More Progression: Empowering Employees to Reach Their Full Potential
At Minto, we understand our people are our best asset. That’s why we place a strong emphasis on supporting employee career development with ample opportunities to learn, grow, and advance.
One of the ways we do this is through our Learning & Development (L&D) programs which include both in-house and external learning opportunities that empower our employees to thrive in their current roles and prepare for future opportunities.
We recently sat down with our Director of Learning & Organizational Development, Yin Trinh, whose team leads the design, development, and implementation of Minto’s L&D programs and strategies.
Keep reading to learn more about Yin’s role, our overall approach to L&D, and some of the exciting new offerings we’ve implemented in the past year, including Mentorship @ Minto and Leadership Essentials course.
Tell us about your role. How long have you been with Minto and what are you responsible for?
I joined Minto in October 2021, almost two and a half years ago. My role is Director of Learning and Organizational Development.
In a nutshell, my team leads the design, development and implementation of corporate programs, initiatives, e-learning courses, and strategies aligned with the learning needs of the company. We also assess training and specific development needs of the operating, business, and functional units. We support leadership development at all levels, employee engagement activities, and partner with members of our HR team to deliver on key objectives and priorities set forth for the year.
Why is Learning & Development a priority at Minto?
At Minto, we prioritize our People Strategy, and L&D plays a significant role in achieving this. We aim to enhance and expand our employees’ skills, knowledge, and competencies to increase productivity and maximize individual performance. After all, learning and growth are at the core of self-awareness, resilience, adaptability, and purpose – required skills to operate a successful organization.
We continually push forward on these programs because we understand that changing mindset and culture takes time. We understand that simple, repetitive offerings are at the heart of developing key skills .
How do you think our approach to L&D is different/unique?
We try to meet our employees where they are at. This requires care, patience, and understanding as opposed to a cookie-cutter model which is usually just one type of offering and method of delivery for all.
Our approach to L&D reflects our need to reach a very diverse workforce — from on-site construction workers, property personnel like housekeepers, superintendents, property managers, and back-office professionals, to remote employees. The challenge is meeting the needs of each of these groups who have varying degrees of experience and knowledge. We intentionally take great care in analyzing needs and balancing customized solutions, even for offerings that may seem straightforward.
What are the core offerings your team delivers (program streams, technology, etc.)?
Our team offers the following leadership development and employee development programs:
For all: Mentorship @ Minto is one core offering which launched in November 2023. We currently have 70 mentors willing to invest their time in employees committed to developing their career growth and have just hit 70 mentees requesting to be paired up.
We also offer career development workshops, both in person and virtual in some locations, to help individuals craft their personal brand, reshaping the way they think about career progression, and helping draft their career plan to progress forward.
Another key offering strengthens our inclusive culture to ensure it is welcoming and respectful. We offer a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) “Journey to Belonging” workshop which over 650 employees have taken part in.
Finally, we play a role in Minto orientation which is a 2-hour interactive virtual session for all new employees.
For leaders:
We offer strategic leadership workshops for our Senior Leadership team to further enable and evolve their planning and thinking skills.
We offer People Managers opportunities to come together during our quarterly virtual “Unplugged Sessions” to share, learn, and discuss relevant topics or challenges currently impacting them. We have seen a high attendance at the two sessions held to date, on“Managing Wellbeing” and “The Power of Trust & Safety.”
Since feedback and career development is so critical for employees, People Managers are also offered sessions on Career Conversations to help them enhance the way in which they can support individual’s growth through effective conversations.
Our Leadership Essentials program is designed for our new Canadian leaders or those recently promoted to leadership roles. This program goes deep into the importance of leading self and others, with emphasis on emotional intelligence, self-awareness, coaching, feedback, and career conversations.
Functional & e-learning offerings: Our team offers customized team-building sessions tailored to the objectives set forth for specific teams. Aside from teambuilding events, we’ve offered training on customer experience, brand alignment, and created e-courses for technical topics including intro to HVAC, Accessibility Standards, Health & Safety, Code of Conduct, and much more around compliance and policies.
How do we support the needs of our team in the USA?
Our USA team benefits from the same programs that we offer in Canada.
The Leadership Essentials program is a perfect example of how we adapt the principles and core objectives of a program to meet specific needs of individuals and teams.
Our strategy is to customize the Canadian course to fit the needs of our American leaders who have diverse backgrounds, skills, and requirements. We're providing the training in person across five different locations now through June 2024.
What is Mentorship @ Minto and why did you add this program? Have you received any feedback/impact on the program thus far?
Mentorship @ Minto is a program designed to establish meaningful mentorships between employees across Minto. The connections made will help individuals expand their network, build confidence, share knowledge, develop leadership skills, or progress in their career planning.
We surveyed those who have been paired for three months, and the results both mentees and mentors have been quite positive!
One goal of the program is to raise engagement levels, and 100% of mentees surveyed confirmed that the mentoring relationship has had a positive impact on their engagement. Testimonials show these relationships are making a difference for mentors and mentees, which is what we were hoping for!
"The mentorship program is a great opportunity to take a new step in career development and growth. We learn from more experienced co-workers' ways to meet our goals."
"The Mentroshop Program offered by Minto has been a crucial step for me in building a sense of belonging and strengthening my shared values with the company. It came at the perfect time and has been instrumental in my professional and personal growth. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to advance in their career."
"It has been a source to learn what challenges other associates are experiencing and to provide guidance on how to pursue more knowledge through various resources available and provide constructive feedback."
"My interactions with my mentees have re-instilled the importance of supporting our employees in growing their knowledge and experience. We need to provide opportunities for our teams to grow and advance, even if it means they may not be in our department or on our team in the future."
Are there other programs you are excited to roll out in the next year?
We are looking into collaborating with different partners to expand our assessment offerings to our employees, from a more customized 360 approach to team assessments like MBTI and ‘StrengthsFinder’.
We’ve also received feedback that learning Excel skills continues to be welcomed . While employees currently have access to our online ‘Learning Hub’ for self-guided –training, l, we hope to offer in-person Excel workshops at both the beginner and intermediate levels.
If you were asked to describe Minto in a single word – what would it be?
I personally connect with the word “progression.” The word reflects what we hope to deliver to every Minto employee through all we do.
It’s all about upping our partnership skills to find value in ensuring we are providing relevant offerings, prioritizing through better coaching skills, and aligning our solutions with what the organization needs to continually evolve, progress, and change with the times.
Interested in learning more about life at Minto? Visit our Careers page, or browse our current job opportunities here.