belief – the only way to be excellent is to constantly be learning, so you always stay ahead.

That’s reinforced in performance discussions. Employees aren’t just evaluated on their accomplishments, but managers also build learning plans with them to ensure they stay sharp.

“Knowledge and expertise is the number-one requirement of a consultant,” Kümmerer said. “We want to give our employees what they need so that can manage projects effectively.”

The challenge was, despite the focus on learning, there was no centralized, easily accessible learning platform for MHP Management employees to leverage. So, the company began looking for an online learning platform that would meet the needs of all their employees.

After investigating several, a clear winner emerged: LinkedIn Learning. It stood out not only because it was easy for consultants to access on the road via the mobile app, it also had the content they were looking for.

“LinkedIn Learning has a huge variety of courses that are structured in a way where it’s easy to find the one that fit your needs,” Kümmerer said. “And the quality of the content was good. We felt confident rolling it out to our employees.”

MHP Management’s Experience with LinkedIn Learning: High Usage and Another Tool for Recruiters to Leverage

To roll out and drive usage of LinkedIn Learning, Kümmerer and her team encouraged managers to emphasize it in development conversations. They also advertised it via email, the company blog and other electronic communication.

The key, Kümmerer and her team has found, is getting their employees to activate the licenses. Because once an employee gets into the platform, they come back to LinkedIn Learning again and again.

Why? To find out, MHP Management surveyed their employees about the platform. The results exceeded expectations – people agreed, it was providing them with anytime, anywhere learning.

“The feedback on LinkedIn Learning was very good,” Kümmerer said. “People are very happy with the ease-of-use and all the topics. It’s everything from IT to soft skills to creativity to general business concepts. They are finding it all very useful.”

“It’s doing what we hope it would,” she added.

Plus, there’s an unexpected benefit that is boosting their employer brand – LinkedIn Learning is helping attract better talent to MHP Management.

“We often hear from recruiters that learning is important to applicants,” Kümmerer said. “Candidates want to know what we offer in terms of learning and professional development. So, when recruiters show them LinkedIn Learning, it helps them choose to us."

Post updated on April 9, 2019.