Let’s be honest, from catching up our favorite Netflix show to playing games on our PCs, we all are looking for immersive experiences. Well, the same is true in learning and development of employees wherein employees enjoy a personalized & engaging experience.
Learning and Development is one of the areas where companies can re-invent and boost employee engagement levels. . Training programs can be an effective communication tool, allowing employees to better themselves with each passing day in an organization.
A multitude of studies in the past have revealed that the top performing companies were five times more likely to implement engaging L&D programs, and almost half (42%) of L&D professionals who indicated their employees were highly engaged in learning were also highly engaged overall at the organization. Let’s break this down:
Recognizing that L&D needs to evolve |
Employees are evolving; so are employment trends. It is no secret that innovations in technology have redefined expectations and relationship between work and learning (even more so during the COVID 19 Pandemic.) With the millennials making more than half the IT workforce today, we see these recurring patterns emerge:
- The demand for flexible, open career models;
- Modern career encouraging learning;
- Growth of workplace into becoming hubs for personal development.
Despite this, and its inevitable impact to both engagement and retention, many organisations write off L&D as something merely as an array of courses that need to be prescribed. There is an opportunity here today for L&D departments to recognise role in boosting employee engagement, and invest more into learning experiences that encompasses different gamut of learning – from social learning and microlearning, to adaptive assessments and outcome-based training.
L&D-as-a-shared-Endeavour
The same study has also revealed that across-the-board involvement / engagement in L&D initiatives always lead to increased participation and employee engagement, going on to reveal that over 90% of companies that had a strong culture of learning and personal development had senior executive members actively involved in L&D initiatives. When leaders, managers or senior executive champion learning in employees, it creates a ripple effect that allow the mass workforce to feel valued and return investments in learning by engaging in wider company roles.
One-size-fits-all doesn’t fit all.
No simple employee is the same, and all L&D strategies should reflect this. Everyone has their own unique career expectations and goals, and when it comes to workplace learning, some will respond best to a structured, theoretical approach, while others may achieve better results from more interactive formats. To maximize engagement, implement a balanced blend of training options to appeal to the diverse needs of your staff.
Offering personalized training and the freedom to choose between different, yet personalised, learning journeys puts power in the hands of the learner and allows them to play to their own strengths. Keeping all bases covered can be a time-consuming and potentially costly approach. However, the organisation and the employees will develop a symbiotic relationship in this learning ecosystem that allows everyone to reap the benefits of doing so!
Embracing the tech
Learning technology can help make training an accessible and enjoyable experience. The intervention from technology front can be looked at from two perspectives:
- We now live in an age where the Internet, social media, mobile devices are intrinsically linked to both our working and daily lives. It therefore comes as no surprise that many employees can feel disenchanted by their company’s L&D strategy when it fails to mirror the tech-savvy environment they are often accustomed to. Today we have a broad range of options at our disposal. Social media, e-learning, gamification techniques, and even virtual sandboxes can be utilized in a way that makes professional training fun and engaging.
- Turning to tech can smoothen out insights, and incorporating a LXP (Learning Experience Platform) can grants all parties a robust authority over learning objectives and progress. Employees have the freedom to pace their learning to tailor to their learning needs, and more importantly, they are able to analyze results to identify strengths and areas for improvement in the future. This increased tra
nsparency also gives L&D departments, HRs, and managers to monitor progress in a non-invasive manner. It also becomes significantly easier to extrapolate the outcomes of learning in aid of improving future L&D strategy.
Make Learning Count Again
Incentivizing achievement by rewarding top performers is a great way of increasing employee motivation and encouraging career progression. According to Kim Edwards (Talent and Leadership Development Manager, Getty Images,) an engaging company is “one that puts the employee at the center of everything”. Companies must find new ways to make staff feel they are central pillars of company success, and L&D offers the model for growth and recognition that makes this possible.
Engage your workforce through L&D and begin reaching company goals in synchronicity with the development of your employees today!
