Part three of our four-part series on escaping The Activity Trap with Fosway’s CORE framework.
In the first two blogs of this series, we explored why every successful learning initiative starts with understanding the business context and defining clear business outcomes.
Once you’ve agreed the problem you’re solving and what success looks like, the next question is often met with a familiar response:
“Let’s build some learning.”
Sometimes that’s exactly the right answer.
But often, it isn’t the complete answer.
One of the biggest reasons organisations struggle to demonstrate business impact is because they assume learning alone will change performance. In reality, people rarely change what they do simply because they’ve completed a course. Performance improves when learning is supported by the right environment, processes, managers and opportunities to put new skills into practice.
That’s why the third stage of Fosway’s CORE framework is Route. It’s about designing the right combination of interventions to achieve the outcome you’ve defined, rather than defaulting to learning as the only solution.
Imagine a customer service team is struggling with slow response times.
The obvious reaction might be to create customer service training.
But what if the real issue is that advisers can’t find the information they need? Or managers aren’t reinforcing the expected behaviours? Or existing processes are creating unnecessary delays?
In those situations, even the best-designed learning programme is unlikely to deliver the outcome the business is looking for.
That’s because learning can build capability, but capability alone doesn’t guarantee performance.
To escape The Activity Trap, L&D needs to stop asking, “What course should we build?” and start asking, “What combination of interventions will help people perform differently?”
The Route stage of the CORE framework encourages organisations to design solutions that combine learning with the other elements needed to influence behaviour. That means considering how people will practise new skills, receive feedback, apply learning in their day-to-day role and overcome the barriers that might prevent change. It also means being realistic about the time, effort and support required to achieve meaningful outcomes.
Learning might still play a central role, but it becomes one part of a broader performance strategy.
For example, improving manager capability might involve:
None of these interventions are particularly revolutionary on their own.
Together, however, they’re far more likely to change behaviour than a single course completed in isolation.
One of the most significant shifts organisations can make is moving their focus from learning completion to learning application.
For years, L&D has measured success by whether people accessed the learning.
But access doesn’t equal action.
Someone can complete every module in an LMS and still behave exactly as they did before.
The better question is whether people are using what they’ve learned in their day-to-day work.
The CORE framework places a strong emphasis on designing experiences that allow learners to practise, apply and demonstrate new behaviours. That might include simulations, real-world scenarios, manager observations, coaching conversations or opportunities to solve genuine business challenges. These moments provide far richer evidence of progress than completion rates alone because they focus on performance, not participation.
Another important shift is recognising that L&D doesn’t own business outcomes on its own.
Improving productivity, reducing risk or increasing customer satisfaction requires collaboration across the organisation. Managers, operational leaders, HR teams and employees all have a role to play in creating an environment where new behaviours can stick.
That’s why the Route stage is as much about partnership as it is about programme design.
Rather than being brought in at the end to deliver training, L&D should be working alongside business stakeholders to shape the solution from the beginning. The result is an approach that’s far more likely to address the root cause of the problem, rather than simply treating the symptoms.
Choosing the right route doesn’t just improve the chances of success. It also makes it much easier to demonstrate value.
When you’ve intentionally designed opportunities for people to apply new skills, practise behaviours and improve performance, you create meaningful moments that can be measured alongside business outcomes.
Instead of simply reporting how many people completed the learning, you can begin to understand how behaviour changed and whether that change contributed to the results the business was aiming for.
That’s where the final stage of the CORE framework comes in.
In the last blog of this series, we’ll explore Evidence, looking at how organisations can move beyond reporting activity and start demonstrating the business impact of learning with confidence. Read here to continue.
Book a demo with us
| Blog | 
