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Managed Training for Fujitsu Services

Client Background

As one of Europe's leading IT services companies, Fujitsu Services helps customers in the retail, financial services, healthcare and government sectors to realise the value of information technology through the application of consulting, systems integration and managed service contracts.

An Investors in People Champion, the company appreciates that developing its people is the key that unlocks the capability of the organisation, enabling it to retain profitable accounts, grow its market share and enhance its reputation.

"We recognised that delivering training was not our core business and that outsourcing it would be financially beneficial. KnowledgePool provided the best fit against our requirements." Sue Payne, Head of Operations (People Development) at Fujitsu Services

"Our business is centred around our people," said Sue Payne, Head of Operations (People Development) at Fujitsu Services. "To further improve their knowledge and capabilities, we have a huge requirement for technical and soft skills training."

However, finding appropriate training courses and managing and contracting with hundreds of external training providers was proving time consuming. As a large organisation, Fujitsu also found it difficult to analyse its training spend across the business - and harder still to evaluate the real impact of training. It wanted to provide greater training support to its employees yet at the same time reduce its spend on public schedule courses.

In 2006, after a comprehensive tendering process, Fujitsu signed a managed training service agreement with KnowledgePool.

"Choosing the right partner was such an important decision that it had to be approved at Board level," said Sue Payne. "We selected KnowledgePool because they provided the best fit against our requirements."

KnowledgePool's Approach

KnowledgePool worked with Fujitsu Services to create an online catalogue containing over 1,000 training courses. These include externally-run, public courses provided by a panel of preferred suppliers - covering IT, management and personal development - as well as Fujitsu's own in-house courses and events.

Fujitsu employees access this online catalogue through a web browser. They have their own online learning account and they can search for specific learning topics and view the appropriate course details, in Fujitsu's preferred priority order. After selecting a course, they contact their training coordinator and gain authorisation from their line manager.

"KnowledgePool's online catalogue makes it quick and easy for employees to find and access the training they need to improve their skills and capabilities," said Sue Payne. "Currently, the online catalogue is just for our UK-based staff but in the future we may extend this approach to continental Europe."

KnowledgePool's learning advisers run a helpdesk service, offering advice to individuals on choosing the right course.

In 2007, over 5,000 employees booked more than 12,000 days of training through the online catalogue.

Cost Reduction

KnowledgePool has delivered substantial cost savings, principally through its supplier management service. The company assesses training providers to ensure that the proposed content will meet the required needs and it has saved an average of 26 per cent off the retail prices of public schedule training courses.

"KnowledgePool source training courses from a wide range of suppliers, achieving better discounts than we ever could, and they offer us the best solutions. Their online catalogue makes it quick and easy for employees to find and access the training." Sue Payne, Head of Operations (People Development) at Fujitsu Services

"KnowledgePool are 'vendor-independent' which means they source training courses from a wide range of suppliers and offer us the best solutions," said Sue Payne. "This is an enormous benefit. Because they buy training on behalf of many organisations, they can achieve better discounts than we ever could and they pass those discounts on to us. They also monitor which courses people are searching for and with their industry knowledge, they can match this to new trends or training courses in the market. Now when people approach us offering training, we simply say talk to KnowledgePool."

KnowledgePool's system achieves additional efficiencies by automating the routine and labour intensive administration tasks involved in booking and managing training, such as sending confirmations, joining instructions and reminders.

"Working with KnowledgePool has enabled us to divert our own training administration services onto higher value activities, such as supporting our in-house management academy," said Sue Payne.

Evaluation

KnowledgePool provides automatic Kirkpatrick level one and level three evaluations for all training. A 'happy sheet' form is emailed to attendees after their course. Ten weeks later, another email is generated to gather feedback from individuals and their managers on the behaviour of learners in the workplace, after training, and how effective and useful the training has been. The data is compiled in a central system, which allows the results of different suppliers to be compared.

"We're keen to evaluate learning outcomes in the workplace and we want to ensure that we're investing in the right training events," said Sue Payne. "Getting input from line managers is very helpful because they're the ones who will notice any resultant improvement in knowledge or behaviour. We've made several changes and improvements to our training as a result of feedback captured by KnowledgePool in this way."

Improved Service Levels

KnowledgePool prepares a monthly report which provides comprehensive management information, including details of the training undertaken as well as a financial analysis, a satisfaction analysis, booking statistics, supplier performance and a service level analysis.

"We have a very open and honest relationship with KnowledgePool. It is a true partnership" Sue Payne, Head of Operations (People Development) at Fujitsu Services

"We now have greater control over the purchase of training services," said Sue Payne. "The reports give us all the detail we need on what we're spending and where we're spending it."

Fujitsu has service level agreements in place for issues such as response times and turnaround times. KnowledgePool undertakes six-monthly reviews to assess and 'continuously improve' its service.

"We have a very open and honest relationship with KnowledgePool," said Sue Payne. "It is a true partnership. We keep them in touch with our business objectives and goals and they're very proactive in providing support as well as suggestions for improvement. They have been able to constructively resolve any issues and feedback from employees has been very positive about their service. Our employee opinion survey shows that people now feel more supported and much clearer about what training is available to them."

KnowledgePool has also provided consultancy support to Fujitsu Services - in areas such as training needs analysis, developing e-learning strategies and analysing return on investment - and it has undertaken additional projects for Fujitsu's end customers in areas such as blended learning and outsourced training.

Learning Effectiveness

Fujitsu has been a pioneer of 'lean thinking'. Originally developed by Toyota as a route to cost-effective mass-customisation, 'lean' principles and practices involve reducing waste and reforming processes to improve customer value.

"Lean thinking is a step in our evolution towards ever-better service," said Sue Payne. "It is being adopted throughout the organisation. In people development, we're using it to reassess our efficiency and effectiveness. KnowledgePool are working with us on this, for example by honing down our portfolio of preferred suppliers so that we offer only the most effective courses."

She adds that ensuring access to the right training for employees is part of helping Fujitsu to achieve its corporate objectives.

"Our learning development plans are created as a result of analysing our business plans," she said. "By working with KnowledgePool, we're not only benefiting individual employees by enhancing their development but we're also ensuring that we have the right skills and capabilities in place to meet our business goals. It's a win-win contract."