How evolving digital content technology can impact your e-learning strategy

All technology evolves. To keep on top of current e-learning trends, it is essential to make sure your learning and development departments have a L&D strategy that evolves and engages the right audiences, whilst being tailored to meet your specific team or company learning outcomes.

Considering a variety of digital content and how this can be delivered to your audience technology as part of a learning strategy is a must. It can make or break the effectiveness of the learning delivered. For example, not just ensuring the right mix of digital objects, but also the most up-to-date ways to communicate to your employees and via the most appropriate systems such as an LMS.

Digital content could include a variety of media such as: animation, video and interactive video, interactive scenarios and simulations, learning games, visual or interactive storytelling, case studies, diagnostic tools, reflective questions, tests, task-based assessments, micro-learning and much more.

Communication

It is not sufficient to communicate training and objectives via email alone – they get lost, are hard to track and do not provide an appropriate filing mechanism to share input or secure communication between managers and employees. A recent report completed by PwC revealed that 82% of senior leadership teams communicate compliance via email and only 6% deliver this message via training. Click here to view the infographic that shares all these key findings.

Not only is this difficult to track but also for compliance purposes, how can you prove any actions were ever taken? Especially if you need to provide this as evidence for auditing purposes.

Engagement

When staff are logging in to an LMS to train, there is an element of commitment at that stage by both the organisation and the employee. They are letting you know they are on the path to compliance and also they are showing commitment to learn. The ideal way to encourage this and keep this engagement is via the most appropriate tools to do the job.

This includes:

• An LMS for log in and tracking of training progress by individual. Any results that indicate employee knowledge gaps can provide useful insight into leadership skills needed or alignment of priorities and deadlines for actions across teams.
• Structure to the learning and a way for gentle ‘nudges’ to ensure deadlines are met and learning outcomes are achieved.
• The right mix of learning tools for the audience concerned – a one-size-fits-all approach is not the answer. Different people learn at different speeds and the best approach to your L&D strategy is having the right mix and blend of learning to suit all user types and needs. Compliance courses can be delivered in unique ways to drive the best results.
• Games and quizzes, as a way to provide fun and information retention for employees. They get people in teams talking and help the application of learning within scenarios.

As such, Virtual College ensures it creates games and quizzes to make the content lighter, especially for very compliance-heavy topics. For example, our latest GDPR game was created to apply the GDPR principles in three different scenarios. This was very well received by Sarah Loughney, Business Development Manager at Executive Grapevine International Ltd.

“I just wanted to give you a quick email as me and the team have been playing the GDPR game this morning (I won). Love it. It's brilliant. Honestly, we all really enjoyed it. Let’s be honest, GDPR isn’t the most engaging topic, but the game was really fun and got everyone involved. Any more, send them my way.”

Regulation changes

E-learning is often synonymous with mandatory courses and updates that are governed by various authorities. These courses need to be completed for organisations to prove they are compliant and have been assessed and measured to demonstrate they can sell a specific product or offer customers advice or services. As such, there will always be a need to update your learning content in line with new regulations – which can often be difficult to digest and cause ‘incomplete learning objectives for employees’.

Refreshing your company culture

It's important to regularly review the status of your company's learning technology and the way training is delivered. Many organisations do not take the time to review this and to find out what other options there are available for them.

With 81% of UK employees looking for flexible working options before they even join a company*, a growing number of companies need to have the technology and L&D strategy to support flexible working or remote working. It’s imperative that individuals feel connected to their organisation and comply to the organisational training needs. So, face-to-face may no longer be a viable solution, but e-learning or a blended solution certainly is.

Some top tips from Virtual College are:

• Keep your content fresh and up-to-date.
• Ensure it is available in the right format for the right platform – is phone, LMS or tablet-based access important to your users?
• Change your training approach to ensure you capture the evolving culture and recognise different employee training needs.
• Review and analyse what you have – not just by a feedback form, but by results and tracking. This is the only way to prove what is working and having a supporting e-learning technology, such as Enable LMS or Enable Audit, will provide meaningful data to support your business decisions.

To discuss how Virtual College can help with your e-learning strategies, please contact Cameron Glennon for more information at cameron.glennon@virtual-college.co.uk or on 01943 885085.