Meet Unmind

Unmind is a workplace mental health platform on a mission to improve the mental wellbeing of 10 million people in organisations around the world, partnering with household name brands including M&S, asos, and Virgin Media.

The COVID-19 pandemic has catalysed more organisations to invest in the mental health of their people. This has contributed to Unmind’s growth, with its team tripling  in size and plans to keep on growing. 

Part of taking care of the mind is growing the mind, which is why Unmind places so much value in the development of its people. With values like ‘Do it for 'U’’, ‘Grow your mind’ and ‘Thrive in autonomy’, it’s no wonder that they want a thriving learning culture in their organisation.

Their challenge 

A £1000 personal learning budget (PLB) per employee. The ability to take learning leave. Values that champion growth with autonomy. And a People team dedicated to giving their people the best working environment possible. That doesn’t sound like a problem. 

But even with all that, learning engagement wasn’t as high as it should be. In 2020, fewer than 20% of Unminders (that’s their people) had used their learning budget. Those who did used only 10% on average. It wasn’t that Unminders didn’t want to engage, it was that they didn’t know what to spend their budget on. They were short on inspiration and their Google searches for learning resources left them without any confidence in the quality of results. 

At the same time, Hazel Silvester, from their People Operations team, was struggling with manually processing and tracking the requests that did come through. The process was slow, taking up too much of Hazel’s time and it had minimal visibility for learners. Both created a barrier to learning. 

Unmind’s team is set to double in size on the back of their funding meaning even with low engagement, more requests were on the way. They knew this process could not scale with them and that a strong L&D function was vital to the growth of the organisation. They needed a better way forward.

Our solution

When Megan Kille, Unmind’s Head of People, and Hazel spoke to us, they knew they were looking for a learning platform that:

• Hosted resources their people could confidently use to upskill
• Supported and inspired a learning community
• Catered to individual learning needs and preferences
  

It all boiled down to wanting a platform that inspired Unminders to learn and keep learning.

They also wanted a platform that was easy to use from the People team perspective and where they could seamlessly add and connect with the many new joiners they bring in as they continue to grow.

Learnerbly was a natural fit to their needs and as soon as the Unmind team was onboarded, sparks of inspiration ignited their now flourishing learning culture.

Putting learning options at people’s fingertips was really important to us. Giving people inspiration and sharing learning in a concentrated space is what’s made all the difference.”

Hazel Silvester, People Operations Manager

The outcome

Never before seen engagement

Since onboarding 6 months ago, 99% of Unminders have signed up to the platform and Unmind has seen more than a 400% increase in engagement.

People who have never used their learning budget before are doing so with Learnerbly. It’s really a reflection of how the platform has made learning fun again.”

Megan Kille, Head of People

Unminders are using Learnerbly to upskill and reach personal and professional development goals. They browse, bookmark and request learning resources they find on the platform in line with goals and interests. 

Inspired learning every day

The Learnerbly Slack integration has quickly become the People team’s favourite Slack channel. Every day they get to witness their learning culture at work. 

When someone makes a request there is a flurry of reactions and it sparks discussion, often inspiring more requests for resources. There’s now a genuine community of learners within Unmind and it's a community fostering collaboration and connection. 

The most requested book from Unminders is Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking which was the first request Megan made on Learnerbly. Her request inspired many others to get the book and now there’s a large group of Unminders who can discuss it and share learnings.

The visibility of learning and the inspiration is invaluable. I can’t imagine Unmind without Learnerbly!’  

Hazel Silvester, People Operations Manager

Scaleable and seamless

Unminders have visibility over what they can spend and the People team is no longer bogged down by a manual process. As Unmind continues to grow and scale, they can easily add new joiners and bring them into their learning community, supporting genuine growth and fostering autonomy in their people. 

We can’t wait to see how Unmind’s organisation and community of learners continue to grow —  in size and in mind — with Learnerbly.