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By Super User | June, 07 2020
Thanks to the digital economy, it is now much less commonplace for a company’s employees to share a common workplace. 63 percent of organizations have remote employees, according to Upwork’s Future Workforce Report, and only 9 percent of managers believe it’s better for all personnel to be physically present in the same office.
Distant co-location of facilities provides many advantages in terms of costs, efficiencies and data security. However, when it comes to employee training, distance brings many disadvantages. Classroom-based training is expense and impractical, especially in multiple locations. E-learning technologies make it much easier to train a dispersed workforce. Unfortunately, just because it’s easy doesn’t make elearning automatically effective.
To ensure your company and your employees get the most out of your online learning and development program, here are five considerations and best practices for bridging skills gaps even across geographic gaps.
Quality elearning is not as simple as posting a series of videos on a shared drive. Not everyone can absorb knowledge or skills just from watching videos. Although convenient, self-paced videos often lack the power to keep viewers engaged. Plus, studies have shown that different people learn differently. These differences can be especially profound across diverse cultures, generations and languages.
Some people learn best from live instruction. A great alternative to on-site or off-site classroom training is to stream a live virtual classroom (LVC). Other types of learners gain the most from social interaction, such as an online forum.
Just as different people demand different learning mediums, so too do different skills. “Usually the most effective way for us to learn is based not on our individual preferences but on the nature of the material we’re being taught,” says Christian Jarrett in Wired magazine.
The best approach for addressing these differences is to administer training through a blended learning methodology. Blended learning enables variety and flexibility, optimizing training over any distance. Employees can train in the manner, at the pace (and place) that suit them best.
Solution: Before distributing your translated learning materials, run them past a native speaker of the language you’re intending them for.
Solution: Again, before publishing your training program to another country, have someone from that country or culture examine your content, specifically to spot any nonverbal or cultural gaffes.
Another way to improve your training program’s cultural sensitivity, as well as learner engagement, is to deliver it using a blended learning pedagogy that includes a virtual classroom option led by a locally-hired instructor in each training country.
Elearning eliminates the need to wait until you have enough employees together to make classroom training cost-effective. Whether local or remote, employees can start training as soon as they’re hired or when they or their managers desire them to learn a new skill.
“Chunking” educational content into smaller units not only improves comprehension and retention, it helps prevent technology or bandwidth issues that employees in some remote locations may face. Plus, it enables “just-in-time” learning—to solve sudden problems or accomplish ad hoc projects that demand a specific area of knowledge.
A learning management system (LMS) or similar dashboard through which training could be administered and monitored by local and headquarters management alike. To be effective, an e-learning solution cannot simply be a static library for employees to visit.
Except for the few, purely self-motivated learners, employee training requires continuous oversight in order to ensure completion. An LMS enables managers to check in on each employee’s progress, regardless of location, and offer assistance and motivation.
Using gamification elements, such as a leaderboard that graphically displays employee or team progress and quiz results, can also help motivate learners through competitiveness and pride. Besides the obvious outcomes of completion and certifications, you should also measure your training results through surveys or even informal manager/learner discussions, both during and after the training. Use these results to learn from your learning program and demonstrate the ROI of your L&D.
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