As you well know, an usual day of an employee looks like that: you go to the office, you start doing the things on your to do list, and then the unplanned comes into place: new tasks appear out of nowhere, you cannot perform your usual tasks due to the fact that you depend on other members of the team, technical issues appear. And what if you have to attend an online training too? That’s not a very happy turn of events, right?
But there are other specialists in the company who really want the training to be effective. So how do you make anyone happy? Well, you find a way to turn from a mandatory task into something that’s really helpful for the employee.
Make this clear from the beginning: the training program is meant to be an asset for the employee, not a burden. And in order for this to happen, tre trainer should know what is important for the employee when it comes to gaining knowledge. Let’s see a few examples of questions that can get you there.
Give the learners a chance to see that their professional goals and the right training programs come hand in hand. You gain the knowledge that you need to acquire skills that will further help you achieve your professional goals. Upskilling, reskilling, filling some knowledge gaps, all of these can be accomplished with the right learning process and can increase the employee engagement rates. And once the employees get a feeling of it, you’ll see increases in the employee engagement rates.
Is it the trainer’s teaching style? Is it your own learning style that should be taken into consideration when preparing the learning resources? Is the media format of the course? The trainer should know what the learners like when it comes to a training session, this makes things easier both for the trainer and the employees. From what we’ve experienced, people learn easier if the information is well-structured in short pieces, so microlearning is a great method in this sense.
As we’ve already said, virtual is the new reality, so this is not a matter of choice. But the way in which we use it can be adapted based on needs and preferences. So, ask the learners what they dislike most when it comes to online training. Maybe they miss the social interaction, maybe they are fed up with the traditional powerpoint presentations, maybe it is the inability to ask questions when they feel too.
All of these lead to a lack of engagement, but the good news is that technology has evolved and there are online platforms that find solutions for challenges like this. What you have to do is just to be aware of them, so that you know what needs to be addressed when planning a virtual training.
People want to find purpose in the activities they perform and employee engagement is impossible in the absence of it. Starting from specific needs, not from universal requirements lead you into that direction. For example, let’s say that you organise a Business Analysis course. This is a vast field that can be seen from different angles, so you should ask, for example, what’s the biggest challenge they have encountered while doing their BA job. What’s their challenge. You, as a trainer in this field, have a broader perspective on this, so you can come up with a fresh perspective that might give them a new direction for finding solutions.
Some (final) thoughts
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