It’s no secret that the lack of employee engagement is a major concern for most companies. According to a recent Gallup report, up to 87% of employees are not motivated in their work or committed to their company. And the same applies to workplace learning: students end up bored in front of their computers, doing the same dull online courses year after year.
So, what’s the solution? While every company is different, if you follow these five tips you will be able to develop training programs that motivate and engage employees.
1 – Get to know their interests
How can you offer employees motivating training courses if you don’t know what they want? The first step is to find out their interests, think about what content might best fit their priorities and choose the most appropriate courses based on this. If employees feel you have consulted them and that the training has been designed by and for them, they will be more willing to participate in all your training programs.
2 – Look for useful and practical content
Many e-learning courses begin with long theoretical lists and an endless bibliography, when employees are looking for exactly the opposite: content that is useful and practical and can be applied to real life. Instead of offering courses comprised of lengthy lessons littered with technical terms and theorems, use more dynamic formats and, above all, content that might be useful to them.
3 – Be flexible
In workplace training too, it’s worth heeding the famous advice of Bruce Lee: “be water, my friend”. More and more, employees are looking for greater flexibility to be able to take the courses when and where they want. Forget about strict rules on where and when to take the training; the important thing is the result. If you are flexible and give your employees some freedom, they will reward you with greater motivation and engagement.
4 – Mobile friendly
Look around you: can you see anyone within a meter of you who doesn’t have a smartphone? Mobile phones have become man’s inseparable companion, always in the palm of their hand. If we use our smartphone for almost everything we do, why not use it for training? Make sure that the courses you recommend to your employees can easily be done from a mobile phone. This way, you’ll pique their interest and allow them to do the training at their own pace.
5 – Gamification and game-based learning
If you really want to increase your employees’ engagement, go for games. It has been demonstrated that gamification techniques (rankings, characters, badges, etc.) motivate students and increase course completion rates.
Game-based learning takes this a step further: the very format of the video game and the use of simulators (“learning by doing”) is designed to place the student in a story, facilitate interaction from the outset, give an immediate feedback to the students and engage the employees. There’s no better way to learn than by having fun. Your employees will be happier and more content with the training, and so will you.