Getting your Business Strategy Game Right

So, we’ve talked a little about employee training strategy before. There are a thousand new age philosophies behind the best way to handle training so that it’s faster, more effective and less tedious and miserable for those involved. A thousand models have come around, from organizational learning and knowledge management all the way up to gamification and flipped classroom models. A billion other concepts that are somewhere between these are also popular, meaning that you have any number of choices for how to plan your employee training strategy. So, the first thing to consider is that you need to consider what you’re training for. In this case, we’re going to assume it’s software since software is our main overarching topic around here … business software at least. So, you need to first consider the problems you encounter with training for use of technology. One of the biggest hurdles to overcome with this is peoples’ resistance to the technology. People who may be adept in using specific software, due to repetition, are not necessarily experts in using computers all around. This means that when confronted with something new, they’re going to be confused and uneasy. It’s the same kind of apprehension and resistance that change management often contends with as well. Well, the biggest way to get around this is to use an easier, less annoying training methodology. Consider an onboarding solution like WalkMe. What these do is create smart little macro tutorials that live in forms. They can monitor user activity by watching browser states and element states. With simple point and click logic to compare these conditions, it can interrupt users, correct mistakes, direct attention to different elements, and prompt users. This lets it guide users through the most complex processes imaginable very easily. This is the learn by doing mentality which overcomes resistance and lack of technological aptitude directly. Along with this, you’ll still need “face time”, and how that is handled matters. Consider most likely a loose flipped classroom model, where you discuss a concept, let users use WalkMe or something like it together to work out the processes and get accustomed to them, and stand by to provide human intervention in the rare places that something like WalkMe can’t really do yet. If you follow these procedures, and maybe work in some gamification to the overarching presentation to drive engagement and enthusiasm, you’re going to have a pretty solid plan, all things said and done. Now, using onboarding software is a good idea for tech training, but as for the model I recommended, it’s just a personal favorite honestly. And learning model you feel is best for the people you’re training, the corporate culture at hand, and your own personal preferences will be just fine. Before you commit your employee training strategy, be sure to research the many models out there, and weigh their benefits and strengths within certain types of scenarios before becoming too married to any one of them. There are so many of these, that any number of them might be viable depending on your situation and your preferences. But, aside from that, if you follow the advice above, you’re good to go.