What businesses want. What teams want.

Comparative analysis:

Business vs Team learning needs

Source: survey responses from Validation Lab at Auckland Startup Week October 2025.

Executive summary

Businesses see budget, time and engagement as the top barriers to growing capability — for example: “Limited budget or resources”, “Finding the time”, and “Not sure where to start”. Team members emphasise psychological safety, practical short learning and allocation of time in the working week — for example: “Feeling safe to be honest and try new things together”, “Access to short, practical learning I can use right away”, and “Doing it as part of regular team time, not extra work”. There is strong overlap (both groups want learning that actually happens in normal working rhythms), but clear gaps around resourcing, measurement and leader participation.

What businesses want 

1. Engagement & uptake

  • Getting staff to participate is a concern: “Getting the team engaged and motivated”.
  • That ties to wanting activities that feel relevant and that leadership supports.

2. Time & scheduling

  • A repeated friction is time: “Finding the time” — businesses recognise upskilling must fit into busy work schedules.

3. Feasible cost & ROI

  • Businesses repeatedly flagged cost constraints: “Limited budget or resources”.
  • When asked about acceptable budget levels, answers included spending preferences (e.g. “$250 per year per FTE” and “$500 per year per FTE”), indicating willingness to invest but within tight caps.

4. Practical, implementable programmes

  • They expressed uncertainty about how to begin: “Not sure where to start”.
  • They want programmes that are easy to roll out and scale without excessive admin.

What team members want

1. Psychological safety and shared participation

  • The top motivator for team-based growth: “Feeling safe to be honest and try new things together”.
  • Team members also value leaders joining: “Seeing everyone (including leaders) join in and share”.

2. Learning integrated into work (not extra)

  • A strong preference for learning during team time: “Doing it as part of regular team time, not extra work”.

3. Short, practical, role-connected content

  • Team respondents want usable, quick learning: “Access to short, practical learning I can use right away” and “Understanding how it connects to my role or career”.

4. Time and coaching

  • Practical enablers named: “Having time set aside for learning” and “Feedback or coaching from my leader”.
  • Frequency of access varies — responses included “Daily”, “Weekly”, “Monthly” and some: “Not at all” (showing inconsistency across workplaces).

Areas of alignment (where business & team want the same thing)

1. Learning that fits into the working week

  • Business: worried about “Finding the time”.
  • Team: want “Doing it as part of regular team time, not extra work”.
     → Shared understanding that learning must be scheduled into work time, not an add-on.

2. Relevance and practical impact

  • Business wants implementable programmes
  • Team wants “short, practical learning I can use right away”.
     → Both value applicability and immediate usefulness.

3. Engagement & leader modelling

  • Business worries about “Getting the team engaged and motivated”
  • Team explicitly values “Seeing everyone (including leaders) join in and share”.
    → Both groups see leader participation as an accelerator of engagement.

Key gaps & tensions

1. Resourcing vs. expectations

  • Businesses are budget-constrained (“Limited budget or resources”) but desire regular, effective learning — which can be hard to deliver without investment.
  • Team requests for dedicated time and coaching imply resourcing that businesses currently see as constrained (budget + leader time).

2. Measurement & clarity about outcomes

  • Businesses’ “not sure where to start” suggests uncertainty about priorities and measures. Few direct business quotes propose how to evaluate impact.
  • Teams focus more on immediate usefulness than on measurable outcomes.

3. Leader capability to facilitate

  • Teams want coaching and leaders who participate (e.g., “Feedback or coaching from my leader”), but business responses imply leaders feel stretched and uncertain about how to deliver learning.

4. Inconsistent access

Team responses show varied frequency — some daily, some monthly, and some “Not at all” — meaning inequality in access across teams.

Recommendations (practical, low-cost, high-impact)

1. Design short, role-linked micro-sessions during existing team time

  • Create 20–30 minute activities that run inside regular team meetings (addresses team desire: “Doing it as part of regular team time, not extra work” and business constraint “Finding the time”).
    → Check out Smartskills AI Agent TAG

2. Use a low-cost microlearning library + leader playbook

  • Provide “short, practical learning” modules (aligns with “Access to short, practical learning I can use right away”) plus a one-page facilitation guide for leaders so leaders can run sessions with confidence (helps businesses who are “Not sure where to start”).
    → Here's the beauty of the merger of Skillpod Microlearns and Smartskills

3. Model by leadership and make participation visible

  • Encourage leaders to attend and share — supports team call for “Seeing everyone (including leaders) join in and share” and helps solve the engagement problem for business.
    → Team leaders are often promoted for their 'hard skills'. Smartskills helps them develop their own softskills while building their team.

4. Pilot with a clear measurement framework

  • Run a 6–8 week pilot with simple KPIs: % attendance in team learning time, short post-session usefulness rating (1–5), one concrete behaviour change per participant. This gives businesses ROI evidence without complex evaluation.
    → This evaluation structure is already built into Smartskills

5. Offer tiered budget options

  • Given the budget comments (e.g., “$250 per year per FTE”), present multiple subscription/tier options so small teams can start low-cost and scale as value is proven.
    → Smartskills has the budget structure for this

Conclusion

The survey paints a clear picture: Teams want learning that is safe, short, directly applicable and embedded into work. Businesses want solutions that are affordable, easy to implement and that actually engage people.

The fastest path to alignment is to design low-cost, leader-supported micro learning embedded into existing team routines, measure impact simply, and scale from successful pilots.

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