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In today’s ever-evolving workplace and “always-on” learning culture, knowledge isn’t gained in isolation – nor should it stop at the walls of your company. The most impactful learning cultures are innately collaborative, and deeply connected to the world outside.
Reflecting back on Learning at Work’s 2025 theme of Get Connected, we thought it’d be the perfect opportunity to explore how external partnerships can breathe new life into your internal learning strategy. From knowledge exchanges with industry peers to speaker sessions from universities, connecting people to outside expertise is invaluable.
So how can you make external learning connections part of your ongoing L&D approach — and how can learning technology help?
When we talk about building a strong learning culture, it’s easy to focus inward. “How are we strengthening our internal knowledge systems? Promoting our Subject Matter Experts? Making sure everyone has as many learning opportunities as possible?”
And all of that is important, don’t get us wrong.
But in order to truly thrive in the fast-changing workplace, organisations also need to look outward.
External perspectives offer something that’s hard to replicate in-house: fresh insight. They help employees step back from the daily grind and look at their work (and the wider industry) with fresh eyes.
Here are just a few ways these connections can supercharge learning:
Bringing in guest speakers or collaborating with partner organisations helps learners connect the dots between what they’re doing and what’s happening in the world around them. Whether it’s hearing from a digital transformation lead in another company or a policy expert at a university, these sessions offer real-time insight into the latest trends and challenges facing your sector. This is essential for keeping skills current and staying competitive.
Working with universities, professional bodies, or research institutions gives your team access to cutting-edge knowledge and emerging best practices. Think of it as a direct line to what’s coming next — from AI ethics and green technologies to inclusive leadership and workplace wellbeing. By tapping into these external networks, you’re actively preparing for the future.
Sometimes the best learning happens when we step outside our bubble. Comparing your team’s ways of working with others (whether it’s a similar business or a completely different sector) can prompt powerful moments of reflection. What are we doing well? What could we approach differently? This kind of cross-pollination helps people see processes in a new light.
In fast-moving areas like AI, digital strategy, and sustainability, staying still is falling behind. That’s why learning from others (even competitors!) can be so powerful. When your teams hear how others are approaching similar challenges, it opens up new ways of thinking.
Professional development is obviously important – it’s the reason we’re here. But a well-rounded learning strategy isn’t only concerned with the professional; it also deals with the personal. Health and wellness, stress management, Neurodiversity… All of these topics help to enrich employees’ lives both in and outside of work. (And that leads to better employee engagement and retention.)
Take it from us. At Thrive, we recently enjoyed a talk from Jenny Muhlwa, Leadership Consultant and former L&D Partner Consultant at Thrive customer Sumo Group. She brought her expertise to a virtual workshop all about how understanding the science of female energy and hormone cycles can unlock focus and confidence at work. These insights were invaluable for the women in our team, and we never would have gained them without harnessing our external partnership.
Looking to bring the outside world in? Here are four practical ways to start opening those doors:
Invite academics, industry leaders, or specialists from partner organisations to run live sessions. Pick topics that resonate with your strategy and your people – whether that’s digital transformation, leadership, or (in the case of Thrive’s guest session with Jenny) feminine energy!
Live events help make learning as timely and engaging as possible, and connect your people to real-world issues.
Why not go beyond the occasional guest speaker and create an ongoing knowledge-sharing initiative? Partner with other businesses and networks to set up job shadowing, peer learning groups, or shared problem-solving sessions.
These exchanges give people hands-on exposure to different ways of working, and encourage collaboration across borders.
If it’s not in the budget to invite external guest speakers to run sessions or knowledge exchange programmes, you can still build external knowledge into your workplace learning. There’s a huge amount of high-quality content scattered across the internet – from TED Talks to academic research.
Bring these resources into your LMS and curate themed pathways that mix them in with your own resources. It adds variety, and these kinds of blended programmes are proven to be more effective than internal content alone.
Create time-bound, high-energy learning experiences that involve both your internal teams and external partners. Think sustainability sprints, innovation weeks, or leadership labs — with input from guest mentors.
These challenges make learning social – which in turn, contributes meaningfully to organisational effectiveness.
At Thrive, we believe learning is most powerful when it’s social, collaborative and connected — and that of course includes connections outside your organisation. That’s why our platform is designed to make external learning partnerships not just possible, but seamless.
Here’s how Thrive supports external collaboration:
Broadcasts hosted right within your learning platform are a great way to make external knowledge fit seamlessly in with the rest of your team’s learning – and with our new multi-speaker capabilities, you can make this transition even more seamless. As a bonus, Thrive also auto-generates captions, making it easy for everyone in your organisation to join in.
Whether it's a guest speaker recording or an external report, Thrive makes it easy to upload, tag and share all types of content — and keep it discoverable via intuitive search and personalised recommendations.
Blend internal and external resources into structured learning journeys, with support for multimedia content, external links and microlearning formats.
Thrive’s social learning features enable user-generated content, as well as commenting, sharing and discussions on externally-sourced content — so learners don’t just consume, but reflect and contribute too.
Build spaces where employees can join challenges, engage with campaigns, or connect with guest mentors — all supported by Thrive’s communication features.
Thanks for reading; we hope we’ve given you some ideas to bring outside expertise into your organisation – whether that’s a guest speaker or a clip from a YouTube video. With a platform like Thrive, those external connections can become a lasting part of your learning ecosystem — so why not book a demo today to see how we can help you do just that?
Explore what impact Thrive could make for your team and your learners today.
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In today’s ever-evolving workplace and “always-on” learning culture, knowledge isn’t gained in isolation – nor should it stop at the walls of your company. The most impactful learning cultures are innately collaborative, and deeply connected to the world outside.
Reflecting back on Learning at Work’s 2025 theme of Get Connected, we thought it’d be the perfect opportunity to explore how external partnerships can breathe new life into your internal learning strategy. From knowledge exchanges with industry peers to speaker sessions from universities, connecting people to outside expertise is invaluable.
So how can you make external learning connections part of your ongoing L&D approach — and how can learning technology help?
When we talk about building a strong learning culture, it’s easy to focus inward. “How are we strengthening our internal knowledge systems? Promoting our Subject Matter Experts? Making sure everyone has as many learning opportunities as possible?”
And all of that is important, don’t get us wrong.
But in order to truly thrive in the fast-changing workplace, organisations also need to look outward.
External perspectives offer something that’s hard to replicate in-house: fresh insight. They help employees step back from the daily grind and look at their work (and the wider industry) with fresh eyes.
Here are just a few ways these connections can supercharge learning:
Bringing in guest speakers or collaborating with partner organisations helps learners connect the dots between what they’re doing and what’s happening in the world around them. Whether it’s hearing from a digital transformation lead in another company or a policy expert at a university, these sessions offer real-time insight into the latest trends and challenges facing your sector. This is essential for keeping skills current and staying competitive.
Working with universities, professional bodies, or research institutions gives your team access to cutting-edge knowledge and emerging best practices. Think of it as a direct line to what’s coming next — from AI ethics and green technologies to inclusive leadership and workplace wellbeing. By tapping into these external networks, you’re actively preparing for the future.
Sometimes the best learning happens when we step outside our bubble. Comparing your team’s ways of working with others (whether it’s a similar business or a completely different sector) can prompt powerful moments of reflection. What are we doing well? What could we approach differently? This kind of cross-pollination helps people see processes in a new light.
In fast-moving areas like AI, digital strategy, and sustainability, staying still is falling behind. That’s why learning from others (even competitors!) can be so powerful. When your teams hear how others are approaching similar challenges, it opens up new ways of thinking.
Professional development is obviously important – it’s the reason we’re here. But a well-rounded learning strategy isn’t only concerned with the professional; it also deals with the personal. Health and wellness, stress management, Neurodiversity… All of these topics help to enrich employees’ lives both in and outside of work. (And that leads to better employee engagement and retention.)
Take it from us. At Thrive, we recently enjoyed a talk from Jenny Muhlwa, Leadership Consultant and former L&D Partner Consultant at Thrive customer Sumo Group. She brought her expertise to a virtual workshop all about how understanding the science of female energy and hormone cycles can unlock focus and confidence at work. These insights were invaluable for the women in our team, and we never would have gained them without harnessing our external partnership.
Looking to bring the outside world in? Here are four practical ways to start opening those doors:
Invite academics, industry leaders, or specialists from partner organisations to run live sessions. Pick topics that resonate with your strategy and your people – whether that’s digital transformation, leadership, or (in the case of Thrive’s guest session with Jenny) feminine energy!
Live events help make learning as timely and engaging as possible, and connect your people to real-world issues.
Why not go beyond the occasional guest speaker and create an ongoing knowledge-sharing initiative? Partner with other businesses and networks to set up job shadowing, peer learning groups, or shared problem-solving sessions.
These exchanges give people hands-on exposure to different ways of working, and encourage collaboration across borders.
If it’s not in the budget to invite external guest speakers to run sessions or knowledge exchange programmes, you can still build external knowledge into your workplace learning. There’s a huge amount of high-quality content scattered across the internet – from TED Talks to academic research.
Bring these resources into your LMS and curate themed pathways that mix them in with your own resources. It adds variety, and these kinds of blended programmes are proven to be more effective than internal content alone.
Create time-bound, high-energy learning experiences that involve both your internal teams and external partners. Think sustainability sprints, innovation weeks, or leadership labs — with input from guest mentors.
These challenges make learning social – which in turn, contributes meaningfully to organisational effectiveness.
At Thrive, we believe learning is most powerful when it’s social, collaborative and connected — and that of course includes connections outside your organisation. That’s why our platform is designed to make external learning partnerships not just possible, but seamless.
Here’s how Thrive supports external collaboration:
Broadcasts hosted right within your learning platform are a great way to make external knowledge fit seamlessly in with the rest of your team’s learning – and with our new multi-speaker capabilities, you can make this transition even more seamless. As a bonus, Thrive also auto-generates captions, making it easy for everyone in your organisation to join in.
Whether it's a guest speaker recording or an external report, Thrive makes it easy to upload, tag and share all types of content — and keep it discoverable via intuitive search and personalised recommendations.
Blend internal and external resources into structured learning journeys, with support for multimedia content, external links and microlearning formats.
Thrive’s social learning features enable user-generated content, as well as commenting, sharing and discussions on externally-sourced content — so learners don’t just consume, but reflect and contribute too.
Build spaces where employees can join challenges, engage with campaigns, or connect with guest mentors — all supported by Thrive’s communication features.
Thanks for reading; we hope we’ve given you some ideas to bring outside expertise into your organisation – whether that’s a guest speaker or a clip from a YouTube video. With a platform like Thrive, those external connections can become a lasting part of your learning ecosystem — so why not book a demo today to see how we can help you do just that?
Explore what impact Thrive could make for your team and your learners today.
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