Controlling the Narrative: Inside Comcast’s Learning Council with Martha Soehren

Reshaping Learning and Development in a Fortune 10 company is a daunting task. For Martha Soehren, establishing sound governance structures and exceptional business partners were critical, and ultimately the secrets to success. 

In a recent podcast episode, Martha took me inside the L&D function at Comcast, a global broadband, media, and wireless services company with more than 110,000 employees. Martha explained how she was able to create alignment between more than 800 L&D staff and key stakeholders, and get consistent, reliable executive buy-in on new projects. 

She also explained how data, storytelling, and a focus on succession planning helped elevate the function’s credibility across the organization. And told some wonderful stories to illustrate. 

This episode is essential listening for L&D leaders ready to lead with influence and impact.

Listen to the full episode, or keep reading for some of the highlights from our conversation. 

Inheriting a messy Learning operation

Most new L&D leaders come into a role and immediately find challenges or areas ripe for improvement. For Martha, at a company as large as Comcast, the key issue was a lack of cohesion, even between Learning departments. 

“When I first started, it was a mess. There wasn’t alignment, and there wasn’t executive signoff. Content had lots of quality issues.”

“There were more than 30 new hire courses across the organization. These were six to eight weeks long, and none of them were alike. So how could we develop agents to give a consistent customer experience if they weren’t getting a consistent learning experience?”

“A very specific example: There are only three ways to navigate a utility pole when you’re climbing up it. Only three that are technically safe. But there were 11 different ways taught to do so.”

Martha quickly decided that the only way forward was to unify the disparate Learning organizations within Comcast. Even with a wide range of products and business units, it wasn’t working to have things as spread out and independent as they were. 

Centralizing the L&D function

In 2010, Martha’s team went through the hard work of bringing Learning and Development under a central umbrella. Centralizing the function was a huge decision, and required approval from above. Martha set about building a business case. 

“I spoke to companies of a similar size, with similar functioning employees. I reviewed industry reports. And I built a story not just from inside Comcast, but from colleagues across industries. It didn’t look like it was just my opinion. It was built on the successes and opinions of others. And it worked.”

With some smart storytelling, the business case made the need for change very clear. “Before we centralized, I had about 39 of the 800 L&D professionals reporting to me. But I couldn’t really manage their work and their impact this way. And there were 79 different reporting relationships for Learning and Development people—into Finance, into Care, into HR, and all sorts of different organizations. All of them were doing their own thing.”

Armed with industry benchmarks and a clear picture of the limitations of the existing setup, Martha convinced leadership that a reorganization was needed and overdue. 

Inside Comcast’s Executive Learning Council

Such a fundamental restructure required active engagement from senior leadership—a struggle for all too many L&D teams. 

To achieve this, Martha built “a governance model where we had the 10 most senior executive leaders sit on a learning council with us. The CEO of Comcast Cable and I co-chaired it. That shows the level of executive emphasis put on the council.”

The goal was “to help drive strategic direction and ensure we were in alignment with the big bets for the calendar year. At our meetings, we would always share one of our business impact stories. We could show that we had ROI on some type of business pain point, or some learning solution, or a talent project we were working on. They loved it.”

This is a formalized, repeatable way to ensure leadership buy-in and prove the value of your L&D function. And it put Martha’s work at the center of the story. “You’re preparing these executives to stand up for you when you’re not at the table. “You can never over-communicate to senior executives. The more times—and the more different ways—you tell them things, the greater the buy-in will be.”

Handling difficult feedback from senior stakeholders 

Of course, not every Council meeting went to plan. “They would also give honest feedback, and it wasn’t always good news. We were working with our senior business partner to build a product portal which had training content around all of Comcast’s products and services. We were so proud of that portal, and we debuted it at one of the Learning Council meetings. 

“Our business partner was there in the room, and there was a visceral reaction to what we presented. ‘This isn’t right. This has to be redone.’ We never blamed that business partner. We simply regrouped, redesigned, and the second run of the portal was a big hit.” 

This kind of response can become a major setback if you’re not used to spending time with executive leaders. But part of the beauty of a regular, structured governance model, is that one project doesn’t make or break the function. And the output is usually better thanks to the feedback and stress testing you receive. 

“L&D professionals aren’t business experts. These executives know a heck of a lot more about the business than we do. So we have to learn from the leaders we’re serving.”

How ROI comes from business alignment

We know that connecting learning outcomes to business success is critical. Both to prove L&D’s value, but also to deliver more relevant, meaningful training. But if you don’t have a learning council or dedicated operations support, how can you ensure you’re aligned on the right success metrics and goals?

“Before you start building the content,” says Martha, “ask your business partner ‘what do you want your agents to do differently after they consume this training?’ And ‘what are the metrics that would tell you that they’re performing their job in a better way?’ 

“Get that understanding and agreement up front. If you try to get it later, it’s very difficult.”

Martha illustrates the tangible value of proper alignment with this story from Comcast: 

“The most senior business partner in technical operations had a pain point. They were having to send trucks back to customers’ homes much more often than in the past. Something wasn’t right. 

“We went in, studied, and discovered. And we built a learning solution that included the technicians, but also the supervisors. We rolled it out to the trial team, and we had over 700% ROI. Then the business leader chose to roll it out for all of their technicians, and build the savings into their budgets. This was millions of dollars.”

It’s hard to imagine a more direct measure of learning ROI than millions of dollars saved in a team’s budget. “It was because we designed it with a business partner. We knew what needed to be changed, and how they were measuring and could help us measure at the end. 

“Alignment can bring really great value to the business.” 

About Martha Soehren

Martha Soehren is the former Chief Talent Development Officer and SVP at Comcast Cable, where she led enterprise-wide learning and talent initiatives for nearly 15 years. With a PhD in Educational Leadership and a background that spans 25 years in the U.S. Army, Martha brought deep expertise in instructional design, workforce planning, and organizational effectiveness to her corporate roles.

She has served on numerous boards, including ATD, the Wharton/UPenn Doctorate of Learning Advisory Board, and SCTE, and is a recognized industry leader—named one of CableFax’s Most Powerful Women in Cable and a recipient of the WICT Liberty Award. Martha continues to contribute to the field through thought leadership, mentoring, and active participation in the Elliott Masie Learning Consortium.