Driving Value For Your Business Through Enterprise Learning Management Systems

As e-learning becomes more essential to organizations’ learning and development strategies, so does deploying a Learning Management System (LMS). With innovative technologies and improved practices, e-learning plays a major role in organizational success. Using an LMS is a great way to engage employees, manage courses, generate reports and track how well learning caters to diverse training goals.

How LMS Improves Workplace Training Strategies?

When a business transforms its training strategy from a classroom-based approach to online learning integration, there are ample benefits that impact the decision-making process:

• Fewer travel costs, with online workplace learning.
• Effective, flexible and adaptable learning solutions encompassing e-learning contracts that organizations manage.
• Increased time to market, customized training needs of sales personnel, customer service and business partners along with multiple language support.
• Data collected to provide learner assessments more effectively and accurately.
• Impact self-paced learning to boost workplace performance, thereby ensuring that training is aligned to diverse training needs.

As per the survey, businesses that have implemented an LMS stands at approx. 80%, while less than 20% did not use any LMS. [Source:https://cdn-web.learnupon.net/blog-downloads/whitepaper-trends-challenges-and-rewards.original.pdf] In the figure given below, the first quarter indicates that around 81.95% of respondents currently use an online learning platform, while around 18.05% do not use it.

Figure 1: Percentage of Respondents that Use an LMS

Getting Huge Returns from Online Training

It is important for organizations to ensure that their LMS is delivering huge returns on investment (ROI) as they want. When developing a training strategy for your employees, it is crucial to consider how your training will be imparted. For a survey, workplace training was divided into three use cases that organizations, mainly administered respondents how effectively they use LMSs. The choices are outlined here:

• Design and manage e-learning content and delivery Manage
• instructional-led classroom training approach
• Deliver a blended learning approach (combination of online and classroom-based learning).

The survey shows that e-learning is the top choice for majority of organizations, followed by the blended learning approach. It provides a key insight into how well the business is shifting away from the boring and less effective classroom-based approach.

Figure 2: Different Types of Trainings that Organizations Deliver

[Source: https://cdn-web.learnupon.net/blog-downloads/whitepaper-trends-challenges-and-rewards.original.pdf]

Choosing the right type of LMS requires dedicated time and effort from the organizations to develop an effective e-learning strategy. By catering to the pertinent learning needs, LMS serves as a complete learning environment that supports enriched learning experiences for individuals and groups.

Increasing Scope Of Online LMS At Workplace - Is Traditional Learning A Thing Of The Past?

Gone are the days when classroom-based training was imparted and it is the time to adopt e-learning approach that perfectly aligns with the pertinent needs of all. The traditional training approach is time-consuming, less interactive and inefficient, not appropriate to the needs of all. So, traditional learning is dead and the use of robust online Learning Management Systems (LMSs) is rising with changing demands of the new-age workforce.

As per Ebbenhaus’ Forgetting Curve, learners retain only 10% of information after one week of training. The only way to recover what they forgot is by delivering continuous learning sessions at regular intervals. It is not just grabbing knowledge at once, but putting time and effort to learn during the entire process. Consequently, it helps to seek the maximum return on investment through continuous learning experience, without wasting your budgets on obsolete training strategies.

Changing Learning Behavior to Meet Future Organizational Goals

In today’s modern scenario, the pace at which knowledge is transferred is evolving with the change in learning behavioral patterns. Bloom’s Taxonomy model makes it possible to address this challenge and track the entire learning journey from beginning to the end. At the initial stage, trainers impart knowledge and learners revise what they have learned. Moving forward to the next stage, learners face more challenges including understanding of the context, seeking knowledge and applying it to real-life situations.

Apart from handling changed learning behaviors, organizations need to revive their online learning strategy. They build a solution which allows modern employees to learn at their own pace, without any hassle of going anywhere. Outlined below are some of the crucial elements responsible for aligning with future learning needs of organizational workforce:

·         Provide chunked content

In today’s digital age, learners find it easy to access short and crisp course modules rather than a boring, long-duration course. For this, LMS is responsively designed so that courses are compatible with personalized mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. This allows the mobile device users to access courses as per their convenience of time and place.

·         Incorporate gaming elements

To make learning more fun and exciting, different kinds of gaming elements in the form of badges, scores and points are included with e-learning. Learners are motivated to participate as teams, earn points for the right answer and get rewards on successful completion of a training program. As a result, it improves learner engagement and retention levels, leading to improved learning efficiency and workplace productivity.

·         Incorporate social learning experience

For learning to be utmost effective, it is significant to embed the social factor and drive an informal learning experience at workplace. People learn from each other and share new ideas, so it is important to drive social collaboration which acts as a bridge between learning and behavior.

With technological advancement and use of efficient LMSs, more number of organizations are shifting from old training methods towards engaging online learning solutions, thereby changing the face of workplace training and attaining organizational success.

Getting A Better Insight Of 70:20:10 Code To Deliver Effective E-Learning Solutions

In today’s modern scenario, learning has become a continuous process which can be supported by effective models. The fact that people apply what they learn has been translated into the 70:20:10 model, where 70 implies learning by doing to boost performance, 20 indicates learning in groups to improve knowledge sharing and 10 implies learning by engaging in formal learning solutions to gain enough expertise to work more efficiently. The 70:20:10 model has become the basis for successful organizational strategies in diverse industry domains. Certainly, it creates a framework for thinking beyond the classroom-based approach, along with focusing on the spectrum- formal learning, social culture and workplace.

All About the 70:20:10 Code

The 70:20:10 model is not only about numbers and ratios, but also adopting innovative ways to create effective e-courses and boost workplace performance. Some of the crucial aspects how this code can be deciphered are outlined here:

▶ Focus shift from learning to performance

The 70:20:10 model clearly signifies that not only learning, but achieving the desired business objectives should also be a priority for the organizations. Today, formal workplace training is not an end, but an optimum way of helping employees perform better, learn more effectively and develop themselves. Therefore, workplace learning is a by-product of improved performance, smarter learning, increased learning efficiency and so on.

▶ Emerging role of HR and L&D

Most of the HR and L&D professionals follow the 70:20:10 code without changing the nature of e-learning solutions they offer. In addition, some of the 70:20:10 experts provide revised versions of formal training, that takes place in the form of challenges and outcomes at workplace. It becomes a significant part of 70:20:10 approach

▶ Service update with the 70 and 20

The 70:20:10 concept allows learning & development as well as Human Resources to provide more than the 10. Extending the service to include the 70 and 20 helps to build a great collaboration between an organization’s core activities. It is all about employees working with their peers to attain the desired training outcomes and improve overall workplace productivity. Through this model, new-age employees communicate with each other and explore new opportunities to efficiently apply what they learn at the workplace.

We all know that learning is more effective when done at regular intervals. Modern workforce boosts their knowledge and skills through effective communication, practice and reflection. The 70:20:10 model is a holistic model which focuses on how the new-age employees learn at workplace, enabling them to perform better at workplace when compared with the classroom environment.

Unleashing The Topmost Instructional Design Theories For An Engaging Learning Experience

When we reflect on the delivery of e-learning programs to replace the traditions of instructor-led trainings, it also helps to assess the significance of theories based on design and implementation of online learning environments. These theories help to understand how human minds absorb, apply and retain specific information. Due to lack of engagement in a traditional learning design, organizations apply e-learning instructional design model based on Cognitive Theory. This model was aimed to deliver high-order learning experience by improving creative thinking ability. With the fact that difficulty of high-order learning requires more efforts from learners, it is essential for trainers to motivate learners during the experiment.

By adopting the best instructional design theories and models, organizations ensure to deliver engaging online learning experiences. Discussed below are some of the popular instructional design theories that can be embedded with your e-learning courses in the future:

1. Sociocultural Learning Theory

Based on three crucial elements including language, learning culture and proximal development, this theory has been widely accepted across diverse domains. It depicts the significance of workplace culture for the development of new-age employees. For instance, employees within an organization can influence other employees’ thinking ability on a specific topic and how they apply it to real-life situations at workplace.

2. The ADDIE Model

The ADDIE (Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement and Evaluate) model aids instructional designers to handle different kinds of e-learning projects with ease. It also helps them to focus on personalized learning needs and business objectives to achieve the desired training outcomes.

3. Situated Cognition Theory

Utilizing the Situated Cognition theory, learners can apply what they learn during the entire training program. It also helps learners leverage the opportunity to improve their knowledge competency through discussions and problem-solving.

4. Individualized Instruction

An Individualized Instruction model focuses on training individuals as per their customized learning needs. If employees learn and grasp easily, they can continue through training. But, if they do not connect well with the course, then this theory helps them to access training courses at their own pace of time and place. This theory also focuses on the following areas:

◈ Written course materials are preferred over presentations.
◈ Learners are asked to learn as per their convenience of time and location, providing them with an opportunity to work on their strengths and weaknesses.
◈ Educators help learners by adding highly interactive element to the learning experience.

5. SAM Model

By utilizing this model instructional designers can include interactivities at different levels within e-courses. First is the Preparation level, where information is gathered from different sources and then the Iterative Design phase where the design is created and further reviewed.

No matter which instructional design model you choose, it should cater to the personalized needs of diversified audiences. The primary objective is to address diverse customer’s expectations and then accordingly apply instructional design theories to drive the best training outcomes.

Top Mobile App Learning Trends That Will Transform The Face of E-Learning

In today’s modern scenario, organizations have realized that the use of varied mobile learning apps is not an optional investment, but a necessity. Mobile learning is the latest trend adopted by organizations to cater to customized learning needs and improve sales. The ever-evolving mobile app market is dominated by social media, gaming, lifestyle and other apps.

Large enterprises such as healthcare, retail, banks, automobiles and others use mobile applications for product branding, marketing and customer engagement.  Even small companies are adopting mobile learning and designing apps that are tailored to varied learning requirements. Some of the latest mobile app development trends that determine the efficiency of learning are outlined as follows:

1. Internet of Things (IoT)

The idea behind smart classes, smart health, automotive sector and smart retail is growing with time. From healthcare to smart office settings, IoT apps have gradually become mainstream in the year 2017. With increasing demand for connected things, innovative apps are required for smart devices to meet diversified learning needs.

2. Accelerating Mobile Pages (AMP)

With introduction to AMP, loading pages using smart devices is also accelerated. It allows quick and easy loading of pages on your personalized mobile devices, with reduced bounce rates and higher page ranking and visitor frequency.

3. Augmented Reality/Virtual Reality Apps

In the year 2017, AR and VR have gone beyond gaming and entertainment, driving huge business growth. The market of both these technologies has transformed diverse sectors including retail, healthcare, automobile and others.

4. Cloud-based Apps

Today, most of the organizations prefer designing cloud-based mobile apps, leading to easier access of data without affecting internal phone memory. As per research done by Cisco VNI Global Forecast, cloud apps are expected to drive mobile data traffic to 90% by 2019. [Source: https://crysberry.com/blog/mobile-app-development-trends-2018]. Companies were always concerned about protecting their data, which can now be protected by the cloud.

5. Machine Learning & Chatbots

Conversational interfaces and chatting with online shoppers are highly profitable for businesses. At workplace, bots are used to handle information overload, ease information access and lighten load of repetitive tasks.

6. Lazy Loading 

Lazy loading is the upcoming trend which is expected to drive the future of mobile app learning. There are few images that take much time to load, preventing the learner to access the complete course. As the page loading time increases, the bounce rate grows and the conversation rates decrease. Therefore, this technology is adopted which enables loading of images only when their turn on that page comes.

Certainly, mobile app learning and development is at the cusp in the year 2018. So, it is essential to adopt these latest trends to allow learners access training at their own pace of time and location.

Moving A Way Ahead Through Customized Blended Learning Solutions

The potential of blended learning has redefined in ample ways. It is no more confined to the combination of classroom instruction with e-learning to create a training module. The delivery method took preference in this style of learning, with a prime focus to distribute learning to employees working from diverse locations. Digitization has improved the scope to impart custom e-learning solutions by paving the way for microlearning, gamification and other emerging trends.

Blended Learning: Going Beyond Traditional Training Instruction

A question may arise to your mind: is the technology-aided learning spell an end of classroom-based training? The answer is, no it is not. An effective blended learning program can redefine the way classroom training is provided, making it more engaging. Let us imagine a typical classroom environment:

• The instructor uses sources such as documentations and presentations to explain different concepts.
• The learners are motivated to ask queries once the presentation is complete.
• Handouts of the entire sessions are given to the learners.

Now imagine this scenario-

• TThe trainer shares a calendar with the learners and asks them to complete pre-assessments.
• TThe trainer notifies learners to undergo few courses which will help them to boost their knowledge level, before undergoing a face-to-face session.
• TA highly interactive presentation is prepared based on pre-assessment results, embedding links to engaging games and video nuggets.
• TAssessments during instructor-led session will help the trainer analyze an individual’s performances.
• TFurther, assignments can be completed online, when the learners are back to their workplace.

In the above two scenarios, training is same, but the approach is different.  With the support of technology-oriented blended learning solutions, organizations ensure that learning becomes a measurable outcome.

Social Learning- An Essential Pie for Blended Learning

As training is becoming more learner-centric with the use of innovative tools, it is crucial for an organization to redefine its learning and development strategy. With an introduction to social learning for corporate training, it is crucial to understand its benefits for an optimal learning experience. The conventional approach does not support social learning, thereby unable to embrace an informal learning experience. However, an engaging blended learning program when combined with social learning components leaves a better impact. Different ways in which social media elements can be incorporated with blended learning are discussed here:

• Introducing social media components within classrooms as well as online sessions so that learners are aware of what others are saying. Embedding links to videos and blogs within the courses aid learners get an in-depth insight on the topic.
• Social media acts as an ideal platform to share new ideas and spin off discussions, thereby fostering a continuous learning environment.
• Through social media, learners gain access to a variety of sources including webinars, case studies and more.

Without any shadow of doubt, it is the time for organizations to redesign their e-learning strategies. With employees becoming a crucial aspect for the training process, trainers have found it effective to implement customized e-learning programs that boost employee growth and performance.

Statistics That Will Impact The Future Use Of Learning Management Systems At Workplace

Today, the optimum use of LMSs at workplace has become a significant aspect to impart training, serving as a digital hub for both learners and trainers. New-age learners expect a more customized and discoverable learning environment that ensures the experiences which are more effective and engaging. An LMS allows learners to undergo training at their own pace, with the flexibility to choose when the learning should take place.

Statistics Affecting LMS Market 2018

E-learning delivered through modern LMSs has become a necessity for most of the organizations. Let us discuss the following statistics that will have a major impact on both LMS market and e-learning organizations in the year 2018:

• Modern learners will choose gamified courses

An enterprise LMS's robust content creation tools helps to embed different gaming elements to an e-course. Games entice millions of learners from all over by leveraging motivation as well as engagement. Latest trends towards gamified learning helps reducing the complexity of a well-structured game to its simplest components including scores, badges and leaderboards. Games improve collaboration among the peers and encourage them to participate more and boost their knowledge competence. 

• LMS market will rise

It is expected that the LMS market will rise by 23.17% in the year 2018 [Source: eLearning Stastics]. The LMS market needs to monitor training course accessibility, management of different ourses, create reports, feedback analysis, thereby contributing the highest to revenue generation of the market. 

• Video will generate more traffic

Presently, video-based learning is taking center stage and it has transformed from 'costly, nice-to-have' to the 'new normal' over the past few years. As per CGS Enterprise Learning Survey, video is considered as the most essential change to e-learning strategies [Source: https://act.cgsinc.com/Learning-2017Q1-TrendsPromo_LP-Q12017-Trends.html]. In 2017, video became a significant platform to deliver personalized content over mobile devices and social media platforms. Driven by changing employee demands, customer engagement and cost-reduction, video has shifted front and center for L&D organizations. 

• More investment into L&D

As per Forbes, organizations are expected to invest more money into online learning and development in 2018 [Source: Forbes 2018 Trends]. This will help them to bridge  skills gap, improve their performance and boost the overall business growth. 

2018 is expected to become a promising year for the LMS market across the globe, thereby transforming the entire online learning landscape. By using an LMS, it is possible to deliver customized courses as per the desired needs of all.