Getting the Most Out of Your Content

Most organizations have developed some type of training content, whether it was for new-hire orientation, teaching company standards, or a more job-specific training session. Whether you have limited training materials or are bursting at the seams with content, the potential exists to yield continuing results by leveraging this content in new and unique ways. If you want to develop a learning culture in your organization, then training must be continuous. A recent Forbes article explains that companies often receive lackluster results from training because they rely solely on a single session to deliver results and do not put effort into making learning sustainable.

You have already spent a significant amount of time and effort developing your content, but outside of face-to-face training, the content lies dormant, waiting for the next session. It is time to make your content work for you! How can you utilize what you’ve already created to help support continued learning and development as well as sustain your company culture? Here are a few tips on how to get the most out of your training content.

Create e-Learning Courses

Take your face-to-face training content and develop engaging e-Learning courses where employees can access the content on demand. E-Learning provides immense benefits for both the employees and the organization. You will have to devote some resources towards organizing this content into online courses, but the good news is that most of the work is already done! The content is there; now the focus is on delivering it through an effective medium.

Already have e-Learning courses? Think about how can you enhance these courses and increase engagement. Can you add interactive pieces to the courses, such as a group discussion board, a live chat with a trainer, or a scheduled webinar or conference call to discuss key points? Can you utilize a recorded panel discussion or brief interviews with your company’s senior leadership team? Are your e-Learning courses mobile-friendly, allowing convenient access to employees? There are countless ways to enhance your current e-Learning – check out the latest trends in this article. E-Learning is an important part of continuous development and helps to show your employees that you care about their performance and advancement.

Create Reinforcement Tools

Use your existing training content to design and develop useful reinforcement tools. Some reinforcement tools that we recommend are posters, which can be displayed in employee areas, pocket guides with useful company information, or company culture cards, business-card style handouts with your company’s mission, vision, values, or other important habits and behaviors unique to your culture. Training content can also be used to create daily briefing cards that focus on different training topics each day. In addition, add training content to your company’s internal newsletter or intranet site for team members to review at their convenience. Making your content consistently visible is a great way to reinforce your company’s standards, best practices, values, and more.

Create Pre-Training Tools

Face-to-face training is undoubtedly an important part of learning and development. Using existing content to create pre-work for the audience can increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the training. Furthermore, pre-work materials can increase interest, enthusiasm, and participation during the training session itself. To create meaningful pre-work, use content that helps set up the course; this could include reading a case study and preparing discussion points, taking a self-assessment, or completing a worksheet. The idea is to not recreate content, but rather to use existing content to develop a pre-training tool.

Leveraging your content to create supportive materials pre and post face-to-face training can yield optimal learning results. At SGEi, we are leveraging our years of experience in content development and training to provide e-Learning courses that meet the needs of organizations operating in customer-centered industries. Our content experts work closely with our design team to develop one-of-a-kind, effective, and engaging e-Learning courses for our clients. We are also taking it a step further by organizing our own content into courses that will be available to anyone wanting to enhance their own company’s culture and performance. Stay tuned for exciting things to come from SGEi! If you are interested in utilizing our expert team to create a customized training course for your organization, send us a note today.