Vitaco Accelerating New Hire Readiness and Linking Learning with Performance

A developer, manufacturer, and marketer of world-class nutrition products, Vitaco Health Ltd. has seen tremendous value in investing in both people and talent management tools. In 2010, the company implemented Cornerstone’s small & medium business solution, PiiQ (formerly Growth Edition) to automate performance reviews. As the company grew, its performance and learning needs became more complex. By 2017, Vitaco’s rapid growth and need for skills training meant the company was ready to graduate from the simple "out of the box" solution. According to Leeza Law, H&S Specialist/L&D Advisor at Vitaco, “We knew we needed more capabilities. We wanted to establish a succession planning program. And we wanted to better link our development planning to performance.”

A full-fledged talent management platform, Cornerstone isn’t just for large companies; it’s also the ideal platform for small businesses who are growing and in need of a more robust, configurable, and customizable solution. “Cornerstone would give us more capabilities as we grew, including development and succession planning,” said Leeza Law, H&S Specialist/L&D Advisor at Vitaco. “It would enable us to standardize our approach to induction and onboarding.” Ensuring all talent management tools were in one place was also a priority. “Today, we have Cornerstone Performance and Cornerstone Learning. We’re working on Cornerstone Succession,” said Law.

Vitaco employees don’t need permission to access more than 1,500 online courses, ranging from health & wellness and business skills to office productivity. “Across the board, we want to retain people,” said Law. “It’s crucial that we develop them and give them the opportunity to grow with the business, even if the courses they’re interested in don’t relate directly to their current position within Vitaco.”

Vitaco has a broad range of employee roles, from management, sales, marketing, and finance to factory and warehouse teams—and everyone is using Cornerstone. “Employees use it for required curriculum like compliance training, but they’re also searching for career development courses and doing a lot of self-directed learning,” said Law.

Law and her team created a special “onboarding suite” for areas within the business. “We created different modules for learning and set them up to dynamically assign within the system. Every time I load a new hire into the system, they’re automatically assigned the right modules.”

Having an effective, structured onboarding program increases retention. “We use Cornerstone to help new employees understand what’s expected of them, how they fit into the bigger picture at Vitaco,” said Law. “We’re very values-driven, so the ability to induct new hires into those values before they come on board has had a huge impact. When they come to work, they already understand who we are as a business.”

Gained confidence in meeting compliance regulations.

As a manufacturer and distributor of health and nutrition products, Vitaco must comply with numerous compliance regulations. Law has the ability to run reports and easily follow-up with any stragglers. “Compliance is really important for us, especially from a health and safety perspective,” said Law. “One of the biggest benefits to having Cornerstone is we can finally say ‘yes’ with confidence to any compliance questions. We know—and can show—that all of our team members have taken compliance training and that they understand all the policies and procedures around health and safety and fair treatment.”

By using Cornerstone Performance and Cornerstone Learning in tandem, Vitaco can tie development planning to performance reviews—and vice versa. “Good performance starts with good development planning,” said Law. “From our perspective, linking learning and performance gives our employees the option to improve and work through the next steps. Employees are automatically prompted to complete their development planning when they’re doing their reviews. They understand what their goals are and what it is that they want to do next in their careers.”

By automating performance reviews, Vitaco has more time to think more strategically about HR initiatives. “With Cornerstone Performance, it’s easy to track review completion, run reports, and follow up with anyone who has not completed particular tasks,” said Law.