The I.T. organization at Gap is taking on a new look. Using a combination of classroom and interactive E-learning instruction, the retailer's tech management team is getting schooled in leadership skills that can help it make the most of employee performance and productivity.

Gap recently outsourced to IBM a chunk of its IT operations, including data center, networking, hardware services, and back-end support. As a result, the company's IT head count has shrunk from 1,100 to about 700 people.

In the past, Gap's IT department operated more like an order-taking services group for the company's businesses, which include its flagship chain, along with Old Navy and Banana Republic. But now, the IT team is focused on strategy and partnering with the company's businesses to leverage technology to meet their needs. To accomplish that, Gap's IT unit must develop more business-oriented skills and adapt to changes on the business side.

	Online training racks up a success at Gap. Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

So the company began late last year to provide its 250 IT leaders, including VPs, directors, and project and people managers, with leadership training to help them better manage their direct reports. Gap deployed Situational Leadership II, an interactive E-learning course from training company Ninth House that was available via the Web or CD-ROM. The course's content, which was developed by business leadership expert Ken Blanchard, instructs leaders on management and coaching skills to help them assess and develop the skills and competencies of their employees.

Gap isn't alone in expanding its E-learning offerings. Business spending on E-learning will grow from a little more than $6 billion last year to about $19.6 billion in 2010, predicts IDC.

Common language
At Gap, the E-learning course was sandwiched between an in-person, three-hour kick-off program that included a demonstration of the software and a two-day classroom course to reinforce the material presented in the E-learning program. Gap's IT leaders completed the course and attended the classroom instruction from August to November last year. The E-learning course took between six and eight hours to complete, and participants were asked to finish the curriculum within a three-week window.

The Situational Leadership course saturates its students so that everyone is "speaking the same language" and using common approaches in helping their staffs develop their competencies, says Evelyn Orr, senior manager of Gap's IT learning and development.

Using simulation and interactive scenarios, the course instructs students on how to assess staffers' skills and competencies; identify the best management approach in assisting and directing people based on their competencies; and partner with individuals to help them be more productive and self-sufficient.

In assessing a worker's skills and competencies, students are taught how to to observe behavior, evaluate results, and ask the kinds of questions that get more information on a person's competency levels, Orr says. The course isn't tailored to IT managers specifically; it's based on leadership principles and techniques that can be applied throughout different areas of business, she says.

The interactive course features examples and challenges that help leaders determine the best way of dealing with a situation, such as deciding how much direction should be provided to an employee with beginner skills versus how much responsibility can be safely delegated to someone with more advanced skills.

It was "very compelling, very interactive," says Wayne Riley, Gap's director of store business capabilities, who completed the course and attended the in-person pre- and follow-up classes last year.

Students are asked how they would deal with a particular situation and given several scenarios to choose. Depending on which answer a student selects, the Situ- ational Leadership actors respond accordingly. The actors look into the camera as though they're speaking to the student and react with anger, gratitude, or other likely emotions, Orr says. "It's a Hollywood-production-level video," she says.

The E-learning course and classroom interaction with peers enhanced what Riley says were his already strong people management skills and reinforced his talents.

The course also is good at improving the people management and leadership skills of less experienced IT managers, Riley says. It bolsters the ability of IT managers who might have been promoted into management positions because of their solid tech skills but who don't have a lot of prior experience in managing people. "That's often the case in technology management," he says.