When you talk to Mark Collett, Head of Learning and Development at Derivco, a leading software development house, it is clear that Derivco is not your average IT business. First of all, the business designs and develops “trailblazing” technology for the online gaming world. Secondly, it places greater importance on the welfare of its talent than it does on output.

“If we take care of our people, output will take care of itself,” explained Mark. “It’s not about output. We have a performance development programme and model that values principles and how people feel. That drives everything in our business.”

Keeping up with demand

Mark heads up a six-strong learning and development team that enables Derivkins to learn whatever they are passionate about. He explained: “We’re a team of six but we’re not actually a team of six, we’re a team of 2,000.”

Mark describes Derivco as a family-business. It comprises an inquisitive community that desperately wants to learn.

This is evidenced in the huge demand amongst employees for learning. “As a learning and development team, we could not keep up with the demand for learning coming from the people at Derivco,” Mark said. “We had to change our approach. Online learning became an obvious solution for us.”

There were a number of problems that Derivco wanted to solve, every one of which seemed impossible at first. Derivco wanted to give everyone access to learning opportunities and there was a clear need to support line managers with curated learning paths and comprehensive content.

Mark continued: “We initially tested the engagement of LinkedIn Learning with people at Derivco. The engagement and feedback exceeded our expectations.”

Derivco started with 100 LinkedIn Learning licences. Mark added: “Within a week, 400 Derivkins wanted to access the platform. We ramped up our licences to 400 then we had 900 people wanting a licence. Now we have more than 2,000 LinkedIn Learning licences and a 100 per cent activation rate.”

Remove boundaries to achieve the impossible

According to Mark, a big part of the success of LinkedIn Learning is attributable to the culture of learning at Derivco. “Curiosity is a strong feature in our people, which helped the take up of online learning when it was offered. We chose to run a pilot for three months, and by the end of that time, word of mouth had increased the demand for licences.”

But what’s also of huge interest is Derivco’s attitude towards learning. Derivco provides all its employees with a LinkedIn Learning licence and all employees can learn anything they want to. Even the ukulele if they want to!

Mark explained: “There is no way that you can abuse learning. If you have LinkedIn Learning and you want to spend time learning the ukulele, knock yourself out.

“We know the importance of learning. We don’t tell people off for having 30 hours of ukulele lessons. Why? Learning is a discipline and an art that can be honed; no matter what you are learning. It is something that we as a company can still benefit from and it increases our capabilities as a boundary-less organisation.”

He continued: “As a technology company, continuous learning is even more important to keep a company relevant. Online learning has supported this for Derivco. But above that, learning is a habit and having learning as accessible as it is with LinkedIn Learning supports the habit. Derivkins have access to all the LinkedIn Learning courses to help each person develop themselves, and to help others around them, so that we can achieve the impossible as one community.”

Learning and development is fundamental to company culture

Derivco’s innovative approach to learning and development is further evidenced by Reboot, which is a specific initiative whereby Derivkins are expected to spend 30 per cent of their time “rebooting”. Every month. In fact, all employees dedicate an entire week each month to “rebooting”. Reboot week gives Derivkins the opportunity to make a difference, addressing challenges and developing processes that could improve the way people work.

“When we recruit talent, we look for passion,” Mark explained. “We’re interested in their passion and what drives them.

“The working day is just an extension of someone’s passion. Who you are authentically, as a person, is also an extension of that. If we tap into that, motivation and engagement is not a problem.”

Once again, this is evidenced by how many Derivkins engage with content. Mark added: “Over time, as learning has matured at Derivco, we have seen patterns evolve. Whereas initially it was unusual for more than one per cent of the business to do a certain course, there are now a number of courses that achieve more than 75 per cent attendance. The shift from online learning being an individual activity to being a community experience has begun. Development has become a fundamental part of our culture and is what sets us apart as a technology company.”

Learning communities go deeper

Clearly, learning has gained momentum. For example, Mark explained that there are people within the business that have a specific interest in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. These people are pushing the AI/ML agenda, influencing conversations and encouraging Derivkins to collaborate even further within Derivco learning communities.

“As a business, if we decide that we want to learn more about AI/ML, for example, Derivkins go and learn about AI/ML. They then tell us what they learned. Pretty soon, conversations around AI/ML snowball. Suddenly, we have learning communities that decide whether or not certain elements of AI/ML are applicable to our business. You then have a scenario where people are having intelligent conversations around definitions. This is cool to leverage.”

He concluded: “In a world where technology is advancing so quickly with so many bright people, to keep 2,000 people engaged and pulling in the same direction is exciting. It makes for an energetic environment.”