CATERPILLAR UNIVERSITY - INNOVATIVE COMMUNICATIONS AND BRANDING

Summary of a presentation delivered by Fred Goh, Director of Strategic Learning at Caterpillar University at the 2007 Training Conference.

Caterpillar is a growth-oriented organization, with more than 300 products sold in 200 countries, and 100,000 dealer employees. Cat U was established in 2001, focusing on common learning needs, culture, and knowledge sharing. Four key objectives were put into effect as part of the strategy for marketing Cat U:

1. Communicating the importance of continual learning
2. Partnering with the learning community for alignment
3. Transcending 25 autonomous business units
4. Operating Cat U as a business

Leaders of the project understood that marketing encompassed a range of activities that went well beyond creating a nice logo and putting up a useful web portal. In reality, a successful program would need to focus on the primary goal of convincing business leaders that the corporate university could help them reach their business goals. Furthermore, this was understood to be a critical, ongoing objective that had to be the focus of every interaction between business leaders and CU; regardless of the level of support pledged by senior executives.

The marketing and communications strategy focused on the following:

• Communicate the importance of continual learning and the value offered by Cat U
• Partner with the learning community for alignment of goals, quality content, and shared cost reduction

Another major objective of the internal marketing activity was to ensure that employees had a positive impression of the program. If these programs were to succeed, the team would need to be able to track progress against an accurate baseline assessment. The project team employed various methods to communicate the value of Cat U to employees, stakeholders, suppliers, and customers, in addition to various strategies for maintaining the awareness of Cat U and the role technology plays in marketing services and products.

The ultimate outcome was the development of a unique brand identity, and metrics that demonstrate the impact of the marketing efforts:

• 73% said Cat LMS provides easy registration
• 54% begin with Cat LMS as starting point in Cat U
• From 10,000 CLMS users in 2002 to over 50,000 in 2006