Change is the only constant in today’s fast-paced world. New technologies make earlier ones obsolete. Changing customer preferences and economic conditions force changes to entrenched business models. Shocks such as COVID-19 make supporting economies of a business unviable and encourage innovation. Employees require access to the latest knowledge and competencies to be agile and cope with such changes. An efficient employee learns new concepts and unlearns obsolete knowledge fast.

With the pandemic forcing classrooms across the world to go virtual, eLearning has become the default way to promote a learning enterprise. In any case, conventional in-classroom training is incompatible with the needs of a dynamic workforce. 

1. Flexibility and Convenience

Training and learning deliver long-term benefits. But many employers, who cannot afford the immediate disruptions to work or loss of productivity caused by training breaks, do not support learning initiatives.

Conventional in-classroom training sessions are disruptive. Employees have to take time out or adjust their work around the training sessions. The training venue may be out-of-the-way for the employee, placing further strain on an already stressed employee. They may become less-focused, unable to apply their mind to business problems that require full attention.

eLearning removes such handicaps. eLearning sessions gel in with the employee workflow and improve productivity.

With eLearning, employees do not have to leave everything aside and attend a fixed classroom session. They access learning at the time of their choice, at their own pace. An employee with some time off in the afternoon of a busy day may log in and watch the recorded video. He can cut off the sessions during a busy week, devote his faculties to meet the deadline, and catch up on the lost sessions the next week.

The trainee, in self-learning mode, may vary the pace as per his/her comfort, may ignore familiar content and focus on unfamiliar areas or repeat hard-to-crack sessions.

2. Custom Solutions

eLearning comes in diverse types of content, such as videos, charts, images, infographics, quizzes, and games. These varied content types kindle interest in the topic and engage the learners deeply. For instance, a dull session on compliance becomes engaging when delivered in a quiz or game mode. Interactive game elements improve post-training self-efficacy by 20%.

eLearning enables employees to learn with the instrument of choice – office PC, home laptop, smartphone, or any other device. Add-ons, such as augmented reality glasses make training even more potent and effective. The eLearning portals themselves come in several options. Many enterprises set up SaaS-based eLearning platforms, delivered to employees through intuitive apps.

3. Track Employee Competencies

eLearning platforms allow employers to track employee development, and make assessments without subjective bias.

A well-configured eLearning portal, integrated into the Humans Resource information System keeps track of employee competencies and certifications. HR managers may track the expiration dates of employees’ competencies and arrange training renewals.

The need to track employee competencies become critical in today’s world of fast opportunities and skill shortages. An enterprise in need of specialist skills refers to the employee database to see if any employee fits the bill. If not, HR may target employees with the right competencies and deliver custom course modules. An eLearning portal makes it very easy to assign personalised training plans to employees and monitor progress. Some staff functions such as attendance become automated, sparing valuable resources for deployment elsewhere.

eLearning delivers spin-off benefits of improving the employee’s communication and collaboration skills, which is so essential in today’s digital economy. It prods the workplace culture into the right digitally dominated direction. Empirical estimates suggest such heightened engagement levels improve productivity by 25% to 60%.

4. Better Training Effectiveness

One size rarely fits all. Yet conventional training solutions are blunt one-size instruments. A classroom instructor has no practical way to separate a fast learner and a laggard. The training progresses at the pace of the weakest participant, with everyone else wasting valuable hours.

Analysing the employee’s training needs is difficult. Many HR teams have incomplete information on skill gaps at the individual employee level. Analysing online data offers a solution. For instance, if a user makes a Google search on an Excel tip, it indicates the employee lacks knowledge on advanced Excel tips and highlights a big productivity issue. Offering relevant knowledge modules through e-learning reduces the frequency of such distractions and increases productivity.

eLearning also makes it easier to measure the effectiveness of the training interventions. The trainers may track the utilisation, ROI and impact of the learning interventions. Taking feedback from trainers becomes easier. In many cases, the eLearning portal captures automatic feedback from the responses.

5. Improved HR Retention Rates

eLearning increases retention rates by 60%.

Employees leave an enterprise when they stagnate. New, replacement employees go through a learning curve, and the enterprise suffers a phase of low productivity. The enterprise also spends extra to rehire and retrain people.

eLearning is a cost-effective way to motivate experienced hands. The flexibility and effectiveness of eLearning allow employees to apply new concepts at work easily. By doing so, employees find meaning and purpose in their work and continue in the role.

The onus is on line managers and HR to identify the skilled employee’s interests and offer them relevant learning opportunities. Options include up-skilling or job rotation, focusing on a weak area, soft skills, new niche skills, situational knowledge, or anything else. At times, even the opportunity to learn a new language may be a sufficient motivator for the employee to perform the job better.

6. Better ROI

In-classroom training is time and resource-intensive.eLearning requires only 40% to 60% of employee time than traditional training. 

 eLearning costs less compared to conventional training. E-learning is easily scalable compared to conventional training. Trainers may add a course module to the eLearning dashboard of infinite employees. eLearning reduces administrative costs, including record-keeping and training delivery costs. 

IBM, for instance, adopted eLearning and delivered five times the amount of training for only one-third of the cost, saving 200 million dollars.

Every dollar spent on e-learning returns thirty dollars’ worth of productivity. Even when the enterprise does not have a training budget, the investment in eLearning pays itself back in a short while through efficiency and productivity gains. 

Employees with eLearning tools at their disposal become competent to innovate their way out of a crisis.