“Mystery Coffee”
and the Art of
Getting Better

Reg­u­lar and struc­tured learn­ing on the job — which con­tin­ues long after employ­ees com­plete their offi­cial voca­tion­al and pro­fes­sion­al train­ing — is becom­ing ever more impor­tant in every­thing from trades and ser­vices to com­merce and indus­try. High­ly qual­i­fied per­son­nel who com­mand the lat­est knowl­edge are a cru­cial fac­tor in com­pet­i­tive suc­cess. Cus­tomers, after all, expect inno­v­a­tive prod­ucts and ser­vices as well as intel­li­gent solu­tions. And com­pa­nies, whether large or small, need to adapt their busi­ness mod­els, inte­grate new tech­nolo­gies, and devel­op addi­tion­al skills to meet these expectations.

Inno­va­tions are com­ing thick and fast. In other words, time is of the essence. HR lead­ers are called upon to pro­vide smart and high­ly flex­i­ble qual­i­fi­ca­tion and fur­ther train­ing options for their work­forces. This goes beyond the usual orga­ni­za­tion­al aspects. It is also a mat­ter of con­tent. And of sound edu­ca­tion­al and instruc­tion­al skills. The focus is no longer on class­room for­mats, but rather on dig­i­tal sem­i­nars with indi­vid­ual per­for­mance reviews — for sub­jects that lend them­selves to this approach. Online sem­i­nars can be both flex­i­ble and eco­nom­i­cal. For them to work, how­ev­er, par­tic­i­pants must be able to learn on their own. In other words, com­pa­nies often need to instill, or at least fos­ter, a desire to learn. And espe­cial­ly for elec­tron­ic train­ing pro­grams, reg­u­lar reviews and clever incen­tives are need­ed to main­tain moti­va­tion over the long term. Employ­ees need to see the value of fur­ther edu­ca­tion. Not only finan­cial­ly on their pay slips, but also in oppor­tu­ni­ties for growth, new hori­zons, greater respon­si­bil­i­ties, and more autonomy.

For a company’s own train­ing pro­grams to suc­ceed, they need to be devel­oped and run by peo­ple with edu­ca­tion­al exper­tise. One impor­tant fac­tor here is the rel­e­vance of pro­gram con­tent to actu­al prac­tice. Ever more com­pa­nies are there­fore opt­ing to recruit instruc­tors from their own ranks and pro­vide them with exten­sive train­ing in edu­ca­tion. Inter­nal instruc­tors are well received, because they already have an authen­tic­i­ty bonus. That in turn increas­es the degree to which trainees iden­ti­fy with their sub­ject mat­ter. As for the orga­ni­za­tion­al side, infor­ma­tion about these pro­grams should be com­piled on a cen­tral learn­ing plat­form that is acces­si­ble to all employees.

The idea of a “learn­ing orga­ni­za­tion” is noth­ing new. How­ev­er, its char­ac­ter­is­tics need to be rein­ter­pret­ed, at least in part. Deutsche Bank is one exam­ple of how that can work. As Germany’s largest bank and a finan­cial insti­tu­tion con­sid­ered “sys­tem­i­cal­ly rel­e­vant” on the glob­al stage, it has to meet high stan­dards. By its own account, Deutsche Bank is under­go­ing con­tin­u­ous fur­ther devel­op­ment “from a cul­ture of experts to a cul­ture of flex­i­ble learn­ers.” But what in fact does that mean?

To help its employ­ees devel­op fur­ther on both pro­fes­sion­al and per­son­al lev­els and advance their careers, Deutsche Bank has made learn­ing a core ele­ment of its HR strat­e­gy. The Frank­furt-based com­pa­ny calls this “get­ting bet­ter at get­ting bet­ter.” Its approach builds on an attrac­tive, per­son­al­ized, and diverse range of learn­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties, designed to be avail­able to all employ­ees at every stage of their career. It also needs to address a range of posi­tions. In addi­tion to finan­cial ser­vice providers, Deutsche Bank’s work­force includes many other spe­cial­ists such as engi­neers, legal experts, project man­agers, and secu­ri­ty professionals.

“Learn­ingHub” is the name of Deutsche Bank’s plat­form that uses smart tech­nolo­gies to sug­gest indi­vid­u­al­ized learn­ing con­tent to all employ­ees. Users can increase their skills in pre­cise­ly the areas they wish to devel­op. If they like the con­tent, they can rec­om­mend it to their col­leagues by shar­ing links and resources. They can join groups, work togeth­er, and lever­age exper­tise. In 2023 alone, Deutsche Bank employ­ees made use of near­ly one mil­lion learn­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties. The bank’s phi­los­o­phy is that learn­ing con­sists not only of acquir­ing new knowl­edge, but also of both per­son­al and pro­fes­sion­al growth. This is the only way to build the abil­i­ties need­ed to keep pace with the rate of change.

The platform’s dig­i­tal learn­ing pro­grams can be accessed from any loca­tion at any time. One pos­i­tive effect is that nine out of ten employ­ees used its options in 2023. That rep­re­sents a major step toward the goal of becom­ing a “learn­ing orga­ni­za­tion,” an idea that trans­lates to “ongo­ing employ­ee empow­er­ment.” This is so impor­tant at Deutsche Bank that its board made it a key com­po­nent of its lead­er­ship agen­da. The bank has invest­ed strong­ly in areas such as arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence — with the aim of pro­vid­ing com­pre­hen­sive, var­ied, and rel­e­vant learn­ing con­tent. Accord­ing to the bank’s HR depart­ment, learn­ing is ulti­mate­ly “no longer a mat­ter of tak­ing cours­es but of quick­ly find­ing and apply­ing the right knowl­edge and infor­ma­tion.” Anoth­er aim is for no one to be iso­lat­ed in their efforts to learn and do research. A team there­fore stands ready at all times to pro­vide tech­ni­cal sup­port, inform employ­ees about proven meth­ods, and facil­i­tate access to a wide range of resources. Thanks to close col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Tech­nol­o­gy, Data and Inno­va­tion divi­sion, bank employ­ees can also access exter­nal con­tent from lead­ing tech­nol­o­gy com­pa­nies world­wide, such as cur­rent research results, spe­cial­ized knowl­edge, and entire­ly new con­cep­tu­al approaches.

Deutsche Bank’s exam­ple clear­ly shows that a learn­ing orga­ni­za­tion needs strong foun­da­tions, high acces­si­bil­i­ty, and appeal­ing incen­tives. In addi­tion, it must be designed with suf­fi­cient flex­i­bil­i­ty to adapt to chang­ing times — as rapid­ly as progress itself occurs. The foun­da­tions con­sist of strate­gic, edu­ca­tion­al, tech­ni­cal, and cul­tur­al com­po­nents. Acces­si­bil­i­ty requires high-per­for­mance IT solu­tions in con­junc­tion with good train­ing and solid sup­port for all users. And the moti­va­tion to both start and con­tin­ue needs to stem from the joy of learn­ing itself. Part of that con­sists of hon­or­ing achieve­ments. Val­u­a­tion is a pow­er­ful engine in learn­ing orga­ni­za­tions, and lead­er­ship per­son­nel should keep it hum­ming smooth­ly. An emo­tion­al con­nec­tion with the com­pa­ny is pre­cise­ly what encour­ages employ­ees to iden­ti­fy with it and help it out­per­form com­peti­tors on the market.

One way a learn­ing orga­ni­za­tion can cul­ti­vate new expe­ri­ences and a pos­i­tive work­ing atmos­phere is to pro­mote employ­ee net­works by inno­v­a­tive means. Some com­pa­nies use clever algo­rithms to match col­leagues who might not have known each other pre­vi­ous­ly for what can be sur­pris­ing exchanges of ideas. Deutsche Bank’s “Mys­tery Cof­fee” ini­tia­tive brings employ­ees togeth­er either vir­tu­al­ly or in per­son for impromp­tu talks. This expands net­works, and ide­al­ly encour­ages par­tic­i­pants to sup­port each other’s work in the future. Mys­tery Cof­fee is a point of pride for Deutsche Bank. Avail­able to the work­force world­wide, it has rapid­ly become the company’s most suc­cess­ful infor­mal learn­ing ini­tia­tive. By get­ting togeth­er for a cof­fee, employ­ees make new con­nec­tions and learn about other parts of the com­pa­ny. They also come to appre­ci­ate dif­fer­ences. From 2017 to 2023, the bank made more than 48,000 Mys­tery Cof­fee matches.

A learn­ing orga­ni­za­tion should also be capa­ble of upend­ing con­ven­tions and ques­tion­ing received wis­dom. One exam­ple here is the “Reverse Men­tor­ing” ini­tia­tive, which flips the usual men­tor­ing rela­tion­ship and places an expe­ri­enced man­ag­er in the role of mentee. Younger employ­ees then coach the “old hands.” Here, too, Deutsche Bank relies on dig­i­tal tech­nol­o­gy to gen­er­ate excit­ing com­bi­na­tions. A learn­ing orga­ni­za­tion becomes all the more suc­cess­ful when no one can or wants to remain out­side it. Life­long learn­ing then attracts not only novices but every­one — includ­ing those with exten­sive expe­ri­ence. A learn­ing orga­ni­za­tion is only as good as the degree and qual­i­ty of com­pa­ny-wide exchange — in inter­dis­ci­pli­nary con­texts and with­out hier­ar­chy-relat­ed inhibitions.

Lead­er­ship per­son­nel should not only insti­tute train­ing pro­grams. They have anoth­er impor­tant role to play in learn­ing orga­ni­za­tions, this time with a focus on devel­op­ment dia­logues. Man­agers should hold reg­u­lar talks with their team mem­bers to plan indi­vid­ual fur­ther train­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties and dis­cuss how these can advance careers. They need not limit these dia­logues to indi­vid­u­als. Ide­al­ly, small groups can form that learn togeth­er, orga­nize on their own, exchange ideas, and pur­sue shared goals. Such groups can become cor­ner­stones of a learn­ing orga­ni­za­tion and moti­vate oth­ers to take ini­tia­tive as well. As always in pro­fes­sion­al life, a good cor­po­rate cul­ture makes work­ing more enjoy­able, encour­ages strengths, and pro­motes com­mu­ni­ty. Gen­er­al­ly speak­ing, work also plays a sig­nif­i­cant role in the social lives of most employ­ees. A team spir­it, a con­ducive (learn­ing) atmos­phere, and attrac­tive aims can quick­ly pay off — for both employ­ees and the com­pa­ny as a whole.

Con­tact: ninjo.lenz@porsche-consulting.com