It takes serious effort to create a training program that actually sticks after your employees have gone through it and started their jobs. The thing is, if you’re using boring old lectures to convey important information, you may be putting your organization at risk. Whether your company operates heavy machinery, works with others’ money, sells products for babies or children, or otherwise has an easily identifiable risk associated with the work – which most companies do – you want to make sure your rules and procedures stay with your workers over the long term.
How, you’re wondering? Use the right training methods. Stuffy training methodologies that rely on rote learning often won’t do the trick. Many workers aren’t scholars, and traditional classroom learning needs a serious tune-up in order to reach them. That’s why you need to adopt training methodologies and tools that reach your learners where they’re at, taking into account their specific needs, their learning styles, and the goals of the training. This often involves software coupled with a more hands-on, on-the-job approach. Read on to learn more about how you can train your employees, deliver material, use classroom-style training effectively, and more.
Employee training methods
There are several employee training methods in the workplace today. Which employee training methods end up working for you will depend on your own personal style, the structure of your workplace, how many employees you need to onboard, what you’re teaching, what your employees need to learn, their individual learning styles, whether you’re teaching brand-new employees or helping older ones brush up on material or add to their preexisting knowledge base, and more. Although it can sound confusing to take all these factors into account, all you really need to do is consider the current types of training methods in human resource management available to you and choose the one that seems to fit your needs the best. Although there are many types of training available, let’s go over a few of the most common.
Classroom-style training is still one of the most effective training methods for new employees. However, you have to be careful to approach it correctly, as many employees won’t respond well to being handed a book and expected to learn. You have to interact and engage learners and make the knowledge stick by using real-world examples and drawing clear applications to your organization. If you can do all this, your training program will likely be very successful. Often it helps to use software, which responds readily to the needs of various learners, can go at different paces, and adapts to a variety of training situations.
Other effective business training methods include 1:1 training, which matches one learner with one instructor to show them the ropes. If you can spare the resources, this can be an excellent way to quickly familiarize a new employee with their job-to-be. Methods for employee training in the workplace also include job shadowing, which is similar to 1:1 training in that the trainee will follow an experienced worker around to learn their job. However, they are supposed to play the role of a “shadow,” meaning that there is less interaction between the experienced worker and the new employee, as the latter just watches and learns and sometimes asks questions. This is a better way to get a feel for what an actual day, or week, or more, will look like for that new employee.
Self-training, which relies on the new employee conducting research to learn what they need to know for the job, is also an employee training method learning style. Other types of training methods in training and development include bulk training, where you train large numbers of employees at once, and automated training, such as we offer here at Lessonly.
Automated training can help you reach large numbers of employees all at once, or it can allow you to train individual employees as they come on board quickly and easily, so that you don’t have to waste time waiting for a large enough batch of employees to justify a classroom series or other group training approach. By using tailored software, you reach employees immediately, giving them the skills they need to become valuable employees right away.
