L&D QUESTIONS

Developing an L&D Strategy at PUMA

LAVINIA MEHEDINTU
November 4, 2024

We talk a lot about creating L&D strategies, but we don’t see enough examples in action. That’s why we’ve created this series. We want to dig into how other top L&D leaders approach strategy in their organizations, from start-ups to global giants.

In this article, we sat down with Joachim Kohlbacher, the Director of People Development & Organizational Learning at PUMA. 

For more case studies like this, read our piece on how Foodora built an L&D process.

Where Joachim’s career journey began

PUMA is a global sports and lifestyle company known for its quality items, innovation, and strong values. It has a people-first culture that encourages personal development and lifelong learning. 

Joachim began his journey with PUMA 16 years ago in retail operations. After eight years, he transitioned into his first training role as the “Retail Training Manager (Europe),” where he spent five years building and establishing the Retail Training Network for the region, and switched to the role of Global Retail Training. At the beginning of this year, he advanced to his current role as "Director People Development & Organizational Learning."

Organizational context

When Joachim took over the role of Director People Development & Organizational Learning, two separate departments existed with very little collaboration: global retail training and corporate learning development. 

In terms of structure, the Corporate Learning department comprised two managers who were responsible for learning activities and communication with external providers, as well as corporate eLearning content and vendor management. The team had a low level of global collaboration with four regional learning partners. 

The Global Retail Training department was made up of Joachim, a Manager of Global Digital Learning, and a Junior Manager of Global Retail Training. The department had high levels of collaboration with 25 regional retail training managers, with a dotted line reporting to the Global Retail Training Manager. 

Despite both being top-performing departments, they weren’t yet reaching their full potential. 

As a result, the Vice President of People & Organization, Dietmar Knoess, made the decision to merge the two departments for better alignment, impact, and synergy. 

“There was always one big password, and it was synergies. So this was always the North Star that we tried to follow", says Joachim.

With the decision to merge the departments, Dietmar and Joachim anticipated the following improvements:

  • Improve impact with learner activation
  • Better alignment between learning programs and content
  • Enhanced measurability and ROI of learning activities
  • Faster, more flexible responses to training requests with a larger focus on their customers
  • Stronger alignment with global stakeholders 

The merger triggered the need for a new L&D strategy that would be pivotal in supporting this big organizational shift. 

Since the merge, the Global People Development and Organizational Learning department now includes the following functions:

This wasn’t an overnight transition or an ad hoc initiative. Joachim had six months to prepare for the new department. 

The process of creating the L&D strategy

Now that the context is clear, let’s break down how Joachim and his team built PUMA’s L&D strategy.

Step 1: Do research and choose the right team

The first step for Joachim was divided into two key actions: research and choosing the right team. 

Here’s how Joachim approached the research stage:

  • Since he was building the strategy on top of his current role, he put measures in place to make sure his work doesn’t suffer (delegation, automating tasks, etc.)
  • He immediately started thinking about the best time to communicate the change and how to make the announcement without causing fear or anxiety for his colleagues, especially for the business areas with strong historical backgrounds such as Retail Training 
  • He did individual research by reading articles and getting advice from his colleagues and people in his network

When it came to choosing the team, he started by asking himself two questions:

  • Who will be the key players for this project? 
  • How can I bring them in?

As we’ll see, doing the work to choose the right team members paid off massively when it came to the next phase of strategy building. 

Step 2: Align the team around identity, vision, mission, and values

One of the most critical steps in the L&D strategy for Joachim was to create a unified vision. He wanted to understand what the team hoped to get out of the change. For instance, his goal was to move from being just an L&D department to being one that influences P&L and supports the business in a measurable way.

Building an identity

Joachim wanted to create an early sense of belonging within the team. To do this, he realized very early in the strategizing process (before he even assembled the team) that they first needed an identity. This became a major talking point during his initial conversations with future team members, stakeholders, and line managers. 

That identity ended up being summarized in a single word: “growth”.

But what exactly does “growth” mean for the team? For Joachim, it means growing as individuals and also as a business. Ultimately, the team wants to contribute to PUMA’s further growth.

“Now “GROWTH” has become more than just a word to us as a team - it was the beginning, and it is leading us together as a squad”, says Joachim.

So, although the team’s official name within PUMA is the “People Development & Organizational Learning” department, the squad is now unofficially known as the “Growth Crew”.

Having a clear sense of identity from day one laid the foundations for building the team, identifying team values, and defining guiding principles. 

Aligning on mission, vision, and values

The next step was an offsite in Istanbul to build a joint vision with the new team members. Over the course of three and a half days, the team came together to define who they were, what they wanted to achieve, and what they stood for. That included spending a full day working on their values. By the end of the offsite, they had a North Star for who they were as a team.

On top of this, they used the results of an employee survey (conducted by another team) and a team retro as a basis to build on more operational aspects. For instance, how to collaborate and who their future stakeholders would be.

Subscribe to Offbeat

Every Sunday we send over a pack of articles, e-books, podcasts, videos, and thoughts, to inspire you and help you stay up to date with what's happening within our L&D community

Awesome! Now, check your inbox
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.

Step 3: Create the L&D strategy

With the groundwork in place, the next step for the team was to build out the strategy. This started with identifying the strategic pillars. 

Conduct a status quo analysis

Joachim and his team understood that it was in their hands to determine how big they wanted to make the wave of change at PUMA. So, rather than diving right in with a huge needs analysis activity, they decided to focus on structural change.

They used their existing portfolio to do the needs analysis and avoid creating more change than necessary for their colleagues. Then, in the second wave, they could work on updating learning programs and content.

Joachim refers to it as more of a “status quo analysis”. 

So what did it look like? It resembled an audit, reviewing what contents and programs they currently had. During this process, the team focused on two key questions:

  • How does it impact the business?
  • Is there a real need?

Using these questions as a filter, they were able to redefine the collaboration with certain assets or initiatives. 

Define operations 

Joachim’s team started by using the results of an employee survey (conducted by another team) and a team retro as a basis to build on more operational aspects of the L&D strategy. For instance, how to collaborate and who their future stakeholders would be. They had already created their OKRs and KRAs up to 85% during the Istanbul offsite, giving them a strong foundation for building out the strategy.

Create a long-term plan around strategic pillars

Defining key pillars is one of the most important steps in the strategy creation process. But as we see with PUMA, it's also crucial to determine how the focus on each pillar will evolve over time.

The L&D team's strategic pillars—Stability, Innovation, Cost, Growth, and Team Support—serve as the foundation of its four-year plan. The plan was designed as a tool to help Joachim, his manager, and global stakeholders align learning with the broader corporate strategy and maintain direction. Each pillar represents a distinct focus area that shifts in priority as the L&D team matures.

For instance, during the initial stage of the four-year plan, Team Support was prioritized to help the newly formed L&D team establish itself and clarify its role. This focus naturally transitions as the team settles into its ways of working, allowing other areas to take precedence. Meanwhile, Innovation—which isn’t an immediate priority while the team is still forming—is expected to become a larger focus as the team gains confidence and stakeholders adapt to the new dynamics.

Joachim used this plan not as a rigid directive but as a guiding compass, particularly when it came to setting Objectives and Key Results (OKRs). While he encouraged his team to develop their own OKRs and Key Results Areas (KRAs), he ensured they aligned with the overall direction of the four-year plan, especially in its initial stages. For example, a manager proposing a high-cost investment for innovation in the first year wouldn’t align with the plan's focus on stability and establishing foundations.

Though the four-year plan played a lesser role in the day-to-day actions of the team, it remained a critical reference point for Joachim to ensure alignment without stifling creativity. The balance between structure and freedom allowed the L&D team to grow while keeping in sync with broader business goals.

Support L&D team members to set their own goals

As the team started to build the strategy, they prioritized objective setting. Every team member had to first come up with an objective sentence or OKR for a year.

The next step was to narrow those down by having the objective on top, followed by their key RAs and results areas (five or six, depending on the team member).

Once each team member had those, they asked the following questions:

  • What will help you achieve that goal?
  • Which actions do you need to focus on?
  • Is it specific in the way it contributes to the business?
  • How can I measure the KRA?
  • What's the timeline?

This exercise was super important because everyone in the team took over a new responsibility.

Joachim shares that one of the “rules” during the objective setting exercise was to only focus on goals that pay into PUMA’s corporate strategy. 

That meant defining what would come up in the first year and parking any objectives that didn’t play into a team member’s key results areas. In doing so, the department was sure it was contributing not just to L&D but to the overall business strategy.

Step 4: Create rituals to check progress

Once the groundwork was laid, Joachim had to find ways to keep the team unified. One of the ways he did this was through regular meetings and checkpoints.

These are some of the rituals the team put in place:

  • Weekly team meetings - to reflect and prepare for the next week
  • Weekly 121s - to discuss tactical steps they need for the week to drive forward with key result areas
  • Monthly project reviews - to go over what each person on the team has accomplished or give a progress update (everyone has an individual project board)
  • Monthly project scope - a 2-hours quality time meeting with every manager of the team individually, to help them bringing projects over the finishing line with concrete decisions. It is not a brainstorming meeting, but a decisions meeting that helps them work more lean in their projects
  • Quarterly individual performance reviews 
  • Quarterly retro meetings to discuss how the team communicates and collaborates (focused on how the team works rather than projects) 

Future developments to support the L&D Strategy

We wanted to know what the team’s plans are to further support the L&D strategy going forward. Here are some of the highlights.

Managing incoming requests

The new department had a 100% increase in requests for internal training. Naturally, this required the team to get serious about expectation management.

It also prompted them to create a more streamlined way to manage requests. In the beginning, the team had internal training requests coming in from all angles. So, the first step was to bring some structure into the process.

They are currently working on a ticketing system to manage requests. 

Another important piece of the puzzle is filtering requests. Joachim’s team has clear guidelines not to reject requests. That said, they also don’t just automatically fulfill and execute every request they receive.

Joachim points out the need to really understand the “why” behind the request. What does the team really want? In many cases, after asking a few questions, they may need to push back or steer the requesting team in a different direction. 

Measuring L&D ROI

At the moment, Joachim’s team is tracking learning hours (although they don’t necessarily consider this a learning KPI). But, they are already working on a more concrete plan to measure L&D ROI.

They plan to use external partners for this, as bringing measurability into the learning efforts is a totally new activity for PUMA.

The long-term goal is to be able to clearly and accurately communicate the return on investment for every training initiative. 

It’s an ambitious goal, but it would give the department an extremely valuable way to prove the impact of their work.

Joachim admits that this part of the strategic process has been a learning curve, especially when it comes to speaking the business language. 

Biggest lessons learned about creating Puma’s L&D Strategy

You don’t need PUMA’s resources to make an effective L&D strategy. Here are some lessons that can apply to learning specialists in organizations of all shapes and sizes.

1. Align the strategy with wider business goals

One of the standout elements of PUMA’s L&D strategy is its close ties with business growth. Here’s how Joachim was able to create that alignment.

PUMA had already communicated its global strategy and goals earlier in the year. This strategy included all areas of the business. Along with all other departments in the business, Joachim’s department was responsible for connecting the overarching strategy and goals to the L&D strategy. That meant linking all four OKRs they set for the department to PUMA’s wider strategic goals.

To do this, he started by asking the question, “Is the OKR for Design/ Implementation/ Digital/ Retail paying into the global strategy and goals?”

When creating the OKR, they kept in mind that the OKR of each pillar needs to answer this question with "yes". This important step helped Joachim’s department connect their L&D strategy to the global strategy and goals. 

Once they had done this, they had to identify the key result areas (KRA) within each OKR to make sure they reached their objectives. In other words, the tactics to help them execute the strategy.

2. Be mindful of change fatigue

Forming a new team with new roles was already a huge change for the organization. For Joachim, it was essential for the new team to first establish itself before making waves in the organization about their new strategy. So, while they announced the structural changes, Joachim decided to hold back the decisions about the strategy for the moment to avoid overwhelming stakeholders with fatigue change.

3. Foster flexibility

PUMA’s L&D strategy is structured, but there’s enough flexibility to allow the team to adapt when needed. 

Joachim highlighted four points that helped foster this level of flexibility:

Understand our team's strategic and tactical approach - "Don't change the destination (strategy), but keep reviewing the routes (tactics) to get there."

Be assertive - Every team member is highly driven to achieve their KRAs, as this consequently means that they will reach their OKR. In turn, they can see how their work pays directly into PUMA’s strategy and goals. 

Note: Every team member is required to show assertiveness, as this helps balance drive with the flexibility to react to unexpected requests or events. Since assertiveness is one of the team’s values, the team receives training and techniques to enhance their skills in this area.

Critical thinking - It can be challenging to strike the right balance of flexibility while managing the daily rush of the business. But, too much (or too little) flexibility can lead the team off track and away from the real mission. That’s why Joachim’s team uses a comprehensive set of critical thinking questions to help them analyze and act accordingly.

Safe environment - Every team member knows they have the autonomy to make (deliberated) decisions. Even if a decision might not lead to the expected positive impact, they have the reassurance that the team considers this a learning opportunity. Of course, this is supported by clear internal guidance to regulate and define the process to ensure that “failures” don’t become the norm.

Joachim points out that the OKR is an additional contributor to the safe environment. The OKR is the rock-solid backbone of everything the team does, especially during times that require more flexibility.

4. Motivation and drive can lead to overload

The L&D team at PUMA noticed that despite hard work, project progress was slower than expected, with too many projects underway and not enough getting completed.

This delay occurred because team members were starting multiple projects without finishing others, leading to inefficient lead times and lack of focus.

To address this, Joachim introduced the “Project Space” initiative. Each team member created a digital project board to track progress, and the team now meets monthly for a “Project Review” to discuss updates and keep priorities clear. Joachim also dedicated two-hour slots with each team member monthly to finalize approvals and decisions on key projects.

With these changes, the team’s project timelines improved significantly, fostering a new culture of “Stop starting, start finishing” that helped streamline their work and drive results.

If we could sum PUMA’s L&D strategy up in three words, they would be “growth”, “structure”, and “alignment”. The team has worked hard to build a unified identity and a clear vision of how the strategy directly contributes to business goals. This has laid the groundwork for Joachim’s team to really show the value of their work and how they fit into broader organizational growth. 

LAVINIA MEHEDINTU

CO-FOUNDER & LEARNING ARCHITECT @OFFBEAT

Lavinia Mehedintu has been designing learning experiences and career development programs for the past 9 years both in the corporate world and in higher education. As a Co-Founder and Learning Architect @Offbeat she’s applying adult learning principles so that learning & people professionals can connect, collaborate, and grow. She’s passionate about social learning, behavior change, and technology and constantly puts in the work to bring these three together to drive innovation in the learning & development space.

Meet Offbeat

We’re the place where L&D professionals accelerate their career. Live programs, mentorship, lots of practice and knowledge sharing.

A diverse learning community

Curated learning resources

Personalized guidance in your learning journey

Weekly live sessions

Cohort-Based Programs run by experts

1:1 mentoring relationships

Become an Offbeat Fellow →

Copyright Offbeat 2023