How Kellogg Evolved its Learning Culture with LinkedIn Learning

Kellogg Was Looking to Transform Its Culture

Kellogg’s Senior Director of Global Learning and Development, Thor Flosason, has a vision to create a truly aspirational learning culture for Kellogg employees.

When Thor took over global learning, he inherited a very traditional approach to learning. He described it as “classroom heavy, resource heavy, events-driven. It was not delivered when it was needed.” 

He realized that challenge stretched beyond simply changing course curriculum or bringing in different workshops. Thor needed to evolve Kellogg’s learning culture from one-size-fits-all to one-size-fits-one. 

To do so, he partnered with the HR team and other business leaders to create a 4 stage plan. At the center of that plan was LinkedIn Learning’s library of over 15,000 courses that learners could access on-demand when and where they needed them. LinkedIn Learning armed Thor and the L&D team with the tools they needed to scale learning at a global level.

The challenge now was how they would get those learners to drop their old views of learning as something that’s mandated to them, and adopt a new culture of seeking learning out on their own, learning that is relevant and tied to their goals.

Kellogg’s 4 Stages to an Integrated Learning Culture

Thor is tracking Kellogg’s learning culture across the following four stages:

When Kellogg began their learning evolution, they were starting at stage 1. Through the techniques and tactics outlined below, in a few short years they’ve moved all the way to Stage 3.

Here are the key tactics that have helped them so far:

Getting Leaders to Advocate for the New Learning Culture

To drive adoption, Thor needed to market LinkedIn Learning to employees – a task he didn’t want to take on alone. “In order to implement a successful program, we needed our business leaders across the globe to be invested and on-board, helping to emphasize the importance of LinkedIn Learning," he said. "I didn’t want this to be a strictly HR-driven initiative.”

Before LinkedIn Learning launched to all employees, Thor gave various leaders early access to the platform. He also incorporated them into a launch video that premiered during the LinkedIn Learning launch. This hands-on approach ultimately created strong advocates for the program because other business leaders felt they were a part of the learning culture.

“Our intention and our hope was that our department leaders would embrace LinkedIn Learning and promote it,” he said. “And that was what happened, that was really the key.”

Creating an Internal Marketing Campaign: #IGotThis

The L&D team wanted to extend their campaign beyond just the launch. To do so, they needed a tagline that people could get behind for months to come. They created their marketing campaign around the hashtag #IGotThis. 

David Castillo, a learner at Kellogg explains, “The hashtag #IGotThis is great because it emphasizes that we are in charge of our own development.”

Kellogg employees continue to post #IGotThis in Yammer, the company’s internal communication platform. Some of those posts include:

Creating a Learning Culture is a Shared Experience

Allowing learners to learn when and where they want is a great benefit, but simply having the tools by themselves doesn’t change a culture. Thor explains that, “learning is not only for you, it’s about sharing. What are the insights you generated from that LinkedIn Learning course? We need to make sure that learning becomes a social thing as well.”

To improve the social aspect of learning, Thor and his team used three key drivers:

Thor says, “We wanted to encourage learners to complete courses and then share what they learned, to share insights. That really helped create that community of sharing. It’s very powerful, very simple, and we got phenomenal reach just through those simple activities.”

The Results: 485,000 Videos and Counting

So far Kellogg employees have watched an astonishing 485,000 LinkedIn Learning videos and spent nearly 25,000 hours learning on the platform.

According to Thor, the employee reaction has been tremendous. Employees provided the following comments about LinkedIn Learning:

It has also freed up the Global Learning Team to be more strategic. Before LinkedIn Learning, the team was constantly responding to requests from the business, trying to fill every learning need. LinkedIn Learning has eliminated a lot of that.

Thor explains a few of the key benefits of choosing LinkedIn Learning were:

“It takes the pressure off, I’m no longer worried about all the requests we get,” Thor said. “Now, we can focus on other things because we have LinkedIn Learning in place. Ultimately, this is about our people’s learning and growth experiences, we care about their needs and are now better equipped to deliver against them.”

Most importantly though, it’s helping Kellogg transition to the Agile Learning Stage. Increasingly, Kellogg employees aren’t waiting for an in-person training to come to upskill themselves – they are using LinkedIn Learning to upskill in the moment and immediately improve themselves and the business.