Earlier in her career, Kathryn Coleman took a risk on making a sharp turn in her career–and today she's glad she did.  Coleman, the former director of diversity initiatives at the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota, expected to be in higher education for her entire career. But when an opportunity to take a similar job at SUPERVALU presented itself, she decided to be open to it despite her initial doubts.

“I thought, ‘this is going to give me a different set of skills. This is going to give me a different set of experiences,’” Coleman told moderator Romesh Ratnesar during From Day One’s September virtual conference.

Coleman is now the senior vice president of talent learning and insights at 3M, where she helps employees recognize opportunities and develop their skills. She said those skills fall into two categories: functional ones, which are constantly changing, and foundational ones, such as problem-solving.

“For managers, there is nothing more valuable than a member of the team who can identify an opportunity or a challenge, and at least recommend a path to solution,” Coleman said. 

Another critical skill that marks someone as a potential leader at a company is business acumen, according to Coleman. This means understanding how a company makes money or how a non-revenue generating function, such as human resources, adds value to the business.

A third essential skill is project or process management, which Coleman defines as “the ability to say, ‘This is a win. This is what success looks like, and I have a path to get there.”

Identifying Skills and Skill Gaps

But how can business leaders communicate to employees the skills they want them to have so workers can demonstrate they have those skills or get help with ones they don’t?

“At 3M, we’ve been really focused on upskilling, really looking at the skills that we need to drive the business forward, and enabling a process for employees to express, ‘Hey, here are the skills that I have,’” Coleman said. “That’s important, because as you’re working across teams, you have to be able to talk about the value you bring.”

3M encourages employees to ask family members, friends, and co-workers what they are best at. Coleman says it’s important for workers to take note of the skills people say they have, but also what they aren’t saying. This helps employees recognize the skills they need to develop.

3M is establishing a taxonomy of enterprise skills. “It doesn’t matter where you are in the organization,” Coleman said. “Everybody needs these skills.” If an employee lacks one or more enterprise skills, 3M has curated self-paced micro learnings they can easily access.

3M also focuses on core skills by level, which includes individual, supervisory, and leadership skills. Finally, there are functional skills. “I think the biggest challenge we have is we can’t be inflexible, because functional skills change too quickly,” Coleman said. “We have to be nimble and partner appropriately so that we are providing the right resources for our employees.”

New Challenges: Remote Work and AI

Besides rapidly changing skills, other challenges today’s businesses face in employee development include remote work and AI. “The reality is a lot of employees now want and expect to work remotely, especially early in their careers,” Coleman said.

However, in-person engagement is key to career development, mentoring, and coaching. So, how can companies ensure remote workers aren’t shortchanged?

3M is a global company, so employees outside the main office worked from home long before Covid. This means at the beginning of the pandemic, when most everyone shifted to remote work, “it was a bit of an equalizer,” Coleman said.

For example, 3M used to take onboarding for granted, according to Coleman. However, when new employees needed to be onboarded in a remote environment, even if they lived in Minnesota, the company became very deliberate in making sure new employees could interact virtually with everyone from top leadership down to their core teams, she said.

Although the increase in AI in the workplace can be anxiety-inducing for employees, “AI doesn’t replace people,” Coleman said. In fact, AI can perform essential but routine tasks, freeing up more time for impactful work, she said. 

Mary Pieper is a freelance reporter based in Mason City, Iowa.