Supercharge Instructor-Led Sales Training With a Next-Gen Learning Experience Platform

Even with the shift to working from home and the associated rise of remote digital training, classroom learning is here to stay. This is not without reason. Instructor-led training (ILT) offers several benefits. For one, it takes employees outside their workspace and lets them focus on the training at hand, in an interactive and social setting. Also, it makes sure all participants reach a certain level of proficiency within a certain time and instructor intervention can be a great way of remedying problems. Lastly, there are inherent values to human interaction and the chance to rehash learning with colleagues.

What if you could take the best from both worlds though? What if you could get the personal aspects of ILT with the heightened levels of learning retention, microlearning engagement, and the potential of adaptive learning associated with eLearning? You can. Here’s how you do it.

ILT can be greatly enhanced by next-gen learning experience platforms. Specifically, you can use game-based microlearning to drive participation, better utilization of training time, and higher learning retention. This doesn’t apply only to the actual Instructor-led session, but also to what happens before and after it.

  • Before ILT – Providing self-paced learning items before the ILT session to make sure all learners start the lesson with some existing knowledge.
  • During ILT – Mixing instructor-led training with e-learning elements such as quizzes, simulations, and collaborative assignments.
  • Post-training – Providing learning reinforcement, repetition, and retrieval practice and assessments

Before ILT

Bringing all your salespeople to the same level of knowledge before the Instructor-led session starts is imperative for having productive, relevant, and practical discussions in class. Flipped classroom is the practice of requiring class participants to undergo a self-paced learning session prior to ILT engagements. Using microlearning delivery tools and pre-class assessments you can provide learners with access to content, videos, and quizzes will make sure they come to the classroom session ready to talk shop and get down to business. It will reduce the time required for introductory sessions and acquainting learners with topic-specific definitions. Lastly, it will allow you to assess the level of proficiency of each salesperson and their ability to tackle complex sales training issues beforehand so that you can prepare your lectures accordingly.

During ILT

Next-gen learning experience platforms normally include sets of tools to support interactions during instructor-led classes. These tools help the instructor navigate the class session and monitor participants. During class, the instructor could send an interactive survey and quiz questions to learners, as he moves from one topic to another. This will both keep learners actively engaged (as opposed to passively listening) and allow the instructor to adapt the course for different salespeople based on their success.  Instructors can also grade salespeople and send feedback from the system, creating moments of introspection for them.

They also provide a visual representation of students’ progress and achievements. This allows them to see how much of the required learning they have already completed, keep track of which topics they’re struggling with, and understand their position compared to classmates so as to ask for support from colleagues when they need it.

Also, they can be used to make the ILT session more engaging and fun. Embedding gamification features such as points, badges, levels, and narratives, can help spice things up, giving participants instant feedback on success and providing more of a reason to participate in class and stay attentive. With several Centrical customers, in class training tasks are delivered within a Sim-City-type narrative, increasing the number of completed assignments and raising sales knowledge levels, as they unlock new buildings and gain virtual coins to buy property.

Post ILT

In any sales training initiative, the goal is not to get employees to complete courses but to get them to be proficient and apply what they’ve learned during sales calls. Next-gen learning experience platforms can be used to conduct certification tests at the end of class and keep a record of who knows what as well as to keep participants continuously engaged with their training after the classroom session is finished. Regularly engaging sales team members with short repetitions and retrieval sessions or offering them access to their learning content on demand anytime, anywhere, will make sure employees learn new information and, importantly, recall and retain it in their moment of need.

Summary

eLearning technology has revolutionized the way sales training is conducted and engaged with. While online learning cannot replace instructor-led classes completely, it can enhance and upgrade them to get better results. Next-gen learning experience platforms allow you to both spread out the learning process and engage employees before and after the class session. In addition, you can infuse the learning process with personalized learning tasks and data driven adaptations that will shorten training time and make it less academic and more practical.

This does not even require class participants have access to a workstation. All these features can be accessed for both tutors and learners easily over their mobile phones or tablets.

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