At Learnnovators, our values aren’t just words—they define who we are and how we work.
From staying curious to acting with integrity, our seven core values guide every decision, every interaction, and every success.
These values unite us, inspire us, and drive us to be better every day. They’re not just what we believe—they’re what we live.
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About me:
- I'm Ravi Pratap Singh, Co-Founder at Learnnovators.
- I’m an entrepreneur, blogger, independent director, trustee, mentor, speaker.
- Reach out to me if you’d like to explore opportunities or just connect!
Here’s to fresh starts, big dreams, and endless possibilities!
Wishing you and your loved ones a year full of exciting adventures, amazing achievements, and boundless joy!
Let’s make 2025 truly extraordinary!
Happy New Year!
P.S. This is my first post in over seven years! I’m planning to write more regularly from now on. Wish me luck! :)
I made countless resolutions over the past 15 months to write at least one blog post every month... and guess what, I successfully managed to break every single one of them!
Of course, I have a host of excuses to justify my action (or rather, inaction!)... but then those excuses are so frivolous that I can't buy them myself. As the old adage goes, "If it is important to you, you will find a way. If not, you’ll find an excuse".
So here I am... FINDING A WAY... and finally putting fingers to keyboard... for my first post since June last year!
And what better way to make my comeback on blogosphere than by sharing a couple of exhilarating news from the past few weeks.
First, I was featured in The 2017 Corporate eLearning Movers And Shakers List by the indomitable Bob Little of Bob Little Press & PR.
Soon after, I was named among the 25 eLearning and L&D Thought Leaders to Watch in 2017 by Christie Wroten of Trivantis.
I feel immensely THANKFUL, HONOURED and HUMBLED to be on these elite lists along with some of my L&D heroes. But I must acknowledge that these recognitions do not belong to me exclusively... instead, they are a reflection of the tremendous work being put in by my terrific team at Learnnovators. So my heartiest congratulations to each one of them!
Needless to add, these plaudits serve as massive incentives for me (and my team) to strive harder and set our sights on greater summits to conquer in the days and years ahead!
I hope they also spur me to find "ways" rather than "excuses" to write more often... :-)
The news of Jay Cross's passing away on 6th November came as a bolt from the blue to his scores of admirers. Jay has been an icon and a huge source of inspiration to most of us in the learning community.
We, at Learnnovators, were fortunate to interview him a couple of months ago for our "Crytsal Balling With Learnnovators" series. True to form, Jay was brutally honest with his answers and didn't mince words while expressing his views on the state of L&D and its practitioners. No wonder then that his interview turned out to be one of the very best of the series!
I am giving below 20 awesome quotes from Jay's interview:
“It’s not so much that the future is informal learning. That’s always been the primary way people learn to do their jobs.”
“If an organization is not addressing informal learning, it’s leaving a tremendous amount of learning to chance. Is that okay? Not any longer. This is a knowledge economy.”
“My role was to point out to organizations that they were investing in the wrong place: formal learning.”
“Schooling, the model that most people support because they were brainwashed into it, is not the most effective way to learn.”
“Learning & development professionals often push what they can control.”
“The informal realm is scary because it empowers the learner. That’s a loss of control for training departments and it makes them uncomfortable.”
“…formal and informal learning are not separate things: they are points along a continuum. All learning is part formal and part informal. The issue is how much of each.”
“Lots of L&D people have been beguiled by the notion of ROI. Most of what’s written about the concept is nonsense.”
“I’ve given up hope that L&D can pull this off on its own. They don’t have and will never have the resources to touch everyone in the organization.”
“I’ve said for years that in our fast paced world, learning is the work.”
“Senior management needs to recognize that learning is the vital variable. It’s not L&D’s job, it’s the whole organization’s.”
“Learning is viewed as a cost that creates no value. Well, we’ve advanced since the Venetians invented bookkeeping but narrow-minded managers are still slaves to that way of looking at the world.”
“I have to admit that I like pushing people’s buttons to get them to think about what’s really going on.”
“I find myself shouting that the “Emperor has no clothes.” Somebody’s got to look at things with innocent eyes and point out what’s really happening.”
“Millions of knowledge workers and their managers have been told they are responsible for their own learning but have no more idea what to do than the dog who got on the bus (Now WTF do I do?).”
“L&D only reaches a small sliver of the workforce and their approach is episodic. It doesn’t do much to improve the organization.”
“People learn most from experience, not courses.”
“Learning is ultimately the responsibility of the learner.”
“The world is changing so fast that staying in one’s comfort zone is not an option.”
“…I’d like to do for learning what Luther did for religion: make the sacred knowledge transparent. Bring things out in the open.”
Thanks for all the inspiration, Jay... you will be sorely missed. RIP.
“When people go to work, they shouldn’t have to leave their hearts at home.”
The above quote by Betty Bender aptly sums up what we, at Learnnovators, unrelentlessly strive to make our workplace into… a home away from home for our employees. A place where our team members are respected, valued, empowered, recognized, motivated… and engaged!
Today’s forward-thinking organizations are no longer content with keeping their employees “satisfied”… instead, they are spending more and more time designing innovative methods to keep their employees “engaged”.
So what exactly is Employee Engagement?
Since William Kahn provided the first formal definition of Employee Engagement in 1990, there have been scores of definitions doing the rounds. But my personal favorite is the one by Kevin Kruse, who defines Employee Engagement as “The emotional commitment the employee has to the organization and its goals.”
Kevin further adds that “This emotional commitment means engaged employees actually care about their work and their company. They don’t work just for a paycheck, or just for the next promotion, but work on behalf of the organization’s goals.”
It is no surprise then that engaged employees display higher levels of INVOLVEMENT and COMMITMENT to the organization’s goals and values, are more MOTIVATED to contribute to the organization’s success, thereby leading to improved PERFORMANCE and PRODUCTIVITY.
I am glad to share 15 quotes on Employee Engagement that inspire us, at Learnnovators, in our quest for creating A GREAT PLACE FOR GREAT PEOPLE TO DO GREAT WORK! Here they are…
1. “To win in the marketplace you must first win in the workplace.” ~ Doug Conant
2. “Always treat your employees exactly as you want them to treat your best customers.” ~ Stephen R. Covey
3. “Employees engage with employers and brands when they’re treated as humans worthy of respect.” ~ Meghan Biro
4. “Highly engaged employees make the customer experience. Disengaged employees break it.” ~ Timothy R. Clark
5. “Research indicates that workers have three prime needs: Interesting work, recognition for doing a good job, and being let in on things that are going on in the company.” ~ Zig Ziglar
6. “When people are financially invested, they want a return. When people are emotionally invested, they want to contribute.” ~ Simon Sinek
7. “Your number one customers are your people. Look after employees first and then customers last.” ~ Ian Hutchinson
8. “The simple act of paying positive attention to people has a great deal to do with productivity.” ~ Tom Peters
9. “Everyone wants to be appreciated, so if you appreciate someone, don’t keep it a secret.” ~ Mary Kay Ash
10. “Employees who believe that management is concerned about them as a whole person – not just an employee – are more productive, more satisfied, more fulfilled. Satisfied employees mean satisfied customers, which leads to profitability.” ~ Anne M. Mulcahy
11. “Engaged employees are in the game for the sake of the game; they believe in the cause of the organization.” ~ Paul Marciano, PhD
12. “Paychecks can’t buy passion.” ~ Brad Federman
13. “The way your employees feel is the way your customers will feel.” ~ Sybil F. Stershic
14. “People want to know they matter and they want to be treated as people. That’s the new talent contract.” ~ Pamela Stroko
15. “Engaged employees stay for what they give (they like their work); disengaged employees stay for what they get (favorable job conditions, growth opportunities, job security).” ~ Blessing White’s The State of Employee Engagement 2008
Which of the above quotes do you particularly like? Do you have your own favorites? What is your take on Employee Engagement? Would be delighted to hear your thoughts…
Have you ever had colleagues or friends who consistently put in 12-15 hours of work a day for weeks on end and still not exhibit the faintest signs of mental or physical fatigue? On the other hand, you may also be acquainted with people who behave like zombies after a couple of extra-long working days. The interesting part about this contrasting behaviour, you may have noticed, is that the "fatigue factor" has nothing to do with the age of the concerned person.
Then what's it that makes the former type of people behave like superheroes? Do these guys gulp down some magic potion with breakfast every morning? Do they suffer from a genetic disorder? Or are they just visitors from a different planet?
Fortunately, none of the above.
The answer is fairly simple. The "superheroes" ENJOY their jobs, while the latter ENDURE them!
Do YOU enjoy or endure your job???
Every entrepreneurial journey begins with a VISION. But as the entrepreneur treads farther and farther away from the familiar environs of his pre-entrepreneurial comfort zones and heads deeper and deeper into the uncertainty-riddled paths of the business world, he finds himself being slowly but surely engulfed in the kinds of pressures that he never even knew existed. At this point, the original vision of a majority of entrepreneurs starts to fade... and before long, darkness takes over!
This 'loss of vision' occurs primarily because most entrepreneurs don't have the guts to stomach short-term losses even when they believe that these losses could potentially lead to long-term gains. They find it easier to cop-out rather than persist with their vision.
This is where Jeff Bezos's philosophy of being "stubborn on vision, but flexible on details" is truly inspirational. The Founder & CEO of Amazon has time and again demonstrated his ability to stand by hugely risky decisions and take on short-term losses because he firmly believed that those decisions would eventually bring long-term gains for his organization. Amazon Web Services and Amazon Kindle are two good cases of Bezos taking on immense pressure from investors and analysts for years on end, but still remaining stubborn on his vision and not giving up until he made enormous successes of these initiatives.
The key, as you can see, is for an entrepreneur to be able to handle the short-term pressures without compromising on the long-term vision... be flexible on the details, if needed, yet stay true to the ultimate vision.
Bezos makes it seem all too simple, but believe me, it most certainly isn't.
"...if you want to test a man’s character, give him power."
When he uttered those profound words, I guess Abraham Lincoln was hinting at a person's Positional Power, which can be given as well as snatched. As the name suggests, Positional Power is the authority which comes from the 'office' or 'position' to which the leader is appointed or elected. Since it is derived from external sources, this type of power is not permanent, and can quickly evaporate with the loss of the leader's office or position. Politics and military are lines of work where Positional Power plays a significant role in getting a job or task executed.
Personal Power on the other hand comes from within an individual… it is the authority which is derived from the personal traits of the leader - like character, knowledge, skill, eloquence and charisma. Since these attributes are internal to the person, this type of power cannot be taken away by extraneous factors like the leader's position or job title. Sports persons and movie stars fall under the category of people who wield an enormous degree of Personal Power over their followers.
Neither type of power is “better” than the other… an effective leader uses both Positional Power and Personal Power judiciously and wisely to acquire and influence followers as well as earn their respect, admiration and loyalty.
Positional Power is used in situations where the leader does not want to encourage a discussion with the followers to arrive at a decision… they are simply “told” what needs to be done. No questions asked! On the other hand, there are also situations where followers have to be “sold” an idea… here the leader uses the charm of his/her Personal Power to accomplish the goal.
It's not surprising, then, that most successful leaders have the decisiveness of an army general as well as the magnetism of a rockstar!
Last week I had a wonderful time speaking at HCL's Social Learning Conference in Chennai. The aim of the conference was to have external and internal specialists share their thoughts and experiences in Social Learning with HCL's leaders.
The topics covered by four other eminent speakers were - The Age of Social Learning, Driving Collaboration through Social Media, Social Learning Tools, and M-Learning. I spoke on 'Walk The Social Talk: Best Practices In Social Learning'.
Here are the slides I used for my presentation. Would be glad to discuss in case you have any questions...
Last week I had the opportunity of doing an interview with SocialProma. Here are some excerpts:
1) What was the idea behind starting Learnnovators?
I had been working in the learning/training business for about a dozen years when I got bitten by the entrepreneurial bug. So in 2003, I started C2 Workshop along with another colleague, Srividya Kumar. In June 2013, we rebranded C2 Workshop as Learnnovators. When we began our entrepreneurial journey, e-learning was a new (infact, almost unknown) concept in India and there weren’t too many players in the market. But Vidya and I were convinced that e-learning was the future of learning. This belief is what prompted us to step out and start on our own.
2) Please brief us about your business model?
Learnnovators, as the name suggests, is all about learning and innovation. We are in the business of helping people learn.
Let’s say an organization wants to train 150 of their customer-facing staff to handle irate customers. We study the scene, speak to the staff, understand the gaps in skill and comprehension, and come up with one or more training courses that can help improve their performance in this area. Such training courses can mostly be taken up online by staff at their own pace and time, thereby saving the organization the trouble and costs of arranging face-to-face training sessions.
This is just one example. The same, or similar, solutions can be applied to several different performance related problems. Depending on the problem and the context, we come up with innovative solutions to help improve learning and performance.
3) Tell us about your core team.
The founding team comprises of Srividya Kumar and me. Vidya comes with over a decade and a half of experience in the e-learning industry, having worked her way up from being an Instructional designer to project manager and onto an entrepreneur. She handles development and delivery at Learnnovators, while I handle business development and HR.
We have a team of instructional designers, graphic designers, programmers, QC specialists and project managers handling project and client requirements on a day-to-day basis. We, at Learnnovators, believe that every single individual on our team plays a crucial role in adding value to our stakeholders, and is therefore a part of the ‘core’ team!
4) Tell us about your three most successful user acquisition methodology?
Our most successful user acquisition mode has been through client referrals. Which means that our clients have been our best salespeople. And I say this with immense pride and gratitude. You can check out some of our client testimonials at http://learnnovators.com/testimonials/
Our second most successful business acquisition mode has been through social media marketing. We are very active on social media platforms such as YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook.
We also have our own LinkedIn group which is of, and for, learning professionals who are passionate about bringing innovation to learning. The group’s objective is to help members engage in stimulating discussions around this topic. Activities of the group include exchanging of thoughts, ideas, experiences, news, tools, tips, trends, case studies, strategies, processes, best practices, etc. that would help the learning community create amazing learning experiences.
Also, we recently launched our own newspaper called ‘Learnobytes’ – it’s a weekly online newspaper that carries the best e-learning news from across the world. The newspaper’s objective is to help readers be up-to-date on the most recent news from the world of Learning and Development (L&D). ‘Learnobytes’ is available at http://learnobytes.learnnovators.com/. And our blog is one of the most popular e-learning blogs in the world. Infact, we recently launched a ‘Guest Blog’, where we have even our competitors contributing articles on our site.
As an industry thought leader, we believe it is our responsibility to build a learning community which can share knowledge, ideas and experiences with each other. This indirectly helps in business acquisition not only for us, but also for others involved in the community.
Check out the full interview HERE.
