Cutting Professional Development Costs
Without Cutting Your Investment in Learning
 As I was writing this article, a newspaper headline announced, "The economy is moving backward more rapidly than experts predicted" -- just one in a long series of dire headlines that have us cutting, cutting, and then cutting some more. It's really tempting to red-line professional development entirely. But here's why that might be a bad idea:
1. People and organizations that aren't actively learning are actively falling behind.
2. Talent development is the business of every business.
3. Poorly performing staff or managers cost in terms of productivity, customers, morale, employee loss--real money. Development Dimensions International estimates the cost of an "average" vs. an "excellent" manager is $126,126.71, once you figure in those downstream costs.
So how can you be penny-wise, but still pay good attention to professional development?
1. Take advantage of free webinars and workshops. Extend the benefit from these 'learning bites' by planning in-house trainings by attendees.
2. Create a Professional Development Group (Learning Group, etc.). Make it voluntary, but be sure there's an agenda at meetings and someone to kick off the discussion.
3. Take advantage of e-learning and blended learning (online + classroom) offerings, which save time and money. Extend and contextualize the discussions yourself or bring in a facilitator to handle that part.
4. Join up with other organizations to share the costs of onsite customized workshops. (Every time I've done this, clients have voiced surprise and delight at how much they enjoyed and learned from the other organization's participants--a catalytic mix!)
5. Lower the costs of instructor-led training by having some work or reading done ahead of time to shorten class time.
6. Explore payment flexibility with vendors: available discounts, staged payments, even bartering arrangements. (I once traded some training seminars for a week at a luxury health resort--yumm!)
7. Finally, and most important: Have a point person for professional development. Later you might create an official Chief Learning Officer or similar position, but for now, just make sure PD is in somebody's actual job description. As with any key responsibility, monitor plans and results at least every quarter.
Keep learning! It's the way we get better--even before the economy does. | 
