Employees are an integral part of any organization. And employees are always on a look for an opportunity to grow. If an organization is able to provide them with that, they are more likely to stick with the organization for a long time. But,
How exactly can you provide opportunities to grow?
To grow in any area people need to put in effort. In the same way, to help employees grow in their career, they need to be trained.
E-learning training method has become an increasingly popular way for companies to train their employees, as it offers many benefits over traditional in-person training.
Employers can ensure employee loyalty and retention by doubling down on corporate training. Traditionally, corporate training was instructor focused. But with technologies being introduced in the corporate area, especially after the pandemic, companies are working with various e-learning partners to create customized training modules for their employees.
What is e-learning?
People have a complicated understanding of “e-learning”. Like, it is a complex learning module delivered via different LMS platforms, it is all about technology.
But it is not the case. E-learning is about imparting learning via the internet. Technology just plays the part of delivering the learning.
E-learning can be as simple as e-books, discussion forums, podcasts, or as complex as online courses circulated via a LMS.
E-learning simply refers to delivering formalized learning content with the help of electronic devices like computers, smartphones, which is more engaging than traditional classroom teaching as we remember and relate more to what is being shown rather than what we heard.
Benefits Of E-learning Training Method
Customizable: At learn infinity, we identify what is the actual problem, the pain point, and offer learning solutions that will tackle your problem in the best way possible.
Everyone has different learning goals and techniques. With e-learning, everyone can focus on what they actually want to learn out of the entire content. The learning solution is personalized and customized as per your company needs, culture and the problems you want to mitigate.
Flexibility: Unlike traditional lecture based learning, where everyone had to be taught in the same way and speed, e-learning helps the learners to choose their own path and navigate the learning contents at their own pace. As it is a learners focused way of teaching, learners can choose what they want to learn first, which contents they need to repeat or how much time they want to devote to individual topics.
Knowledge retention: With e-learning, learners can visit a topic as many times as they need without any issue.
Even without going through a topic multiple times, by crafting the learning content in the best way, you can help in knowledge retention.
How To Craft The Learning Content For Better Retention
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- Break down the content into bite- sized pieces easy to consume in one sitting. Though we may not have concrete proof about the current attention span of human beings, we all can agree that it is decreasing day by day. So, with decreasing attention span among humans, individual learning content cannot be an hour long or more.
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- Use videos, pictures and other interactive elements to explain the content better. Humans, in general, prefer watching videos rather than reading the same story. Videos are more enriching then texts, and when the contents are interactive and engaging, it obviously helps with knowledge retention.
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- Use gamification while developing e-learning courses. Gamification is the new buzz word in the learning industry, it increases engagement which ultimately leads to retention. It simply means adding gamified elements. You can try introducing quizzes in different parts of courses with a leadership board.
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- Storytelling: It simply refers to explaining certain concepts with the help of engaging stories. Stories arouse listener’s emotions, and help them to connect better. And when people are so interested in what is being told, it will in turn help in knowledge retention
Quantifiable: With traditional teaching methods, we don’t have many options to understand how much the learners actually learn from the session. How much information they retained but with e-learning methods there are many options.
You can use quiz, tests at different points of learning. But if you use LMS to deliver your learning content, you can evaluate how many learners participated in the session, how is their learning progress, how much content have they completed, which topic needed more takes to be understood.
How To Make Elearning Effective?
E learning is a powerful tool to disseminate knowledge to a large number of people in less time without any biases. It can be used to train the entire organization at once in return increasing the organizational effectiveness.
How to do it right!!!
We have got your back. Try out these suggestions to improve e-learning for your organization.
Keep it organized. Use a clear and logical structure for the training, and make it easy for employees to find the information they need. Though there can be a number of modules or chapters, arrange it in a way that one chapter follows another and employees can understand the layout properly.
Provide support and resources. Make sure employees have access to resources and support to help them complete the training and understand the material.
If employees require any additional resources, it can be booklets, manuals, or access to certain websites or software, it should be provided beforehand so employees don’t face any issue while taking up the training.
Use a variety of formats. Making e learning interactive is a must but not a difficult task if you mix up the format of the training, such as using video, text, and audio.
Using one type of format can make the training content dull, and monotonous. Try mixing up the formats in a way such that the information is understood in the best way possible.
Tip: Don’t overdo anything. In the process of making the e-learning interactive, using different formats unnecessarily can make it chaotic and unfathomable.
Make it accessible. Make sure the training is accessible to employees with disabilities, and that it can be accessed on a variety of devices.
Your learning group might not be of the same age or use the same type of softwares or devices, so before while the training public to your employees try accessing the course on different devices.
For example: If your learning groups consist of field workers, they might sometimes access the content on their mobile phones as well along with computers. So, the training needs to be both desktop and android friendly.
Or if you are arranging a company-wide training session, you might need to check if it is both android and iOs friendly.
Track progress and provide feedback. Use a tracking system to monitor employee progress and provide feedback on their performance.
Using a LMS to provide training can be useful to obtain data on your participants’ learning activities. LMS software’s has features to evaluate how many learners have participated in the training, what is their progress, how much training content they have completed and so on.
This can also help you identify further training needs for your employees.
For in depth understanding on training needs analysis read our blog on How to conduct training needs assessment (with free template)
Make it relevant. Tailor the training to the specific needs of your employees and their job roles.
Every employee’s needs are not the same, nor are their learning goals and techniques. With e-learning, everyone can focus on what they actually want to learn out of the entire content. They don’t need to waste their time on what they already know.
Also, with elearning employees can learn at their own pace, easily repeat any content if they need, which also values other learners’ time.
Follow-up and reinforcement. Regularly follow-up with employees to reinforce what they have learned and to ensure that they are putting their new skills into practice.
Just providing learning opportunities is not enough, even if the contents are relevant to the employees it is useless if they can’t put them in use. Use quizzes or other evaluation techniques to understand employees progress and provide them with opportunities where they can put those knowledge and skills in use.
Implementing these tips can help ensure that your e-learning training is effective and engaging for your employees. With the right approach, e-learning can be a great way to train your employees and improve their skills and knowledge.
