In today’s highly competitive and fast-paced business landscape, business leaders or employers have been forced to align organizational resources towards corporate training that will help them succeed. Many companies consider corporate training to be vital and highly beneficial in terms of providing their staff with the skills required to drive business growth and revenue. Not only does it help the employers equip their staff with the knowledge and confidence to perform their jobs quickly, efficiently, and accurately, but it also keeps them motivated within their respective roles.
Moreover, it illustrates the value they place on employees. A recent report cites that companies providing comprehensive training generate 218% higher income per employee than companies that don’t deliver corporate training opportunities. In addition to that, the cost of replacing an employee can be 150% or more of the worker’s annual salary. This means that time and money invested in corporate training are truly worthwhile. Sounds impressive, right? Let’s take a closer look at 6 ways to ensure your corporate training is effective.
#1: Make training adapt to your employees, not the other way around.
Unfortunately, most companies opt for the generic and one-size-fits-all programs used in corporate training. However, they are not adaptable to employees’ specific needs or talents. Moreover, this type of training doesn’t allow your staff to achieve their potential or help them advance faster in their careers. That’s why adaptability and flexibility in corporate training are a must.
Only by making training adaptable and flexible to the needs of your staff can you bridge the gap between skills and capabilities. Not only can employees learn at their own speed and bypass areas where they already have competent expertise, but they can also focus on advancing or strengthening their existing knowledge. It’s the most effective way to support your staff's growth and professional development.
#2: Embrace microlearning by dividing learning content into small, bite-sized pieces.
Microlearning, being the future of corporate training, packages valuable information in short nuggets of digitally obtained media (text, video, etc.) and helps actively engage the employee within a short amount of time.
According to recent research, up to 80% of training experts confirm that microlearning is the preferred learning approach for their learners. Providing bite-sized lessons or learning modules enhances the retention levels of employees and ensures better transfer of acquired knowledge to the workspace. Moreover, it simplifies the process of retaining, remembering, and applying knowledge and skills at work. With that in mind, you can avoid long, old-fashioned corporate training courses and focus on learning activities that consist of bite-sized pieces of information aimed at specific outcomes and employee needs.
#3: Motivate instead of reprimand (& make it enjoyable)
It’s no secret that keeping employees motivated fuels their desire to gain new knowledge and participate in training activities. Moreover, it leads to the positive growth of the company. However, you must avoid reprimanding them if they have no interest in gaining new knowledge through corporate training. Instead of reprimanding them, you need to understand why they feel demotivated.
A recent survey shows that over 80% of employees who receive training with incorporated gaming elements feel motivated and engaged while over 60% who receive training without gaming mechanics feel bored and unproductive. This means that you should make corporate training enjoyable and more dynamic to push your workforce to embrace learning.
The gamification elements such as points, badges, levels, and leaderboards can be used to trigger employees’ emotions, creating friendly competition amongst workers and teams and boosting employees’ motivation levels. In addition to that, you can implement a digital coach that creates a more personal learning experience and provides your staff with point-of-need training. Not only does it support real-time interactions, but it also keeps the employees up-to-date with relevant content, pushes learning content (training videos, podcasts, e-books, etc.) at the right time, gives learners advice, and boosts motivation. If implemented properly, gamification engages employees and drives their motivation towards learning and development.
#4: Change the mindset.
Technological advances, industry changes, and competitive maneuvers require quick shifts in business processes and procedures, staff transformations, etc. Having that in mind, companies have to adapt quickly to survive.
#5: Make it easy, empower your employees to train and reference information anytime, anywhere.
Learning in your own time is key to empowering your employees to access easily digestible content anytime, anywhere. Not only does it remove the time pressure that exists during a live class or training, but it also allows employees to create their own learning schedules. Moreover, this allows the employees to set their own pace and cater to their own learning styles. Only by providing multi-tiered and on-demand, digital corporate training can you address the need for upskilling your staff in a time-crunched world and align with the needs of today’s employees.
#6: Approach it like a journey, not an event. The destination is sustainment (and ROI!).
Without regular improvement, your staff sits stagnant while the competition moves forward. A recent study found out that employees who exhibit a combination of vitality and learning achieve over 16% better overall performance and report 125% less burnout than their colleagues. With that in mind, delivering corporate training at work can open up ample opportunities for your staff.
However, to make it effective, you need to present training opportunities that don’t just stop after the initial training program completion. Once an employee has completed a particular program, it’s critical to create an environment that enables each employee to assimilate the learning and quickly apply the new information, skills, or knowledge learned in training back on the job through reiterative and refresher training programs.
This approach can help employees retain the skills developed through the training program and facilitate the sustainment of a certain topic by keeping important knowledge, competencies, and skills fresh in employees’ minds. By providing supplemental training to your employees, you can reduce the impact of the forgetting curve and harness the power of sustainment and profitability.
Bottom line: Ready to reap the rewards of effective corporate training?
In today’s business environment, business leaders or employers need to continually sharpen staff skills and adapt to the ever-changing dynamics of the workplace. Only by incorporating effective corporate training can you drive growth and remain competitive. Not only should you provide training opportunities for your staff to learn new professional skills or new approaches, but you need to create a culture that motivates employees to take the initiative to develop new skills at their own speed. In addition to that, it provides a host of benefits for your company, including:
Increased efficiency and sustainment
Greater motivation and a growth mindset
More cohesive company culture
Decreased turnovers and lowered levels of burnouts