Now Is the Perfect Time to Rethink Your LearnTech – Technologies That You Should Focus On

By now, you have probably returned to the office or taken on a new remote or hybrid work style. Companies have weathered the pandemic to its near end and are restructuring how they do business and work with employees. It’s a new beginning in many workplaces. Leaders have the opportunity to implement new cultures, learning, and overall workplace initiatives for the betterment of the company and its employees.

Most companies limit training to mandatory courses or new-employee onboarding. While those are certainly necessary learning initiatives, it’s time for a new standard. Companies need to offer—in addition to strong onboarding initiatives—courses that allow employees to upskill, explore new learning opportunities, and work toward new certifications.

Many studies were conducted during the pandemic and shortly after to help companies understand the needs of employees. McKinsey reported that HR managers must focus on hiring, developing, and retaining employees. However, another McKinsey study showed that many employees are leaving their jobs because they don’t feel valued or have a sense of belonging.

This is a unique moment and opportunity for companies to reinvest (or invest for the first time) in training and delivery for the sake of their company’s overall success. Consider this a fresh start for you and your employees.

Here are three training and development strategies companies should apply in 2021 and beyond:

Develop ongoing employee training programs

Companies will get the most benefit out of this unique moment in history if they take time to pause and reconsider the habits they’ve maintained, and whether or not they serve employees well. As mentioned before, most companies provide initial training or onboarding programs but do not extend learning beyond those critical moments. It is time for companies to change this habit and craft more intentional training programs.

The best way for companies to engage employees and facilitate learning is to offer ongoing employee training programs. These programs go beyond typical employee onboarding initiatives and, instead, add value to the employee’s experience by providing relevant and interesting learning content.

Continuous education will look different for each employee, and companies can use artificial intelligence to govern this initiative so each employee gets a customized experience. The ExpertusONE enterprise LMS platform makes personalization accessible for any company—large or small—by applying AI in corporate training. Every corporate learner, from customers to employees, will have typical learning assignments like onboarding or required training certifications. The algorithm can understand each employee’s unique interests, taking into account their job title, the courses they’ve completed and ones they have yet to discover, their interests, and the courses their competitors have taken. The platform then automatically recommends these personalized course selections to promote engagement and serve the learner with new content that will upskill and enhance their current skill set.

Related post: 5 Employee Training Trends and Why Companies Should Focus on Engagement and Collaboration

Use employee training to streamline communication and prevent context-switching

Now is the perfect time to teach employees the best ways to communicate with their team members. As companies return to the office or stick with remote work for the long haul, communication may become a challenge. During the pandemic, and especially while most companies were working remotely, communication looked like a constant set of notifications from email, chat channels, video conferences, project management software, and even employees’ cell phones. Studies have shown that context switching—when an employee has to switch between platforms and digital contexts just to complete a single task—has a negative impact on productivity.

This is the perfect time to streamline communication and help employees understand how they can manage a seemingly endless stream of notifications. Consider making it a course within your employee onboarding or return-to-work training initiatives.

Even further, you can help employees avoid context-switching by providing integrative digital tools. ExpertusONE’s LMS platform works with apps like Salesforce, Slack, and Microsoft Teams to provide training courses within the apps that employees are already using throughout their days. In this way, employees can learn on their own time in a context that they are familiar with—instead of having to switch from platform to platform to complete the training task. The ExpertusONE learning management system also helps reduce context switching with its integrated content player that makes it possible for learners to view videos, quizzes, polls, and even video conferencing all within the platform. Legacy LMS platforms require countless pop-ups and external links or documents, crowding the learner’s digital workspace and making information feel disjointed and inaccessible.

Companies should invest in digital tools that streamline the employee experience so they can focus on completing the tasks they need to in a focused environment that can work with their unique needs.

Optimize employee training and create a culture of constant learning 

Companies should create a culture of constant learning and artificial intelligence makes this an easy lift even for overloaded HR departments. While revamping your corporate training strategy, consider adding a variety of courses—from certifications to communication tips and even mental or physical health courses—so that learners can pick and choose from a wider set. This gives employees another chance to engage with the company culture and extend their learning so that they can grow in their careers.

Employees don’t need more pressure at work, but they do need companies that will support them long-term. As companies build new and revitalized training initiatives, it’s important to create a structure that allows employees to learn on their own time. Instead of outdated training of old (and we mean large-group lessons in a fluorescently lit room), companies should give employees the freedom to learn in the way that suits their lifestyles. With the ExpertusONE LMS platform, employees can keep up with training while waiting for their kids at soccer practice, or listen in to a session while on a plane, subway, or riding in the backseat of an Uber. The mobile capacity of the LMS platform empowers employees to stay engaged at work while leaving room for them to train on their own time.

Related Post: The Future Of Corporate Learning Rests On This Type Of Tool: App-Based LMS

Companies can also cultivate an environment of constant learning by making training collaborative. Employees can interact with colleagues within the ExpertusONE learning management system through video conferencing. Even further, the platform offers the opportunity for LMS gamification, to foster healthy competition among employees.

We’re rethinking how we do business as we look toward a post-pandemic era. Why wouldn’t we also take this opportunity to rethink how we understand corporate training and development? Work has changed and learning must change too. Now is the time for HR managers and corporate leaders to give employee training a higher goal. It’s more than a method for onboarding or fixing company-wide problems. Employee training can impact company culture, employees’ success, and the overall health of the business.

Invest in engaging, personalized, and thoughtful training so that employees can upskill, extend their learning, and stay motivated in their jobs. This is a critical moment in the employee experience and companies should invest in their teams and create positive work environments that support their staff in their learning goals. Strategic training initiatives are the best place to begin cultivating a company culture of learning.