The unexpected roadblock of the COVID-19 pandemic has forced you into a huge professional detour.
Like many HR leaders, you’re now managing the training of many employees who are working from home rather than sitting face-to-face with a trainer in a class.
This new challenge offers you a game-changing opportunity to rethink how you’ve been training and explore other effective options.
Transforming your traditional in-class instructor-led training (ICILT) into a virtual format is a great option. That’s where the right learning management system (LMS) comes in.
Let the digital conversion begin
When you migrate your training activities to an LMS, you can cost-efficiently create, promote, sell, and manage your training.
For example, a modern LMS simplifies and reduces the work of your administrators. Through its integrated all-in-one platform, your LMS frees your team from many of the repetitive tasks imposed by manual management of instructional activities and products.
Moreover, the powerful tools of the LMS enable you to create courses quickly, assign them easily to your team, and track individual and team progress with a glance at handy dashboards.
And that’s just the beginning! Working with the right LMS, you’ll be able to:
- Eliminate scheduling hassles. All your training can be managed from one platform. Using your LMS’ powerful automation features, you’ll relieve your team of a huge administrative burden.
- Liberate your learners. With a cloud-based mobile-ready LMS, your learners can access their training anytime, on any device.
- Reduce training time by 40%-60%, compared to conventional in-class instruction. By using an LMS, you can deliver a better learning experience and improve your learner’s information retention rate. These efficiencies shorten the time it takes for your people to begin adding value to your business.
- Save costs. By doing away with ICILT-related expenses, and focus on virtual classes. They are cost-effective and allow you to create training that is infinitely repeatable, globally available, and potentially marketable.
To transform your ICILT into effective virtual training, keep these six tips in mind:
1. Transform classes vital to your goals
You may have a huge menu of training in your repertoire. How do you choose which content to transform first?
Time and money are limited, so prioritize the content that’s essential to helping your organization meet its goals.
2. Maximize the engagement of your content
Do transform your ICILT content thoughtfully to make it engaging and interactive so as to increase learner retention: when learners snooze, everybody loses.
So, the classic PowerPoint presentation should be accompanied by gamified content or transformed into something more interactive.
In the early stages of your digital conversion plan, sit with your instructors and review learner feedback to find out what’s working, what’s not, and what sections of the content deliver the most return on your learning objectives.
3. Take advantage of your LMS’ capabilities
As you design/adapt the new virtual content, think of your LMS’ capabilities. You want to take advantage of them in order to find engaging equivalents to those vital interactions you get in an in-person class.
For example, to facilitate group collaboration, you may want to include activities like interactive forums, video conferencing, and group training.
To optimize training efficacy, for instance, you can have the instructor present in a webinar and blend it with a well-designed e-learning module that includes documents, exams, and certificates upon completion.
This training can be offered synchronously or asynchronously.
Remember, the right LMS can support your engagement objectives with fun gamification features.
These features boost engagement and motivation by adding game-like elements, such as goal-setting, progress-tracking, and rewards (e.g., custom badges and certifications) for achievement.
4. Solicit feedback
Learning is a two-way street. To support the future success of your virtual learning activities, you want feedback from your learners.
A well-designed LMS’ quiz and survey tools enable you to effortlessly test learners on content retention and solicit feedback.
5. Support social learning
People learn a lot from others. Your LMS should facilitate group collaboration, training via web conference, and peer feedback.
6. Seek partners who can help
Transforming your ICILT into an effective virtual class may make you feel as if you were a guitarist learning to play the banjo: it’s a familiar instrument in so many ways, until it isn’t.
We can offer experienced guidance to your key people so they can coach your team. We can also help you discover more about how the right LMS can support your efforts to make virtual training a major L&D asset of your organization.
Simply give us a ring. We’d be happy to help!
