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How Can You Stop The Great Resignation From Impacting Your Company? The Answer Lies In Learning Opportunities For All

We’re in the midst of the Great Resignation – employees are leaving their positions in droves for jobs that offer a better work-life balance. Many of them want to work remotely. 

The Great Resignation has highlighted two problems:  

  • Employers need to fill hiring gaps, but they don’t know how to reach diverse pools of talent 
  • Diverse candidates from non-traditional backgrounds now have an amazing opportunity to find new, better jobs, but they need support 

In this post, we’ll talk about what some companies are doing right now to create actionable solutions, and what options exist to expand learning opportunities. 

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the Venture Capital Space 

The venture capital space gets a bad wrap (and in many cases, deservedly so) for paying lip service to DEI. However, there’s some progress being made across the VC industry, and we wanted to commend those companies that are doing AND saying the right things.

Zane Capital, one of GoCoach’s investors, has launched an entrepreneurial support organization called Zane Access™. Zane Access’ goal is to break down the systemic barriers that keep underrepresented founders from accessing capital as well as the funding itself. The organization produces programming, events, and content that provides founders from diverse backgrounds with education and mentorship. Additionally, Zane Access helps these founders expand their networks so they can successfully scale their companies and become connected to a powerful community of entrepreneurs and investors. 

We also wanted to highlight these VC’s, who have made DEI a priority in funding and access to opportunities: 

  • Black Angel Tech Fund. The Black Angel Tech Fund was started by a group of successful Black entrepreneurs and angel investors to boost the number of Black startup founders. One of their projects is OmniSpeech, a startup that improves the audio quality of speech on mobile devices and VoIP calls. 
  • Backstage Capital. Backstage Capital invests in startups founded by women, people of color, and the LGBT community. Its goal is to bridge gaps and ensure these founders are no longer overlooked or underestimated. They’ve invested in, among other things, LOOP – an AI-powered solution to make auto insurance more transparent and fairly priced. 
  • EchoVC Partners. EchoVC Partners focuses on investing in seed companies and early-stage startups in North America and sub-Saharan Africa. The firm has invested in, among other projects, eBanqo, customer engagement software that supports self-service, customer service automation, and multi-channel live chat. 

Investing in Learning Opportunities at Your Company 

Part of DEI is ensuring that everyone has access to the same learning and growth opportunities. At GoCoach, we strongly believe that everyone should be able to upskill – not just the upper echelons of management. 

That’s why we’ve been sharing stories with the latest data and analysis on the Great Resignation in our recent newsletters. The Cengage Group reported in January 2022 that 78% of people who had quit in the last six months took an online course, while the Washington Post reported on the rising number of employees who want the flexibility to work from home. 

It’s also why GoCoach is taking concrete steps to help every employee upskill. We recently launched Learning For Everyone (L4E), a platform that gives all employees at a company access to the GoCoach marketplace and learning experience platform. We’re proud that L4E is the first of its kind – companies can register immediately for unlimited access to affordable and accessible upskilling programs for each employee. 

Why Learning Opportunities Matter More Now Than Ever

Let’s go back to the Cengage Group report for a moment. The report also revealed that levels of employees participating in online training are at an all-time high; LinkedIn saw a 53% increase in the number of hours members across the world spent in its learning courses, while Udemy’s unique monthly visitor levels grew 1.5 times between February 2020 and September 2021.  

Employees are reskilling or upskilling in record numbers because they want more lucrative job opportunities. In an article in Fortune, the CEO of the Cengage Group said that this report should serve as a wakeup call to employers – if they want to retain their workforce, they need to give employees the chance to improve their skills or learn new skills so they can grow. Otherwise, employees will keep looking elsewhere for new learning opportunities, and ultimately new jobs. 

To learn more about how the L4E platform can help you retain your workforce and improve their skills, contact us.