In a constantly changing labor market and the ever-growing technological evolution, it’s crucial to have a competitive work team within your company. For this reason, in addition to attracting top professionals to your business, it’s essential always to aim to implement continuous training plans.
Promoting a culture of continuous training in the workplace creates not only flexible and engaging environments but also encourages professional development, which is key to improving performance and productivity. This article tells you everything you need to know about developing an employee training program in your company. Keep reading!
What is an employee training program?
An employee training program is a training strategy or plan that provides employees with knowledge and skills to help them become better professionals. This program is typically part of the business development plan or the L&D strategy. Its main objective is to improve employee performance and prepare him to cover different roles in the future.
Why are employee training programs necessary?
Undoubtedly, any company that invests in training its employees is investing in its success. In the long term, these training plans help foster company growth in terms of productivity and innovation. Employee training programs for companies have a positive impact in various areas:
Improve employee morale and satisfaction
It’s very easy for an employee to lose motivation by not being able to perform their job according to the organization’s expectations. Job training leads to skills development and increases employee morale, which is an excellent asset to help the business succeed.
Close skills gaps and increase productivity
In any organization or business, errors or mistakes sometimes happen, but this occurs more often when employees lack the knowledge to fill a specific role. An employee training plan creates more competent employees, reduces errors, and closes gaps that affect productivity and the company’s profitability, including those caused by changes in trends and the advancement of technology.
Improve company culture and talent retention
Professionals want to belong to companies that promote a culture of constant learning and development. A survey of over 1,500 people showed that 80% of employees agreed that personal growth was the essential quality of a company’s culture.
Combat weaknesses and strengthen skills
Employee training plans need to identify and combat employees’ weaknesses and then get the most out of their current skills through specific training. This way, businesses end up with well-qualified employees capable of performing their tasks successfully, at their own pace, and without sacrificing quality.
Types of employee training programs
The improvement in the productivity of your employees depends on the quality of the training plan you offer them and how you present it to them. That is why it is essential to know that your company’s training will be as engaging and exciting as you’ve envisioned it, and to this end, you can use different instruction methods:
- Face-to-face training: It’s a relatively traditional form of training where the teaching program is taught in person and a classroom with the rest of the employees.
- Mentoring and coaching: In this type of guided training, the employee has a mentor who leads him through a specific area, sharing his experience and knowledge. In the case of mentoring, it is often used as a guidance or counseling activity, while coaching is more geared towards acquiring skills to achieve goals.
- On-the-job training: It’s a practical learning methodology that teaches teams in a natural environment. Employees learn by watching a peer or leader do a job and then doing it themselves.
- E-learning: It’s a training method carried out through devices connected to the network, such as computers or smartphones. Its main characteristic is the physical separation between the learner and the trainer. E-learning includes didactic materials such as videos, games, simulations, webinars, or any exercise that generates interaction and participation, which is why it is a more attractive type of training. Do you want to know more about e-learning? Check this article and learn everything about e-learning for business.
10 Employee training programs examples
There are various employee training programs, each of which has a specific objective. Here are some of them:
#1Â Orientation Training
This type of training helps new employees know the company’s basic organizational information and answer any questions. This training plan could include, for example, online courses for managing company software, security procedures, or practical use of equipment.
#2Â Onboarding Training
It helps employees become familiar with the company culture, understand their responsibilities, and join the team, especially today, where working from home has been a new challenge in the onboarding process. Do you want to succeed in your onboarding strategy? We invite you to look at this article.
#3Â Compliance Training
This type of training is essential for any employee since it informs them of the regulations and policies applicable to their roles. Compliance training minimizes risks, helps maintain a good corporate reputation, and improves the work environment regarding harassment, diversity, cybersecurity, or ethics.
#4Â Product training
Product training offers information about the company’s products or services, which employees must learn to carry out their work. This type of training can have different objectives according to the business’s activity. For example, it would allow a sales team to answer all potential customers’ questions straightforwardly.
#5Â Leadership training
This training program allows employees to learn new leadership and management techniques so that, by improving their skills, they can successfully lead teams.
#6Â Technical training
This allows employees to refresh their knowledge of existing technologies or learn more about them. This training plan is important for developing technical skills that improve the company’s competitiveness.
#7Â Quality Assurance Training
This training enables employees to understand quality control processes, ensuring that the final product or service meets company standards. This training builds customer confidence and improves profit margins.
#8Â Soft skills training
This type of training focuses on personal attributes and includes conflict resolution and communication. These skills are necessary for employee and business development. If you want to know more about soft skills and skills to power your team, read this article.
#9Â Diversity training
Reducing the risk of discrimination and prejudice within the workplace is essential to encouraging positive interactions and raising awareness of diversity. A good diversity training plan includes knowledge about sexual orientation, race, nationality, color, religion, gender, etc.
#10Â Sustainability training
Surely you have heard of ESG criteria, which are nothing more than standards related to the development of sustainability and diversity in companies. This training is essential to meet the Sustainable Development Goals proposed by the UN in the 2030 Agenda.
How do you organize and start employee training programs?
Specific skills are required to create a high-performance work team. However, these skills are constantly evolving and changing, so the only way to stay relevant and navigate these changes is to commit to ongoing employee training. Knowing how to make an employee training program that helps you break this gap is very easy by following these steps:
1. Analyze the current situation
First, you need to diagnose your employee’s skills status to decide which training needs your employees have and identify their strengths. Currently, there are means to collect skills data and map development, and even AI to create employee skill development plans or career paths.
2. Identify your goals
What are you trying to achieve? The answer to this question will be your objectives, which should be specific and measurable. For example: Compliance with security policies or increased employee efficiency in the short or long term.
3. Choose a training method
Besides developing your training content, you need to decide on the training method. You already know the different types of employee training. Still, e-learning is one of the most attractive and easy-to-use training models, considering the current use of technology.
4. Select the proper training tools
If you have already decided on online training, now you must choose the tools you will use. You can start choosing an authoring tool for course creation. These tools don’t require previous knowledge because the more modern authoring tools are very friendly and intuitive. Some of its most attractive features are UX oriented interface, resources to generate engagement (games, responsive courses, videos, or images), productivity features such as a photo editor, and compatibility with translators, among others.Â
Another tool you cannot miss is a learning management system or LMS. This software is ideal for creating online training programs, segmenting study groups, assembling courses, measuring results, and managing all the pedagogy material for your training. If you want to know more, check out isEazy LMS and discover its best features.
5. Measure training efficacy
You need to follow up on your training plan to know if you are getting the expected results and to improve your program when needed. LMS is perfect for assembling training and analyzing outcomes, but some authoring tools, like isEazy Author, give you a built-in environment to share your e-learning courses. Get to know isEazy Author Go and discover other ways to perform training in your business and analyze the results.
Create your employee training program with isEazy
Now that you know how to develop an employee training program and what you need to achieve it correctly, it’s time to discover isEazy: A one-stop shop for e-learning solutions.Â
isEazy offers you everything you need to start a training program and to go beyond: Course creation software, LMS, an app for your frontline workers, and even gamification. Boost your training program with the ultimate e-learning solutions.
