Training employees can not only increase your business productivity but also retain employees for the long-term.
In fact, according to ClearCompany, for 68% of employees, training and development is a company’s most vital policy.
Undoubtedly, employees are always looking to learn new skills so that they can advance in their careers. On the other hand, they will not hesitate to leave the company if you are offering inadequate training.
It is a win-win situation both for the company and the employees.
What are the characteristics of a highly productive employee training program that you can start implementing today?
Let’s have a look at the ten crucial characteristics:
- Assess who needs to be trained in which area
The first thing you should do is assess which employee needs to be trained and in which area. You can carry out a needs assessment to identify and evaluate training that should be done.
Here are some of the things you can do to conduct a ‘needs assessment:’
- Conducting research
- Interviewing employees
- Taking a poll or internal survey
- Identifying the
Identifying who needs to be trained and on what skills can make your training program decidedly successful.
What’s more, you can even conduct a training needs analysis to discover the gap between present performance and the prerequisite performance.
- Determining and communicating the objectives of the training
Next, you have to determine the objectives of employee training. The good news is that you can identify the training objectives based on the needs assessment results.
In order to be effective, your training program should address knowledge, skill, and abilities. Only then will your employees be able to perform their jobs efficiently.
Besides, your training program should follow a systematic process to determine:
- Who needs training
- Which areas they need training on
- And how to align the training program with planned objectives
Also, ensure to communicate the purpose, objectives, and result of the training program to your trainees clearly to motivate them to learn.
- Personalized and engaging training
As per Rapt Media, over $500 billion is lost yearly because of employee disengagement. Thus, engaging your employees and investing in their training is a great way to lower the potential risks of losing revenue.
And this is where employee training tools come into play.
You can make use of employee training software such as Whatfix to provide engaging training in real-time. Their interactive on-the-job eLearning solutions can help your employees learn and, at the same time, implement their lessons in real-time.
You can also measure the effectiveness of your user engagement with robust analytics tools and provide more personalized training.
- Relevant content
The content you use during the training is going to determine the effectiveness of the program. Hence, make sure that the content you use is linked to the trainees’ job experiences. It should also help them perform better in future projects.
If the material is not devised to be applicable in real life, the result will not be up to the standard.
- Live demonstration
It goes without saying that humans can grasp things better when they are demonstrated using graphical content.
Thus, it’s a great idea to demonstrate the specific skills and processes to the trainees actively. Live demonstrations will give them an example of desired behavior and results.
And there are several tools available to help you with the demonstration.
You can use Adobe Captivate for demonstrations to capture interactions on the screen.
Then there’s Prezi, another presentation software. It creates interactive presentations to engage your employees. It also allows you to customize images, charts, and layouts that you can use during the training.
- Training should be immediately relevant
In order to retain and reinforce what has been learned, the trainees will have to put things into practice in a short time frame.
The responsibility also lies on your shoulder. Thus, you have to find a way to make sure that your employees implement theoretical knowledge from the training in daily life.
In case there are no opportunities to put the training to practice, allot specialized tasks so that your employees can execute the acquired knowledge in a real-world context. It will ensure that they don’t forget what they have learned.
- Provide Consistent feedback during training
Providing feedback to your employees at every point in training is crucial as it will motivate them to perform better. Thus, make sure to provide feedback both during practice and after completion of the exercises.
Also, the feedback should be related to how they performed the task. And you also need to avoid giving feedback on personal characteristics.
- Training should be adaptable
Your training won’t be useful unless your employees are able to grasp everything and adapt to the changes.
Therefore, your training approach should be flexible and have a room for change and growth. If you find that the methods and tools you are implementing aren’t yielding the desired results, make sure to change them to improve outcomes.
Also, be open to your employees’ opinions. Ask them what they think every once in a while – they may have great ideas.
- Align it with company values
This is another crucial factor that you should keep in mind. Your training program should align with the company values. Consider how the program fits into the company culture. If it does not relate to both long- and short-term goals, you should reassess your content.
Also, consider whether it will have an evident positive impact on the company, its function, and its bottom line.
- Have an effective leader
Even if you have an effective training program, your program will not reap good results if you lack an effective leader.
The person you choose as a leader should understand your business inside and out, recognize your needs, and relate them to the master plan.
Plus, the leader should be able to prove results, adapt to changes, and be passionate about learning. Other must-have qualities include effective communication, social skills, creativity, the ability to set clear goals, and building strategies.
Wrapping-Up
When you implement a highly productive employee training program, not only will you see increased productivity, but you will also be able to retain valuable employees in your company.
Make sure to follow all the things mentioned in the article, including determining and communicating the objectives to your trainees, creating relevant material, giving living demos, and more.
Embracing these characteristics will ensure that your training program is highly effective and will reap desired results.
About the Author:
Hazel Raoult is a freelance marketing writer and works with PRmention. She has 6+ years of experience in writing about business, entrepreneurship, marketing, and all things SaaS. Hazel loves to split her time between writing, editing, and hanging out with her family.