Posted: 14 Jan. 2025 8 min. read

Corporate Academies

Flipping the tassel on traditional corporate L&D

Authored by Josh Haims and Zhdan Shakirov

The state of learning and development

People are the heart of any effective organization, and it’s critical that the skills and capabilities of the workforce evolve at the pace of change in the world of work. And, the half-life of those skills is shrinking. 

Deloitte’s 2024 Global Human Capital Trends report finds workers are spending 50% more time learning this year than the last¹—and in today’s fast-changing and competitive market, that’s time organizations can’t afford to lose. Traditional corporate learning and development (L&D) programs just aren’t enough to keep up with the rapid change of in-demand skills. In fact, 73% of organizations surveyed agreed it’s important to ensure human capabilities keep pace with technological innovation, but only 9% reported making progress toward achieving that balance.²

Buying and borrowing skills might yield positive short-term results, but building a truly agile workforce for the long term requires a different, and strategic approach. (That’s especially true as new technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) dominate organizational priorities—though only 17% of organizations reported making significant investments in training and development to support AI strategies.³) Developing specialized in-house upskilling programs designed to build long-term capabilities can help an organization foster a sustainable and agile approach to learning that allows its workers to quickly adapt to the skills necessary for success.

Using learning to drive organizational outcomes

Enter the corporate academy. Corporate academies differ from “traditional” L&D programs by making a concerted effort to teach a concrete set of capabilities and skills that an organization recognizes its workforce needs. A corporate academy can offer in-house courses that are strategically and systematically targeted to skills and tasks—while at the same time deeply connecting to the organization’s vision, goals and culture. Unlike standard professional development courses, corporate academies operate in-house, course topics target company-identified needs and performance metrics, and typically are led by in-house specialists. Also, compared to the more generalized "any-company" L&D curriculums led by external teachers, the academy model is nimble and agile for change. 

When used with purpose and intention, academies can provide employees high-quality, relevant and engaging learning opportunities—helping them acquire and apply the skills and knowledge they need to succeed in their roles, grow in their careers and drive tangible business results.

The potential benefits that corporate academy programs can bring to organizations include:

  1. Rapid upskilling in hot trending topics: Today, technology is advancing so rapidly that tasks often become obsolete before workers can reach competency without professional development support. Corporate academy programs can help organizations identify and address the skill gaps and needs of their workforce in a timely and efficient way. And that focus on skills can be critical: Organizations that take a skills-based approach are 63% more likely to achieve business outcomes than those that don’t.⁴ 
  2. Cost-effective and scalable learning solutions: Broadly focused L&D organizations often struggle to keep pace as the workforce changes, business priorities shift and technology evolves—making those traditional learning efforts too slow and costly to meet the rapidly changing demand for skills.⁵ On the other hand, smaller corporate academy programs can help the company optimize its learning budget and resources and provide flexible and scalable learning solutions that suit its size, structure and needs.
  3. More impactful and personalized learning experiences: More than 90% of mature organizations encourage workers to have influence over the work assigned to them⁶—and that means being able to tailor learning experiences accordingly. Corporate academy programs can personalize learning programs to the specific needs, preferences and goals of learners, as well as the context and culture of the organization.
  4. Immediate business application: Even the most innovative learning approaches demand a sturdy foundation, and high-performing learning organizations are grounded in core human and operational elements⁷. Corporate academies can help employee-learners apply concepts and skills gained through traditional environments (for example, instructor-led training) into building use cases for the challenges they currently face. This approach encourages “learning through doing” and helps to enable an agile application of the skills with tangible business value being delivered while your workforce learns.
  5. Customer and partner education: An organization can benefit even more when its in-house academy expands to also reach external customers and partners. Without the proper customer and partner education, organizations with more complex solutions (for example, software or pharmaceuticals) risk confusion within their markets. Organizations that don’t invest in educating customers and partners about the functionality, features and benefits of their products and services potentially waste billions of dollars of research and development capital developing products and services that go unnoticed by consumers. By contrast, organizations that invest in customer and partner education see their top-line revenue grow by 7.6% and see a nearly 40% increase in customer adoption, all while decreasing customer support costs.⁸ Customer and partner education is no longer a “nice-to-have” but a “must-have” as part of an organization’s marketing strategy.

A new-school approach to learning

High-performing organizations know that the workforce is their most valuable asset, and they invest in their workers’ continuous growth accordingly. When designed with purpose and intention, a corporate academy infrastructure can help organizations develop an ecosystem of instructional designers and subject matter experts who can help craft engaging learning experiences that excite learners and yield a return on the investment. If you’re looking to get started building a corporate academy infrastructure, consider the following:

  1. Evaluate how a corporate academy might serve your organization’s upskilling strategy.
  2. Determine the skills you want to train for based on your organization’s business needs and desired outcomes.
  3. Engage subject matter experts to help you curate a curriculum of already existing content that meet your learning objectives and needs and augment any new custom programming created.
  4. Establish an ecosystem of learning experts, subject matter experts, technology and content vendors, and other corporate partnerships that have the tools to help you build, launch and then maintain your academy.
  5. Build the relationship between your marketing and professional development arms to invest in education programs for your external customers and partners.
  6. Consider an “Academy as a Service” organization to help manage the design, build, delivery and back-office functions of your corporate academy to minimize disruption to your current L&D offerings.

Investing in building a corporate academy can help extend and strengthen your relationships with existing learning and technology vendors to help you deliver effective solutions at scale. Ready to learn more? Visit the Deloitte Academies for a first-hand view on the ways corporate academies can boost your organization’s performance.

Authors:

Special thanks to Dan Haddad, Kim Vay, and Ariel Ptak.

End Notes
¹ Sue Cantrell et al., 2024 Global Human Capital Trends report, Deloitte Insights, 2024.
² David Mallon et al., What do organizations need most in a disrupted, boundaryless age?, Deloitte Insights, 2024.
³ Deloitte Insights2Action, “Skills gaps are slowing down AI-workforce integration,” 13 July 13, 2022.
⁴ Sue Cantrell et al., Building tomorrow’s skills-based organization, Deloitte, 2022.
⁵ Chelsey Taylor and Lindsey Straka West, “An evolved federated model: Connections conquer new heights in learning,” Deloitte Insights2Action, September 19, 2024.
⁶ Chelsey Taylor and Lindsey Straka West, “Closer than they appear: L&D is the ultimate advisor on workers’ learning journey,” Deloitte Insights2Action, October 15, 2024.
⁷ Chelsey Taylor and Lindsey Straka West, “Did you hear? Sound capabilities amplify learning impact,” Deloitte Insights2Action, April 18, 2024.
⁸ Intellum, “Research reveals the astonishing impact of customer education programs,” May 14, 2024.

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