Even though C-suites demand to know the return on investment of every aspect of their organization, knowing how to measure the ROI of learning programs has been a mystery for many organizations—until now.

L&D teams can no longer skirt around the issue. In 2017, LinkedIn’s first annual Workplace Learning Report found that Chief Learning Officers (CLOs) were facing increasing pressure to deliver learning programs that both engage employees and positively impact their organization’s bottom line. Businesses expect proof that the investment in learning is paying off both in increased workforce performance and financial payback.

According to a report from EY on the ever-growing importance of L&D for the future of work, “data can be a game changer within the functioning of corporate L&D and help the function earn their spot as a strategic partner.” 

Furthermore, in a research paper on adaptive learning by industry analyst Josh Bersin, he states “the depth and ability to continually assess, learn, and act changes the game for how learning departments will operate and make investment decisions. It allows the organization to make faster, better, and more effective decisions.”

Proving the value of employee learning and development investments is often the sticking point, but it doesn’t have to be. With the right tools, L&D teams can easily track learning analytics and measure outcomes. Yet many learning management systems (LMSs) only collect a limited amount of learning data and come up short on business impact insights. 

Companies have traditionally measured the effectiveness of L&D programs through course completion, class attendance, pre- and post-surveys or assessments, engagement surveys, and direct feedback, but none of those ways speak to a business ROI. As a result, none of those methods answer the essential question your C-suite is asking: How is our learning program improving our bottom line? 

Unlock the Secret to Measuring Your Learning ROI 

L&D teams need proof that their learning programs are achieving not just their learning goals, but also the organization’s financial goals. The problem is that measuring the ROI of employee learning is not always a slam dunk, because most LMSs are missing the required functionality.

What L&D teams need to be able to measure their learning ROI is a “secret sauce” created by Schoox data experts. To measure their ROI within the Schoox LMS, all companies have to do is correlate their preferred KPIs against any online training variables they want to measure. This allows the extraction of any relationship that exists between the datasets. 

Schoox empowers learning teams to get creative with how they can look at the training data and performance from different angles—while discovering exactly what impact training has on the business’s bottom line. 

Schoox in Action—Celebrity Cruises Measures a Single “Port of Call”

A perfect real-world example of the power of Schoox learning ROI formula is Celebrity Cruises. The travel company’s learning program has two components: training internal customer services staff members and ensuring external travel advisors are operating in full compliance. Schoox allows the organization to create a “single port of call” for the two learning tracks—and access simplified reporting for each. 

“Schoox allows us to report on thousands of learning insights and compliance metrics for our staff and travel advisors,” said Alex Frady, Manager of Learning & Development. “The reports help us spot gaps in training and learning and increase our percentage of enrollments and graduates. Now we can send specific messages to groups of people or design campaigns to increase enrollments.”

Learn more about Celebrity Cruise success and Schoox’s “secret sauce” for measuring learning ROI in our new report, Real-world Learning for Frontline Workers: Top 5 Learning & Development Must-haves for Employees Working on the Go.

Want to learn more about measuring learning ROI with Schoox? See our four-part blog series, Measuring the Business Impact of L&D, starting here. 

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Today everyone expects the same level of personalized, responsive service with everything they do—including their learning experiences. Fulfilling the need for smarter learning technology in business setting, however, is often considered “easier said than done.” That’s where learning experience platforms (LXPs) enter the picture. 

LXPs are considered the most exciting development in employee learning—and, as a result, are on a fast track to greater popularity among corporations, extended enterprises, and franchise businesses in the next decade. Interest in and demand for LXPs accelerated in 2019, according to Gartner. The LXP market in 2020 was approximately over $508.5 million. The market is expected to surge at a CAGR of 25.3% according to the recent research report.

LXPs are different from learning management systems (LMS.) While an LMS focuses on course administration, learner assessment, and tracking learners’ activities with reports, the purpose of an LXP is to deliver the components of a personalized learner experience through social, collaborative, mobile, and microlearning tools. The systems often utilize machine learning to assess employees’ skills and recommend content.

LXPs are a front-end layer that typically resides on top of an LMS. They integrate with existing internal and external “trusted sources” of knowledge and learning, including LMS and corporate HR systems to present learners with a holistic learning experience. An LXP puts learners at the center of their own professional education experience by tailoring suggestions to their preferences and personalizing all aspects of learning. They also enable L&D teams to be leaner, more agile, and more strategic.

But what if you want both LMS and LXP capabilities in one platform? This is a great question and an ideal goal. One option is to overlay LXP functionality on top of an LMS. This isn’t ideal, however, because there is a fundamental lack of integration between the applications, which means that employees must log into two systems to access the functionality—an outcome they won’t appreciate.

Schoox Delivers Built In LXP Tools

An ideal learning system should deliver the best of both worlds—both administering the L&D program and creating exceptional experiences for learners. Schoox brings the two sides of learning and development together in one platform, thereby, creating a single seamless user experience. 

Here’s a quick look at the capabilities of each and the result from the perfect union of the two. 

Organizations that have already deployed a blended LMS-LXP system are able to easily execute effective employee learning programs that are more experiential and immediate, and that target content for delivery when and where it’s needed. 

These dual-focused learning applications are checking all the boxes of a modern employer learning program—including social, collaborative, mobile, and microlearning. Checkers & Rally’s is a perfect example. 

Checkers & Rally’s Fun, Engaging, and Mobile Microlearning

Checkers & Rally’s learned that teaching the tricks of the trade to its 11,000-strong team members doesn’t always require long lessons. Instead, to learn how to “serve up the perfect fry,” for example, workers simply watch a fun, short video demo on their phones or one of each store’s two iPads. Then they immediately put the new knowledge to work during their shifts. This has made learning more immediate and experiential—and, as a result, more effective. 

The “short video blasts are incredibly popular with our staff,” said Krishawna Henderson, the QSR’s Director of Diversity & Learning Development and manager of its innovative “Crazy Good Learning” program. “The number of employees logging onto the learning platform has doubled year over year, and team members are eager to put into practice what they’ve just learned.”

Learn more about Checkers & Rally’s success and the power of Schoox to support learning programs for front-line workers in our new report, Real-world Learning for Frontline Workers: Top 5 Learning & Development Must-haves for Employees Working on the Go.

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A recent study from Brandon Hall Group found that while over 76% of business leaders would rate learning as highly important, only 45% rate their own organizations as being highly learning focused. What is going on today? Why is there such a profound disconnect? This post looks at some of the latest issues in the connection between employee productivity and employee job training.

Does Training Increase Productivity?

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Americans spend 7.6 hours a day working when they are in the office and 5.8 hours working when they are working from home. But are those hours completely productive? That’s the question more companies are asking to ensure they meet their business goals. One way to keep employees productive, according to research, is to make sure they are well trained for their jobs.

Dozens of studies over the years have found a direct correlation between employee training and productivity. When employees know their jobs and their strengths are valued and supported, it creates a workplace culture that fosters high performance and greater productivity, according to Gallup. The study found that strengths-based organizations improve employee performance by 8% to 18%.

In fact, strengths-based leadership has been identified as a core element of fostering employee optimism, engagement, and project performance—all of which lead to significantly higher productivity.

Research: Investing in Training Improves Employee Productivity

Despite the research on the positive impact of training on employee output, many companies have been slow to fully invest in and embrace the potential of robust employee learning programs

eLearning Industry reported the following: “A study conducted by the American Society for Training & Development compared two corporate groups, where one company spent nearly three times as much as the other on organization training, and the results were startling. The group that invested more recorded a 57% increase in sales and a 37% rise in gross profit per employee. This clearly highlights the importance of investing in training and development to ensure high productivity and effective returns.”

Despite the proven advantages, not every company has fully embraced the power of employee training to boost productivity. According to Shift eLearning, “The problem is that many organizations see training as an expense and not as an investment. Untrained employees will inevitably lack the motivation and knowledge to use company resources properly, which will lead to waste, in a service industry. Lack of knowledge about procedures will affect customer interaction and retention. Because of this, your employees, your company, and your clients will all suffer.”

Research: Training Positively Impacts Employee Performance

Findings from two studies conducted by Brandon Hall Group clarify several aspects of the impact of employee training on productivity:

• Learning That Drives Performance: How Do We Supercharge Learning? found that, for many companies, there has been an increasing disconnect between learning and performance. For example:
  • Only 54% believe that learning performance outcomes are tied directly to learning objectives
  • Only 38% business objectives tied directly to talent development objectives
  • Only 31% believe that talent development objectives tied directly to learning performance outcomes

To overcome this problem, Brandon Hall Group recommends that “companies should rethink the learning experience to ensure everything is focused on driving performance. Identifying and understanding intended performance outcomes puts learning in a position to create programs that deliver the intended results.”

•  Upskilling and Reskilling: Delivering Personalized Learning at Scale found that only about 36% of companies believe they are prepared to develop employees to perform the skills they will need in the future. “Business is moving too fast and the workforce is too busy, distracted and dispersed for traditional training models to be completely effective.”

The contradictions is apparent in these two findings from this research:

• Over 76% of companies say business leaders would rate learning a 4 or 5 on a 5-point scale of importance to the organization.
• However, only 45% of companies rate themselves a 4 or 5 on a 5-point scale of how integral learning is to the organization’s culture.

Overcoming Remote Worker Learning Challenges

Training employees working from home presents an additional challenge for companies to deliver effective training programs, according to findings from a survey conducted by Brandon Hall Group called How Are You Adapting to Hybrid Work? About 50% of companies said that Learning & Development, including upskilling and reskilling, is one of their biggest challenges in the next six to 12 months.

“COVID-19 did not cause workforce problems, it merely magnified them,” per the Brandon Hall Group. All of the talent management, upskilling and reskilling, team development, and career development challenges that organizations face now have only “come to a sharper point because of the health crisis and the impact it had on the workforce and society.”

6 Ways to Improve Employee Productivity with Learning Programs

Employee training and job productivity go hand in hand. If companies appreciate the power of a highly productive staff, they should embrace the power of employee training. 

Here are the leading six ways that training boosts employees’ job performance and productivity

1. Inspires New Employees. How you on-board employees sets the tone for their long-term productivity. Training new employees gets them off on the right foot by giving them a good sense of the business and job expectations. For all employees, having a mastery of the knowledge and skills for their job increases their satisfaction and confidence and, as a result, productivity.
2. Reinvigorates Old Skills. Ongoing employee training helps cultivate talent from within your business. By retraining employees on current skills, you can increase productivity by preventing small, basic mistakes. This can also breathe new life into old tasks. Plus, retraining current employees is less expensive than hiring new ones.
3. Gives Employees New Skills. By teaching employees new skills, you can give them a new sense of a purpose. It also lets them know that the organization is willing and able to evolve — and even offer them advancement opportunities.
4. Raises Confidence Levels. Learning and maintaining skills can boost employees’ confidence. With greater confidence, they’ll enjoy a greater sense of value and enthusiasm on the job. This often translates into increased productivity.
5. Supports a Performance-Based Culture. This inspires and motivates employees by giving them attainable goals to reach on a regular basis. However, your culture should also have a clearly defined definition of success. When employees know what they are reaching for, they are able to achieve it in an optimal way.
6. Boosts Employee Satisfaction. Satisfaction is essential for a productive workplace. Employees are satisfied when they’re given the skills and knowledge they need to perform their duties optimally. Training is an important step in providing the skills your employees need to perform their best.

Clearly, productivity is a vital goal in today’s business world. While there are many systems, processes, and motivational tactics employers can use to boost productivity, companies should remember the power of comprehensive, quality training to lay a foundation that supports the highest levels of workforce productivity every days.

To learn more download our eBook: Access the Power of Your Employees’ Strengths.

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Clarity for Goals Management 

Many businesses utilize goals in Schoox to rally individuals or teams toward common objectives. Goals can be quantitative, such as sales targets or other numeric quotas; or more qualitative, like “increasing customer satisfaction.” 

Goals are often integral to an employee’s learning and development journey in Schoox, but they may be left abandoned for a number of reasons—like changes to job responsibilities, evolving business needs, or time constraints. We updated how goals are labeled and displayed for more clarity between different goal stages and a better overall user experience. Here’s a rundown of how goals will be labeled within Schoox at various levels of progress:

• Goals with 100% Progress Completed  → Now automatically marked “Completed” 
• Currently labeled “Archived” → Now show a “Completed” status
• Abandoned Goals → Can now be manually set to “Archived” 

Goals previously marked “100% Progress Completed” now are automatically marked as “Completed.”

We also added the ability to select “global settings” on goals to determine the default behavior for all goals, which can either be set for an individual as they move throughout the organization or be applied to all individuals within an organization or sub-unit which hold a particular job or role. This new option can be found in Advanced Settings. 

Higher Quality Feedback on Performance Reviews 

Companies often introduce a calibration stage in performance reviews as a checkpoint to ensure feedback is fair, free of bias, and constructive. Since companies may tie annual compensation increases and bonuses to performance reviews, this step serves as quality control to ensure equitable practices. 

We enhanced workflows in Schoox to allow organizations to implement this crucial step in their performance review processes. Implementing a calibration step enables senior-level management to review feedback and adjust scoring prior to delivering the feedback to an employee and completing the performance review process. 

Administrators may now also tailor the rating scale with behaviorally anchored ratings level descriptions associated with specific performance areas. This helps reviewers provide more consistent ratings that align to organizational expectations and avoid potential misinterpretations or bias of general descriptions. 

Admins and managers can customize ratings scales with behaviorally anchored descriptions.

Streamlined Reporting 

With Schoox Report Builder, customers can easily leverage one of our 110 pre-built reports or customize the fields to create custom reports and access critical information about courses or curricula, scores or training results, individual users, various groups of users, content, and more. With Schoox, L&D teams can easily customize user permissions, compare metrics across different groups, and segment data in a way that makes sense for specific business units. Reports can be recurring, scheduled in advance, or created on an ad-hoc basis.

This quarter, we consolidated scheduled reports and basic reporting functionality into Report Builder so that it’s the “one-stop-shop” reporting area of the Schoox platform. Here L&D professionals, admins, and managers will now find all currently scheduled and new reports, as well as options to run ad-hoc reports. We also improved the backend engine that powers reports, making the function more efficient overall, and introduced a number of smaller enhancements to improve flows and user experiences. 

A view of Report Builder in Schoox.

Microsoft Teams Integration for Live Sessions

Schoox is now integrated with Microsoft Teams. Admins and managers who conduct virtual events via Schoox via may now launch and track events through their Teams accounts. This allows for a better user experience and eliminates any learning curves for users who are familiar with the Microsoft Teams platform. 

Biometric Login on the Schoox Mobile App 

For an additional layer of security when accessing their Schoox account, users can now log into the Schoox mobile app using biometric authentication on any compatible iOS or Android devices. For example, a user might choose to use a fingerprint or face recognition scan rather than typing in their password to log into Schoox on their phones or other mobile devices. 

Schoox is designed for how humans actually learn. We’re always enhancing our platform so organizations and their  employees can get the most value from their knowledge bases to get more done. 

Discover how Schoox can meet your learning needs, schedule a demo!

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Why Provide Employees On-the-Job Training?

On-the-job training (OJT) is an essential part of learning and development for many businesses. Let’s look at some reasons why it’s so important.

Optimize Frontline Workforce Performance

A common adage in the business world is that your customer is always right. Optimizing frontline workforce performance can help your business improve customer service and ultimately improve your bottom line.

Whether it’s a restaurant, hotel, retailer, or other consumer-facing business, unfavorable customer feedback usually means your employees aren’t performing well on the frontlines. While isolated incidents of poor customer service might be part of the issue, a general pattern of bad reviews indicates a larger systemic failure on the part of the business—not its employees. These kinds of problems can often be traced to inadequate training.

OJT helps businesses ensure their frontline workforces master the skills critical to success—at both an individual and organizational level. It enables learning and development (L&D) professionals to connect specific skill sets to key business activities and goals, allowing them to design training programs that teach their employees the skills required to truly excel at their jobs. This might mean showing hotel housekeeping staff how to fold towels or prepare rooms in a particular way and observing each employee to confirm knowledge retention, or discreetly observing employees on the sales floor after training to gauge how they interact with customers.

Hands-On Experience

Failure is good for learning. OJT gives employees the opportunity to learn, correct mistakes and enhance skills in a pressure-free environment, providing them with much needed practice before they hit the frontlines or go out in the field. Even for non-customer facing jobs, OJT allows employees to hone their skills before they’re put to the test. Physically performing job tasks also helps employees feel more connected to their work.

Ensure Knowledge Retention

Training is only effective if managers can ensure their staff can perform the jobs that need to be done. OJT is one of the best ways for training managers to confirm their employees learned the tasks and skills covered in training. By observing their performance, training managers can determine whether employees are ready for the frontlines or need more help before taking on the job. They can then provide the necessary additional training to help employees strengthen any weak spots and feel confident in their ability to complete critical tasks. With mobile accessibility, training managers can even quietly monitor employee performance where it matters most—in front of customers.

The Schoox Difference

Businesses often rely on paper scorecards and manual methods to track OJT training compliance, but this method is cumbersome to maintain, makes it difficult to share data with other systems and to report on at scale. Other training tools often focus on simple forms and observation checklists that may not provide enough flexibility to design training in a way that’s efficient and ideal for a digital workplace. Schoox goes above and beyond observation checklists to encourage effective learning via on-the-job training. Schoox offers training managers and L&D professionals the option to create course-connected OJT tasks, which are part of a larger course or curriculum, or standalone OJT tasks that are independent from any other ongoing training programs.

As an example, a course or curriculum-connected OJT task could be used to observe employees prepare different foods after they watch digital content teaching them about each menu item.

A standalone OJT task might be used to observe an employee prepare a new menu item that wasn’t covered in the original course. They can be used to provide supplemental or ad-hoc training whenever required.

Once learners have completed their assigned OJT tasks, training managers can access an at-a-glance view of progress across the board. Training managers can use this information to determine who on their team is excelling, who needs more support, and what kind of additional supervision might be needed for particular team members.

What’s New?

We recently made several enhancements to OJT functionality within Schoox. Admins and training managers may now elect to re-use previously created standalone OJT tasks as part of a course or curriculum. In the example above, this means the training managers would be able to pull the standalone OJT task created for a new menu item into the existing course or curriculum.

We also added a new homepage widget that allows trainees to quickly sign off on OJT tasks, providing a better user experience. Finally, we added a new report for both standalone and course-connected OJT tasks that displays learner progress for each. This provides L&D professionals with critical insight into how employees are performing, which can be applied to improve the design of future OJT tasks.

On-the-job training is the best way for many employers to teach and assess mission-critical skills. It helps employees build the confidence they need to be successful in their roles. When done right, it translates into greater operational efficiency, exceptional customer service, repeat customers, and increased revenues for businesses.

Chat with one of our Solution Consultants to learn more about the many flexible options to create OJT initiatives in Schoox.

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Capturing your audience’s attention and holding it can make the transfer of knowledge much more effective.

It’s more important than ever to try and create a memorable connection during the learning process. It’s not enough to simply check the boxes and have all the right content. The content needs to be arranged and presented in a way that sticks in your audience’s minds. You want people to walk away with as much knowledge as possible.

In this episode of The Learning Xchange, Matthew Brown, VP of Learning and Brand Success at Schoox, has some great ideas on making learning more memorable. Listen to the podcast below or keep reading to learn more.

1. Use emotion

The first thing to note is that the best way to connect a learner to training content is to use emotion. This is often done by invoking one or more of the senses at the same time, and there are lots of ways you can do this.

Whether it’s virtual training or in-person sessions, ways to invoke the senses include the clothes you wear, the background you use in virtual learning, and other little Easter eggs that you use throughout your sessions. You could use interactive experiences that get participants to physically do something. This helps to invoke different senses beyond the visual.

When we do this right, it leaves a lasting impression that makes the learner want to come back for more.

Sometimes, this is difficult; for example, it’s hard to make compliance training fun. However, adding something different or unusual into your training can help participants pay attention and remember what you’re saying. When we do this, we increase the likelihood of engagement.

Why is that so important? Increasing engagement and attention in your training sessions means that they’re more likely to learn and remember things.

2. Leverage technology to make learning more memorable

Learning doesn’t have to be dry and boring. You can make it more fun for everyone involved. Of course, fun is going to be relative to the audience and company culture. However, at its core, what we mean is finding ways to bring in interactions, to keep it fresh, and to leverage technology.

You can do this in a variety of ways, for example, quizzes and games, breakout rooms, or collaborative experiences. These are things that can be applied to both in-person and virtual sessions.

If you want to check how well your participants are retaining information, mini-quizzes are a great way to do this. It breaks up any lectures or PowerPoint presentations and keeps the learners thinking and focusing.

3. Include your learners

Another way to freshen things up is to include your learners in your content. Ask them questions that force them to really connect on an emotional level to the content.

Generic questions directed at everyone can be very thought-provoking, but specific questions for individuals can go much further in creating engagement.

4. For memorable learning, do something unexpected

Including something unexpected in your content can also enhance the experience. Even something as simple as wearing a colorful shirt or changing your background can create a fresh experience every time your learners come back.

They may be focused on figuring out what’s different this time, but while they are in that receptive mode, they will listen and hear your content.

5. Make learning part of their day

Another thing to think about is ways to make learning part of their day. A lot of people see workplace training as entirely separate from their job. When it comes time to do a training session, it can feel naturally disruptive and jarring, which isn’t a great experience.

What we should be doing is making the training fit naturally into their day. Make learning more of a regular experience that people become accustomed to on a daily basis – rather than leaving it to once a year.

6. Create a safe space

Another thing that learning professionals and managers can do is to create a safe space for people to take risks and make mistakes. When employees engage with the content, it’s a lot more memorable and fun if they feel comfortable enough to try out new things and ask questions.

This creates a much deeper connection to the learning content at that moment.

7. Involve learners in the content review process

How do you know whether your learning experiences are fun and memorable – unless you ask?

Find a way to include your learners in the content review process to ensure they receive the kind of training they need and want. Hearing their thoughts and feelings about your content makes your learners feel heard. It also helps you tailor the content towards them for the greatest effect.

Honest feedback from your learners is an invaluable part of the content review process. Ask them, does the tone seem right? Does it have the right aesthetic/company culture feel? Are the interactions valuable?

Remember that if you open the doors to this type of feedback, you might hear things you’d rather not. But the most important thing to do is never ignore it.

The worst thing you can do is ask for feedback and then do nothing in response. All that says to the learner is that you don’t value their opinion, which just creates a negative experience for everyone.

While you don’t have to take action on every single piece of feedback, being able to follow up, explore new ways to improve and take feedback on board is crucial. If there’s something you decide not to change and have a good reason why, don’t be afraid to be transparent with your learners and explain why.

Involving your learners and making training a two-way process is such a simple way to make your content more engaging, memorable, and effective.

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If you decide to take things externally, shopping around for a vendor is not an easy task. You need to find a vendor who can provide exactly what you need, a solution tailored to your specifications.

However, a common mistake people make is rushing into it without a plan. For long-term success, you need to approach an L&D vendor with a solid plan of action.

In this episode of The Learning Xchange, Matthew Brown, VP of Learning and Brand Success at Schoox, discusses the best way to approach L&D vendors.

Do: Identify your organization’s primary learning solution need

The first step in approaching learning solution providers is to identify the primary need in your organization. This could be something like, “we need our training to be more digital.”

Whatever your reason, try to get clear and specific on what the problem in your organization is, the missing gap that you’re looking to fill.

Being specific here will set you up for success. It will help narrow your search down and get the ball rolling a lot faster once you approach a vendor.

Do: Take time to prepare for your conversation with the vendor

By going through these processes, you will save time in the long run, even if it costs more time to put in the groundwork now.

There will be less back and forth, with the vendor trying to work out what it is you really want. Once the vendor has provided a solution, it will be tailored to your needs and hopefully be effective to the target audience.

So, spend some time thinking of the following things:

• What exact problem are you trying to solve?
• How does this affect the rest of the organization?
• What are the primary values of your organization?
• What type of vendor are you looking to work with?
• What’s the company culture like?

Coming to the table with a clear idea of who you are and who you’re not, will give the potential vendor a lot more to work with.

Armed with answers to these questions makes any conversation you have with a vendor a lot more productive. In fact, they may be able to give you some tips and ideas during that initial meeting.

Do: Discuss your learning solution needs openly with the vendor

Another great thing about having a conversation like this is that it helps the vendor decide whether to work with you as well.

When the vendor has a clearer understanding of what you need, they can go away and assess whether you’re the type of client they can help.

They may have a training platform that ticks all the generic boxes outlined in an RFP template. But when it comes to delivering the solution, it may be perceived as a wrong fit because it’s not tailored. It might be too long or short or too inflexible, or just not a good fit for your type of business.

It’s one thing for a vendor to say, “I create training courses,” and another thing when they say, “I create personalized training courses that meet your exact conditions.”

Without knowing what those conditions and specific needs are, how can the vendor meet them? That’s why it always pays to be prepared, to be thorough in your research, and to discuss your needs openly with any third-party vendors.

Don’t: Use generic templates for RFPs

One mistake we see organizations make is when they use a “requests for proposal” (RFP) template. Many people stick with the same RFP template they’ve used at other organizations because it’s the simplest and quickest way of doing it. While using a template may not be a bad thing, watch out for this common issue…

When you briefly mention your needs on a generic RFP template and don’t go into much detail, it makes it more difficult for the potential vendor to assess how they can help you.

This can cause problems later down the line when potential vendors struggle to meet your needs.

A vendor might be able to tick a box and say, “yes, we provide digital training solutions.” But they might not be right for your business unless you give them more context to go on.

A template is fine as a jumping-off point to spark ideas. But don’t rely just on a template when you come to discuss your request with potential vendors.

Some learning and development professionals struggle with helping their customer understand the value and importance of going that extra step to explain exactly you need. Not just in terms of solution and content, but also in terms of tone and company culture.

One step in this is to clearly determine what you as the organization know and don’t know. What will your company resonate with or respond poorly to? Where are the gaps in your knowledge and existing training? Only you know this. But the vendor needs to know this, too!

Don’t: Rush into a decision when selecting a learning solution

Many organizations make the mistake of getting so focused on the time and budget aspects that they lose sight of the bigger picture. This leads them to speed through some really critical steps that could make the process a whole lot smoother.

Don’t make the mistake of highlighting a problem, for example, “we have no digital training solutions,” and then run into firefighting mode where you rush to find a solution.

If you rush, you may risk focusing too much on making sure everything comes under budget, and neglect what the organization really needs.

The best way to set your organization up for success in the long term is to lay the groundwork first and get specific about your needs.

Download our free Buyer’s Guide, Navigating Today’s Changing Learning Platform Landscape: A Guide for Choosing a Next-Generation LMS to learn more about finding the best learning solution for your needs.

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When a talented employee says their heart isn’t in their current position, it can be a bitter pill to swallow. However, it may not signal the end to the employee relationship. 

Here’s how managers can support employees during a career change to encourage them to remain an asset to the organization. 

How Common Are Career Changes?

According to Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data, people held 12.3 jobs on average between the ages of 18 and 52—almost half of these between 18 and 24. 

In 2019 research by Indeed, 49% of participants said they’ve had a dramatic career change. This study also showed that there are many reasons people switch careers. Money is a factor, but there are others:

Image Source

Other reasons employees may change careers include enjoying a less stressful life or caring for an unwell loved one. People might also shift into a different profession because they’re working in an industry that is declining or due to a sudden disruption in the economy like the one brought by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Supporting Employees in a Career Change

Hiring new employees is expensive. By the time the tax forms are filled out, NDAs and other agreements are signed, and the training is completed, businesses have already invested significant resources. Managers can protect that investment by meeting the needs of their employees. 

Here’s how you can support your employees during their career change to benefit your company and them. 

Help Employees Create a Career Change Plan 

To enjoy a successful career change, having a rough plan is necessary. Without a vision, it’s easy to become demotivated—especially if things take longer than expected. 

Management can help employees by creating a career path with them. To begin, look at potential future openings within the company that may satisfy their goals. 

Help them set objectives and create a blueprint. Validating their ambitions and helping them achieve their dreams increases the chance they’ll respond with a commitment to their current role, while embracing the possibility of future growth within the organization. 

Invest in Online Learning

One critical aspect of achieving career growth is learning the skills needed for a new role. Fortunately, employees have plenty of online resources to gain knowledge on any skill or topic. 

When investing in online learning, using a dynamic and customizable platform is essential. Employees should be able to track their progress in a way that suits them, and gets results. 

Investing in online learning gives you the opportunity to encourage innovation and independent thinking within your organization. It also lets your employees know that you are committed to their growth and development.

Help Employees Manage Their Time More Efficiently

Time is everyone’s most important asset. When balancing a full-time job with a pending career change, it’s even more vital. 

To improve efficiency, time-tracking software is a good investment. Time-tracking software helps employees better manage their workflows and where they need to make changes.

Furthermore, time-tracking software helps employers avoid overscheduling employees and minimizes stress levels. 

Notify Employees About Possible Openings

Often, companies are too quick to give in to losing their best talent. According to Work Institute’s 2020 Retention Report, three in four employee turnovers were preventable. 

Switching careers doesn’t always mean having to change companies. The most attractive organizations for high-quality candidates are dynamic and offer flexibility with room for internal growth. In medium-sized and larger businesses, there’s often promotion opportunities for ambitious employees within the company. Once suitable roles become available, the employee can be notified. 

Beyond retaining your best talent, you’ll also improve loyalty and motivate others to strive for promotions. 

Encourage Growth in Their Current Role

In 2020, Deloitte released a report titled: “Talent 2020: Surveying the Talent Paradox from the Employee Perspective.” 

Of those who participated, 27% said that a lack of career progress would lead to them searching for a new job. New market opportunities also ranked high as a reason.

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Though an employee may have decided that their current career isn’t a good fit for them, that doesn’t mean all their skills are useless. For example, marketing knowledge is transferable to sales, while experience as a front desk manager could help human resources. 

When helping employees create a career change plan, it’s wise to remind them that growing in their current role will help them further down the line. 

By making it clear how their current job will improve their chances of success when they’re ready to make a change, employees will be more motivated to continue performing well. 

Make Sure Employees Feel Appreciated in Their Current Role

Many quality employees view their job as a stepping stone to something bigger. Discouraging or suppressing employees who have big ambitions is a surefire way to force them out of your company. 

Ensuring your staff members understand the value they provide is essential. An easy way to show your appreciation is by recognizing when they go above and beyond. Checking in often to see how they’re doing is also an excellent way to remind them of their worthwhile contribution. 

Showing appreciation for employees encourages them to produce their best work and remain dedicated to the organization. 

Career Changes Can Be Beneficial for Businesses and Employees

While an employee’s interests may stray from their current role, managers need to take a proactive approach to ensure valuable employees don’t leave. Career changes can benefit an organization as well as the individual. Helping employees to achieve their dreams motivates them to commit to their current role, even if it’s not their “final” destination. It speaks to the value you place in your employees and in your business growth. HR departments can help with career changes by creating plans, investing in online learning, and finding internal opportunities that fit employees’ goals. These strategies help retain the best talent.

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About the author

Dean Mathews
Founder & CEO, OnTheClock

Dean Mathews is the founder and CEO of OnTheClock, an employee time tracking app that helps over 10,000 companies all around the world track time. 

Dean has over 20 years of experience designing and developing business apps. He views software development as a form of art. If the artist creates a masterpiece, many people’s lives are touched and changed for the better. 

When he is not perfecting time tracking, Dean enjoys expanding his faith, spending time with family and friends, and finding ways to make the world just a little better.

The post How to Support Employees in a Career Change appeared first on Schoox - A Learning Management System.

But company leaders also realize that it doesn’t stop there. Organizations aren’t a “set it and forget it” kind of operation. They need constant work to ensure they are increasingly successful year over year.

As a result, many businesses set their sights on investing in a better experience—for their users, customers, and employees. They want to ensure that people perceive their company positively and that any interactions with their products, workforce, and leadership are top notch.

So why do companies need to focus on learning journeys right now? And what do they have to do with improving a customer’s or employee’s experience at a company? 

In short, there are three main reasons company’s need to focus on improving their learning journeys. Continue reading to learn more.  

Companies need to emerge stronger, better from the pandemic 

As the pressure increases for companies to maintain their competitive advantage in the “new normal,” they must make careful decisions about how they will invest in each of these areas to succeed in the future.

“Experience” is a term we hear often these days, made even more familiar by replacing the word with the letter “X.” For example, user experience becomes UX, customer experience becomes CX, and employee experience becomes—you guessed it—EX.

Usually, department executives receive a budget to allocate funds to initiatives that will help them achieve their business goals. Technology and engineering would handle improving UX. Customer support would improve CX, and typically HR would focus on EX. 

But there is another function in the organization that companies should consider as their primary focus this year if they want to achieve meaningful, measurable business results with lasting impact. And that is learning and development.

Learning and development teams drive progress 

While some may see L&D teams simply as “the ones who do the training,” their unique set of capabilities and reach across all departments can be the difference between a company’s success and failure.

As the saying goes, “knowledge is power.” Learning is something companies can and should rely on as a driving force for success in all areas of the business—including UX, CX, and EX.

But it’s important to note that we’re not talking about just any learning. 

Just as technology, engineering, and product development teams place a large emphasis on UX for the products and services they create, L&D teams should treat the learner experience (LX) with the same level of importance. To do this, they need to start thinking outside the traditional “training” box. 

And that’s where learning journeys come into play.

Learning journeys have a powerful impact on business results

Learning journeys are a far cry from “check-the-box” training. They are the how, when, where, and why a learner interacts with content. They bring in factors like engagement, collaboration, application, and meeting learners where they are in the flow of work.

Learning journeys require a “design thinking” approach, and L&D teams are responsible for continuously rethinking this approach in order to offer the best LX possible.

Well-designed learning journeys consist of three elements:

1. The business—understanding priorities and solving business challenges
2. The role—improving performance in one’s direct area and the overall business
3. The self—developing experience, knowledge, competencies, and beliefs

If all three of these elements are taken into account, learning journeys have the power to drive individual, customer, and organizational change to help you achieve maximum business results.

Design your own learning journeys

If you would like to learn more about designing a better learning journey and how to get started, download our free e-book: The Importance of a Well-Designed Learning Journey.

The post Why Better Learning Journeys Should Be Your Company’s Top Focus appeared first on Schoox - A Learning Management System.

For companies dedicated to learning and development, content curation is a great way to add value to their employees.

In the context of learning and development, content curation is the process of gathering, sourcing, and organizing information that’s helpful for a team.

In many workplaces, the learning and development team is solely responsible for creating this type of content.

However, companies should consider the benefits of empowering their L&D teams to tap into their employee community to help provide curated content, too.

In this episode of The Learning Xchange, Matthew Brown (Schoox’s VP of Learning and Brand Success) discusses the benefits of content curation in workplace learning and development.

Listen to the podcast episode below to learn more or keep reading.

The problem with off-the-shelf learning content

When it comes to training, companies may purchase an off-the-shelf training solution that doesn’t quite hit the mark when it comes to your team, specifically.

For example, you might work in the restaurant industry and sit down to watch a training video featuring people in suits and ties. If it’s not something your employees relate to, it’s much harder for that content to resonate with them.

So, what if, instead of this, you had a training program curated by the very people it concerns—other employees?

Here are four benefits of involving your employees in content curation.

1. Increased trust and adoption

Including employees in the process and asking them to share things that work for them can increase trust and adoption.

Employees could go away and find articles, websites, training videos that they find helpful and share them with others. Additionally, they could take part in some content creation and create videos or process flows for other team members.

Therefore, when the people sourcing the material have experience in the same role, it’s easier to trust and take their advice.

2. Content with fresh perspectives

We can always benefit from a fresh perspective, especially in the world of learning and development.

Learning and development professionals may be too close to the problem. Even subject matter experts can be too close to it. The perspectives are too narrow and the training becomes less effective or even over-engineered.

Additionally, try to consider the perspective of the training course. Did a boss or learning professional design it? How well will that translate to employees?

Similarly, you may have experienced training programs squeezed into a four-step method just for the sake of being in that four-step structure. Maybe it’s the typical way your company does it. Perhaps it’s based on a template. And the cycle continues with that structure.

So, what if you had a different perspective? You might find a far better way of organizing your content or program. With outside perspectives, you can start tapping into other ways to articulate messages that resonate with their intended audience. In other words, sometimes it takes a different voice to spark a better idea!

3. Positive effect on employee engagement

A lot of companies tend to think too narrowly about career development and growth. For instance, they may design programs with the primary purpose of helping people move up the career ladder.

Consequently, the problem here is assuming that everyone wants to move up. Some people would prefer to move sideways into a different department or role. Some people don’t want to move at all and are happy where they are.

For instance, if you design your training resources around promotions and getting ahead they’re likely to fall flat for those who don’t share that goal.

Does that mean these people shouldn’t take part in learning and development programs? No. Everyone can benefit from learning experiences that help them learn and grow, regardless of their career aspirations.

By realizing that not everyone is searching for their next promotion or wants the same outcome, we can alter our training programs to focus on development, not a fixed end goal.

The key is to encourage participation. Encouraging different types of people to contribute can be a critical element of your employee development strategy. This ensures that your training programs aren’t serving just one select group of people.

This takes us back to the second point: Sometimes, all you need is a fresh perspective.

But most importantly, encouraging participation in content curation and creation can add value to employees, increase engagement, and ultimately improve retention.

4. Helps you avoid building a program just for your needs

If you don’t involve employees in the content curation process, you end up building a learning experience tailored to your needs, not the employee’s.

For example, you may design a program and exam to keep a log of everyone’s skills and knowledge. But what value does this add to your employees? What more can you teach them about, beyond passing an exam or being a statistic in your records?

This doesn’t mean you can’t have exams, of course. There are other things to consider from an employee’s perspective, not just from the stakeholders in the background. 

In conclusion, try to get different perspectives. It can be eye-opening to hear alternate views and combine them together into something that really harnesses the power of all that expertise, passion, and talent.

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