E-learning offers numerous advantages, such as flexibility, cost-effectiveness and the possibility to study anywhere, anytime. To get the most out of e-learning, it needs to be planned and delivered with care and structure, and with realistic objectives.
This article will help you to move through the training design process step by step, starting from defining the training objectives, through to training evaluation and further development.
Remember that online training is an investment in the skills and motivation of your employees, and therefore in the success of your business. So let’s take the first step towards effective and meaningful online training!
Designing e-learning: where to start?
Planning online training starts with defining your objectives. Here are some supporting questions to help you in the early stages of building your online training:
- Why are we organising this training?
- What do we want to achieve through e-learning?
- Who is the training for? Is it an induction for a new employee or retraining for a more experienced employee?
- What is the structure of the training and how is it sequenced?
- What technical skills do participants need to have to participate in the training?
- Are participants familiar with e-learning? The training of young people can be organised differently from the training of non-digital participants.
- What tools or software does the training require?
- How much time in each employee’s calendar is set aside for training?
- How do we ensure that the content of the training is meaningful and inclusive?
- What kind of learning materials do we need to support training?
- How many resources (e.g. time, money, staff) do we have available to plan and deliver training?
- How do we assess the effectiveness of the training and whether we have achieved our objectives?
- What do we do if the learning objectives are not met?
Once you have considered these questions, set clear objectives to guide your planning and help you measure the success of the training. In addition to the objectives, it is important to identify the target group and their needs. Understanding their needs and background information will help you create content that is relevant and useful to them.
Consider what aspects a knowledge worker needs compared to a manual worker
Consider, for example, whether it is appropriate to teach a practical task by video, or whether it would be more appropriate for the employee to do the task together with the trainer and then take a test on the subject at the computer. A knowledge worker may have very different skills and expectations when participating in an online course. However, this does not necessarily mean that an e-learning course will be better handled by the knowledge worker if the e-learning course is difficult to implement. Therefore, planning the teaching and being realistic in setting objectives is of paramount importance.
Make a feasible curriculum and be realistic in setting targets
Above all, make the curriculum feasible, both in terms of budget and objectives. Think of the curriculum as a roadmap to help you plan the content and timing of training to meet your organisation’s objectives.
Usually, the aim is to achieve something – for example, better work efficiency or a better quality of work. Make these things clear and design measurable objectives that are as precise as possible, allowing you to achieve the ideal outcome once your employees have been trained. Once you have drawn up a preliminary curriculum, it’s time to move on to the content creation and technical implementation of the online course itself.
How to create engaging content for online training that supports your organisation’s objectives
In e-learning, the content must be engaging and designed to keep the learner interested. Think about how you can make the learning experience rich and interesting.
On the other hand, you can also think about how to make it possible to learn while working, so that the employee has enough time to complete his or her work tasks while studying and to complete the online course.
Please note that each student is an individual. One learns by listening, another by reading and a third by doing. Some will spend more time doing an online course than others.
- Use different media formats in an imaginative way. Text, pictures, videos, audio, and interactive elements keep learners engaged. This also makes it possible to follow an online course while working, for example if an office worker wants to do some simple work while listening to an online course audio. Perhaps a podcast-style discussion could replace traditional radio listening some early morning at work?
- Make the content practical. Help learners apply what they have learned through examples, exercises and real-life cases. This will help you understand the link between theory and practical work.
- Divide the content of the training into small parts that can be fit in between work. Small learning chunks allow learners to learn at their own pace and keep up. At this point, you should still bear in mind that when you organise training for employees, learning on the job will take time away from other tasks.
Technical requirements for online training: how to ensure a smooth implementation
The technical implementation of e-learning can sometimes cause some grey hairs. It is therefore important to choose the right platform for online training. Use a reliable and easy-to-use platform that can be customised to suit your needs. If it’s important to you that your online course works regardless of time and place, make sure that your e-learning platform bends seamlessly and accessibly to mobile and other devices.
Improve your online training with these tools
Continuous development plays an important role in the development of any online training. By closely monitoring different indicators, gathering feedback from learners and trainers, and experimenting with new approaches, you can improve the quality and engagement of your online training.
Goal setting, monitoring and evaluation are an essential part of both the learning process and the development of online courses
Monitoring the objectives will help you to evaluate the effectiveness of the online course and whether the objectives of the course are being achieved – for example, the desired workload a few months after the training. If learners are not achieving the course objectives, this may indicate that the course content or delivery needs improvement.
Collect feedback and use it to help design them
Gathering and using feedback is an important part of developing online training. Feedback allows you to see what works and what doesn’t, and to identify areas for improvement. Feedback can also help you to gain new ideas and insights on how to further develop your online training. However, we recommend being critical of the feedback and collecting a sufficient sample before changing the online course. Ongoing changes to an online training course may be unnecessary due to a single negative feedback. Also, don’t collect feedback for the pleasure of collecting it – ask the things you genuinely want to know and hear from students and make sure they are used to improve the training.
Actively test new things
Active testing will help you stay on top of the latest developments and continuously improve your online training. Try out new approaches and ideas, and evaluate their impact on learning outcomes. Testing can also help you find new ways to improve learner motivation and engagement.
Practical examples from our satisfied customers
Take a look at Xoompoint’s satisfied customers to get an idea of how different organisations have used our FlowLMS platform to deliver online training.
Customer experiences with the FlowLMS platform:
- Restel – Flexible training for all staff through an e-learning environment
- Bonalive – uses the FlowLMS e-learning environment to train its international partners
- SSTL Cleaning industry association – eLearning makes it easy to manage training courses
Interested in the FlowLMS platform and building online training for your company? We have helped numerous organisations develop better online training. We offer everything you need to deliver training: from design to content production and online course delivery. Contact us!
