Corporate training (often referred to as Workplace Learning), helps employees learn new skills and knowledge to hone professional growth and development.
LinkedIn conducted a survey where 94% of the employees expressed their desire to work for a company that invested in corporate learning and development programs.
New data from NovoEd shows the impact of remote work on learning and development (L&D), based on a survey of 150 companies reporting $1 billion to $3 billion in annual revenue. The report uncovered L&D leaders’ thoughts on how remote training was better, where it struggled, and the benefits of online learning.
Major Benefits of Online (remote) Training
Flexibility and self-paced learning
Online training courses can be taken anytime, anywhere, and ideally from any device. Online learning allows employees to move through the training at their own pace, according to their unique needs. Trainers also have more options to cater modules to specific learning styles. With access to formats like videos, presentation notes, scenarios, games and quizzes, learners can engage with the content in the way that works best for them. The only requirement would be an internet connection. This ensures flexibility in terms of time and effort.
Measurable, data-driven results
Return on investment is a key driver for every corporate decision—and that goes for training too. Measuring the effectiveness of training is essential to continually improve outcomes and securing leadership buy-in.
Online learning allows you to build reporting mechanisms into your courses and assessments, so one can pull data reports on everything from assessment scores to course completion rates in a snap. This also makes record-keeping and monitoring easier, letting you know at a glance whose training completion is still outstanding, who needs re-training and more—all without excessive legwork and paper trails.
Easy on the Pocketbook
Online courses are extremely cost-effective and can be utilized efficiently. Depending on the vendor, ‘boxed’ online training courses vary in price point but as a general rule, an online version of a course is ~50% shorter in duration compared to a classroom program. Training hours and administrative time is drastically reduced.
Always consider the cost of developing internal online content compared to third-party training courses.
Interactive and adaptable content
While classrooms offer plenty of opportunities for social interaction and real-time feedback, it can sometimes prove challenging to get every learner involved with the content.
Online learning allows you to create interactive elements & activities, like practice simulations and video scenarios, that allow learners to demonstrate new skills. Or you may choose to bring elements of Gamification and Microlearning into your courses to create reward-driven modules that keep learners motivated and moving through your content. Without the limitations of physical space, materials or access, the possibilities are almost endless.
Long-range cost and time savings
Albeit there are costs to create (or outsource) online course development. This will vary on corporate needs and budget. In the long run, what you end up saving in time and money down the road will more than make up for it.
As an example, classroom training often requires a wealth of expensive printed materials, facilitator and venue costs, catering and more. With online training, those costs are dramatically reduced, if not eliminated.
In addition, you’ll find it faster and easier to make ongoing updates and additions to online content—without the turnaround, cost and waste of producing additional physical materials. Best of all, since online learning can reach well beyond a single location, you’ll save on travel time and expenses.
Information retention
It’s important to understand that there are natural variances with learning preferences and styles.
By creating content online in well-crafted ways, this can lead to a better understanding of information more than lecture-based training by instructors. Allowing learners to visit content ‘on-demand’ and in ‘bite-sized’ amounts improves the ability to remember core concepts and knowledge.
Face-to-face instructor-led training definitely has its place, especially with hands-on competency-based training. However, classroom training can deviate from content because of long lectures, where speech is the major mode of communication. Always remember that non-native-language students can struggle with the speed of instructor speech and slang.
Why not combine online training and classroom training? “Blended-learning” allows employees to take online training content beforehand which is then complimented and re-enforced in a classroom training environment. Material-retention soars by leveraging both of these training options.
Closing thoughts
As with anything in the workplace, there is no single solution for all people. Online learning may be a great fit for many topics but not for others. This all depends on your industry, course content and governing bodies.
With an ever-distributed workforce, it’s critical to have consistent content delivery and tracking. When looking for a training system, a LMS buyers guide is a helpful resource.
For questions about online course-development, online training resources or Learning Management solutions, please reach out to us directly.
References
- https://elearninginfographics.com/5-important-advantages-of-online-corporate-training-over-classroom-training/
- https://elearningindustry.com/advantages-of-online-training-9
- https://www.bobpikegroup.com/trainer-blog/5-benefits-of-online-corporate-training
