Since our childhood, we are being told to work hard and chase our pre-set goals. But how does one maintain the same excitement level and enthusiasm throughout the journey? There are days when one feels extremely motivated, but there are also some days when one feels lost and discouraged.
The same holds for the employees in your organization. Once they enter an organization, they are told about what is expected of them and how they should perform their roles and responsibilities. They make targets and set timelines to achieve training goals. During the initial days of their training, they feel extremely excited and energized to complete their eLearning course.
However, in the middle of their training, they feel low and lose vision. They get caught up in a whirlwind of negative emotions where they feel that their training is either of no use or they are not worth being trained. Such feelings can affect their training badly in the long run.
From an organizational perspective, this is very dangerous and can affect the growth and development of your organization. After all, it is the employees that make your organization progress and reach the pinnacle. But when employees feel discouraged or demotivated you cannot expect the best out of them.
Hence, it becomes very important for you to understand what makes employees feel so discouraged. Try to unearth the potential reasons for such breakdowns and look for the best possible solution. Whatever the reason may be, you have to encourage your employees to prioritize training and help them achieve their goals.
Here are some tips to encourage employees to prioritize their training.
1. Mold your eLearning courses to employees’ roles and responsibilities
Usually, employees dislike training programs that don’t add value to the work they do in the office. For instance, soft skills training may be relevant to your customer-facing teams, like the customer support, sales, and marketing team but not for your product designing, finance, or quality assurance teams.
No doubt that soft skills training, especially for improving the communication skills of employees, is very essential, but making it mandatory for other departments that have no direct connection with customers or clients is illogical.
Bosses often provide a chance for their workers to learn business English online here so they can be more efficient in meetings. So, make sure to mold the eLearning courses according to your employees’ roles and responsibilities.
Before launching a training program, create groups of employees having similar roles and responsibilities, and analyze their training needs. Discuss with eLearning project managers and professionals what each team member wants to learn. See what goals they have, what are their existing skills, and what they expect from you. You can run a quick survey or ask employees directly what kind of eLearning courses they want to opt for.
You can integrate Artificial Intelligence (AI) into your learning management system or an LMS to personalize the training of employees. For instance, based on the history and searches of the employees, the system will automatically suggest the best and most useful eLearning courses and resources for the employees.
2. Tell employees the importance of training
Some employees, especially the new hires lack knowledge and understanding about the training and its uses. Such a lack of clarity makes them feel disinterested in their training and they start looking for ways to escape.
To overcome this, you can encourage employees to prioritize their training by telling them its importance. Tell them how a particular eLearning course will enhance their skills and open more opportunities for career growth. Explain to them the monetary incentives attached to training in the form of bonuses and promotions.
For instance, if an employee completes a course on leadership skills, they might be considered for future management roles within the organization. Similarly, by opting for media training services, employees can refine their communication and public speaking skills, making them more effective spokespeople and enhancing their ability to manage media interactions confidently. This not only benefits their personal development but also contributes significantly to the organization’s public image and outreach capabilities.
By telling them the end benefits of training, you can trigger their intrinsic motivation to attend training with full dedication and zeal.
3. Be mindful of team workload
Often employees are piled up with a lot of work, projects, and assignments that they feel overwhelmed. When employees have to submit their work with tight deadlines, they find it difficult to manage work and training simultaneously. This not just affects the quality of work being delivered by them, but also makes them feel distracted as they’re unable to focus even on training.
Hence, you must try to be mindful of the team workload. Don’t overburden them as it would affect their productivity as well as efficiency.
4. Let them learn on their own
As mentioned earlier, managing both work and training simultaneously can be very challenging for employees. Employees look for flexibility that allows them to manage their training by themselves.
Using a learning management system, you can offer self-directed learning to employees. This means they can learn anytime they want or at any place they want. They don’t have to wait for others to start or finish their eLearning courses. If an employee has finished one course, he can immediately select some other eLearning course to upskill himself.
Also, the professionals can store all the eLearning resources on a centralized platform called an online digital library, which can be accessed by all the employees anytime. Other than this, give liberty to employees to write online training assessments when they’re fully prepared. By doing so, you can relieve them of stress or fears related to exams.
An LMS compatible with mobile devices can be more beneficial to employees as it ensures on-the-go learning without any breaks.
5. Create easy and engaging eLearning content
There is no denying the fact that providing information to employees is important. However, the essence and size of the information provided also matter. If at the beginning of the training you provide intricate details on every topic to employees, they might lose their interest early.
Hence, you must try to create easy learning content that avoids the usage of jargon and difficult terminologies. Instead, use a microlearning approach and break down the eLearning content into chunks that can be digested and assimilated easily.
Experienced training and assessment specialists suggest that gamification and storytelling techniques can be highly engaging for employees, enhancing their learning experience. Also, incorporate multimedia elements like videos, animations, and interactive quizzes to make the training more interesting.
Also, ensure that your eLearning content is engaging. Use multimedia like videos, animation, podcasts, audio, etc so that employees don’t lose interest. It allows employees to access eLearning content in whichever format they want.
For instance, auditory learners can use audio while visual learners can make use of animations or videos. After all, who doesn’t like to be served with dishes and flavors of one’s choice?
6. Introduce gamification to make learning more fun
Adding gamification features to corporate training can introduce fun elements to online training. Some typical examples of usage of gamification include-
- Segregating eLearning courses into different levels
- Providing badges on completion of every level
- Rewarding employees who perform exceptionally well in their training assessment.
- Display the names of top performers on the leader boards
Rewards give a sense of accomplishment to employees and encourage them to prioritize their training.
Conclusion
Training is very important for employees to withstand competition and stay consistent and up to date in their roles and responsibilities in the industry. Without proper training, it will be very difficult for your employees and organizations to grow.
Make sure you choose the right and accurate LMS for training your employees that keep them motivated and energized.
