When it comes to closing skills gaps and making the most of emerging technologies, ensuring your employees have access to robust training options is a must. Work-based learning empowers workers to keep pace with fast-changing environments and embrace new tech that can make them more productive and efficient. Plus, it benefits employers as well, as it can give you pathways for accessing critical skills quickly.
However, training is only effective when it meets the needs of employees and the company. A less-than-ideal learning and development (L&D) program could mean workers are stuck focusing on courses that aren’t particularly relevant or aren’t suitably engaging. Additionally, if the training is challenging to access or hard to navigate, many of your team members might opt not to use it or struggle to complete basic tasks in the system.
Luckily, there are things you can do to make sure you are offering the training your employees need to excel. Here’s how to get started.
Create a Tailored Training Experience
Not all of your employees have the same needs from a knowledge perspective. Roles and departments often have unique workloads that require different understandings. As a result, by creating an L&D program that can adapt to each job, you can ensure the courses each worker sees are relevant to them personally.
Essentially, you want to avoid a one-size-fits-all approach to training. Make sure each employee can access the kind of content they require while eliminating topics that don’t align with their duties. This ensures their efforts are focused in the best direction possible and that no one has to waste time on courses that won’t help them excel.
Make Your L&D Program Convenient
There are a variety of approaches that can make training easier to fit into even the busiest days. Instead of offering hour-long classes, break bigger topics down into bite-size chunks, and deliver each piece as a micro-learning module. Often, when information is given in small bites, it’s easier to digest and retain, making it more useful. Plus, since each course is shorter, your team can jump in and out with greater ease, allowing them to squeeze learning in without having to block out significant chunks of time on their calendars.
Additionally, provide e-learning over classroom-based approaches when possible, ensuring employees can take part at times that work for them. Similarly, offer mobile-friendly learning so your workers can access courses on their smartphones, empowering them to train from nearly anywhere.
Don’t Discount the Importance of Engagement
Most people would agree reading through pages upon pages of text isn’t the most exciting way to learn. Since this approach can be mentally taxing and even tedious, it doesn’t always promote knowledge retention.
In order to boost engagement, use a variety of approaches. Combine text with images, audio, or video. Make certain elements interactive to get employees involved. By mixing it up, you’ll hold your workers’ attention, increasing the odds they will take in and retain any new knowledge that is presented.
By following the tips above, you can offer the training your employees need in the best way possible. If you’d like to learn more about effective L&D initiatives, the team at TempStaff can help. Contact us to speak with one of our skilled staff members today and see how our workplace training expertise can benefit you.
