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Employee Training Software – the 5 Main Things you Need to Know

Employee Training Software – the 5 Main Things you Need to Know

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While many enterprises sometimes treat trainers and training as a necessary evil, cutting budgets and training times, training is at the core of corporate success. Training tells employees what behaviors and habits they should form at work and the knowledge they should use while at work.  Companies and managers conduct training in attempt to improve employee performance, direct them to their future roles and inform them of their duties.

The process of training is very significant, and applies to almost every process throughout the employee’s lifecycle – from the early stages of pre-employment, onto onboarding and acquiring new skills, knowledge retention and finally career development and personal progress & growth.

Employee Training Software – from mobile-only to old-fashioned LMS – is transforming how employees are trained and brining in the next generation in learning, from micro-learning to social learning and more.

Let’s take a look at the core factors affecting employee training software today:

1. The new age of employee training

When we discuss training nowadays, we hardly talk about the boring old-fashioned ways of reading endless guide manuals, listening to long lectures and taking stressful exams. Those times are over.
More and more companies are abandoning traditional ways and moving towards an online elearning approach, encouraging more interactive ways to infuse employees with knowledge and proficiency. The use of software for elearning is becoming prevalent and turning education and learning process into a continuous engaging journey that aims to enhance performance and reach organizational goals.

2. Personalized training

Modern corporate learners have come to expected consumer-grade learning – and not the corporate looking training materials. As consumers, employees expect sleek, mobile first engagement, and new employee training software is going after this goal. After being exposed to modern learning environments on their phones, they don’t have the patience for old fashioned courses. What’s more, they want to know learning is adaptive to their needs (like duolingo, for instance) and personalized. Learning has the best results when served in context, and that’s why personalized learning that matters to the employee’s job performance is important.

Every learner likes to feel like as he is the hero of his game, even if he is going through training alongside other peers. Personalizing the training process can mean allowing employees to choose their own goals, activities and evaluations. It can also mean applying learning paths that apply by learner segment, depending on their knowledge, job and more. Autonomy in such choices ensures engagement.

With personalized learning, employees will be more willing to learn at their own pace. When learning software is adaptive, it can recognize the learner’s strengths and weaknesses, and give extra attention to the fields that should be improved. The employee’s score and performance in a specific course, will direct him or her to additional reading or supplemental activities. Every member of staff gets the practice tasks that are relevant and necessary for his own job duties, and builds skills accordingly.

Every employee has different goals, needs, areas of expertise and areas that needs improvement. A proper use of training enterprise lets us adjust goals, objectives and learning materials according to each employee’s best recommended path.

3. Microlearning

The idea of microlearning is breaking down learning material into small bite-sized pieces, and delivering them to users in forms of activities they can access to wherever and whenever they want. It gives a sense of control and autonomy to the learners and contributes to a sense of autonomy and control.

For learners, microlearning is quick and convenient, simple and prevents cognitive overload. For the learning and development professional, microlearning is served in daily or weekly several minutes’ worth of engagement. The small bite-sized activities come in the form of tutorials or tasks that can be completed in five minutes, like short simulations and quizzes. They can be incorporated when it suits the employee’s schedule, or when he needs the information or knowledge in real time, for example when having to complete a certain job or assist a customer.

Microlearning is a great form of on the job training, and it can be triggered according to certain performance related metrics, indicating that the employee is in need of training.

4. Using real world situations

Training software and enterprises provides us with the ability to mimic real world situations and train employees in coping with the daily challenges that they are about to encounter with in their jobs. What it actually gives, is the chance to be prepared for almost every scenario and situation, and learn how to deal with it before experiencing it in real life and perhaps making mistakes that might be costly.
Introducing employees into a real world environment gives them confidence, replicates the workplace pressure and trains them to work under that stress. Also, it gives them a chance to make mistakes in a safe zone, familiarize them the upcoming challenges and creates a far more profound understanding of their job practices, not just in theory, but hands on. This also increases employee satisfaction, as they become more confident in their ability to perform their jobs. Simulations are a great way to accomplish this.
Real world situations can be reflected as part of on-the-job training in branched simulations and more – make sure to check what authoring capabilities are available within your solution.

5. Gamification Tools

Gamification and elearning work well together. Gamification prompts the daily or weekly engagement managers need with microlearning. It also measures results and provides the social interaction, recognition and proof employees need.
Using game narratives and interactive push learning that drives learning completion can have a significant impact on job mastery. First, gamification drives completion, then ties it into performance, giving employees and their managers a view on competence and performance. Fun elements as well as social elements drive motivation further.

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