Learning and Development programs (L&D) are essential for any company’s success. These programs ensure employees have the skills and abilities they need to do their job effectively. They also show that employers believe their employees are worth investing in, which ultimately results in a better company culture and a greater commitment to the organization.
Many organizations have difficulty proving a return on L&D investment. Estimates suggest that only 10% out of all investments spent every year on corporate L&D yields real results. What is the reason so many companies struggle to implement effective learning programs? Here are a few of the most common problems:
1. Trainings are usually conducted outside the organizations. This makes it difficult to transfer what employees have learned in classes into workplace applications.
2. Learning requires the learners to spend a lot of their time on it, while they are still obliged to perform their normal work duties.
3. The burden of applying the acquired knowledge is often placed on the learner. Very little follow-up comes from the instructor after the training ends.
To overcome the mentioned issues, a method called “learning in the flow of work” has been developed. It’s bite-sized and doesn’t take 7-hour courses to learn how to implement it.
It’s no easy task to create an integrated learning environment that is seamlessly embedded into the workflow. Below there are five experience-backed strategies to help leaders align employee development programs with key organizational results. This will ultimately increase ROI for both the individual employees and the entire organizations.
1. Contextualize the learning
Research shows that students are less likely to use and retain what they have learned if there is a significant distance between where it was learned and the context it will be used in. Many traditional L&D programs are provided outside of the workplace – this forces the learner to transfer what he or she has learned into a completely different context. This greatly reduces the chances that the learner will actually use the skills or knowledge, they have acquired in L&D programs, in their workplaces.
But if employees learn in the flow of work, they can apply the new knowledge into their context, which helps to increase retention and application. Such a result can be achieved with customized training programs that target individual or group needs. While these programs are effective at contextualizing learning inside an organization, they can also be costly and time-consuming.
Another option is “learning meetings”. Managers can individually learn new ideas or frameworks at the expense of a small piece of time with their teams, then share this knowledge with their teammates and discuss how they could apply it within their company.
2. Nudge
Years of experience have proved the power of nudges – small contextual factors that motivate people to take an action in a variety of settings. Short reminders via email or push notifications can be helpful in keeping the frameworks and ideas fresh in the mind of learners and increasing the likelihood of them being used. Although the specifics of the implementation may vary, managers should follow three main rules to maximize their effectiveness.
1. The nudge should be brief and direct. A good rule of thumb is to keep it between two and three sentences.
2. Link the nudge directly to an idea or framework learned. Use keywords that the learner has seen in the frameworks to reinforce the consistency of the message.
3. Each nudge should end with a call for action, added with an explanation of a specific behaviour the recipient should undertake. This will encourage the learner to implement the idea within a short time frame.
As researches show, weekly nudges can be implemented in a variety of training programs and their participants reported that the nudges helped them retain and apply the information they had learned. Some learners report that the nudges offered them quick reminders to take the time to do simple things. Others appreciated that nudges helped them to put certain information at the forefront. Such brief messages encouraged learners to use what they had learned in real working situations, keeping this information in their minds and making it more probable to realize the new knowledge in their workplaces.
3. Allocate time for reflection
Though reflection is an essential part of learning, it is often not integrated into traditional learning experiences. Learners must be encouraged to reflect upon how the lessons they have learned can be applied in their daily jobs.
Schedule time at the end of trainings for reflection. Ask the learners to reflect on the information received and appoint short meetings to let them share their experiences. Question them to share their thoughts on the impact of such meetings. Many people find out that taking a step back, slowing down and analyzing how the new knowledge can be put into practice, help them better understand and apply the received information.
4. Build in micro-learning experiences
Breaking down training content into smaller pieces that can be interleaved with other activities enhances learning and retention. Instead of forcing people to learn big chunks of information, effective L&D programs make it easy for employees to digest the knowledge in bite-sized pieces. Managers could arrange for their employees to attend not a full-day workshop, but to enroll in short online courses that can be easily integrated into their weekly work schedules.
It’s a good idea to break down the whole course into micro-learning pieces, lasting between 15 and 30 minutes each. Experience proves that this approach receives much warmer feedback from employees. For learners, it’s preferable to cover just one core idea and how it could be applied throughout their workday than to include many ideas in one learning session.
5. Measure progress
To accurately evaluate the ROI of an organization’s investment into L&D programs, it is important to measure each learner’s progress. To measure the macro-level impact of a learning program, you must conduct pre- and post-assessments, and monitor changes in employees’ behaviour in real-time. It is important to identify metrics that will help you assess whether or not an L&D initiative is working, especially when measuring the effectiveness of programs for soft skills training – these can be difficult to quantify.
It is also important to keep in mind that learning is an individual process. Results can differ from one learner to another, due to differences in learner’s needs and skill sets, or because of unexpected life events or changes in work schedules. It is often useful to aggregate individual results at either the organizational or team level to evaluate the effectiveness of a learning program. This analysis can be used to determine organizational outcomes such as changes in employee commitment and key competencies.
The following questions can help to identify whether a program is effective and which areas need improvement within an organization:
1. Have you used the framework during the given period of time?
2. How did you use the framework?
3. If you didn’t use it, how would you use the framework next time?
Analyzing the responses of participants to these questions can help identify changes in learners’ behaviour that could be linked to the application of the learned material. Encourage learners to record how they apply the new information. This makes it easier for them and their managers to show the value of the programs in their workplaces, increasing the chances the organization keeps investing in these programs. For instance, usually, employees list the trainings they participated in during the last year. But the mechanism that allows them to track their progress gives them the possibility to not only show the list of trainings, but also the direct and measurable impact they have had on their organizations.
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